NBA Vet Pays
$90,000 in Child Support
But is Imprisoned Anyway
Billy Sims. Andre Rison. Ron LeFlore. Kal
Daniels. James Brooks. Darryl Strawberry. Bennie Blades. Ralph
Sampson. Roscoe Tanner. Chris Warren. Vernon Maxwell. James
"Lights Out" Toney. Monte Reagor.
Newspapers often carry accounts of retired
professional athletes who are arrested for being behind on their
child support obligations. In some cases these are men who have
behaved selfishly towards their children. In others, drug or
alcohol problems have played a major role. Yet in many others
the problem is that the retired athlete is being required to
pay child support based on a high professional salary he no
longer earns. According to family law attorney Lisa Scott, getting
a downward modification on child support is "one of the most
difficult tasks" faced by lawyers who represent fathers.
John Williams, a married father of a 3 year-old
boy, played in the NBA from 1986 to 1995. Upon leaving the NBA
he fell behind on his child support, and is now serving a one
year prison sentence for what prosecutors fancifully called
"Willful Non-Payment of Child Support." This to pay for a child
for whom he had already paid over $90,000 in child support.
"The prosecutors had no interest in dealing
fairly with my husband or even in getting more child support
for John's teenage son," says Fayne Williams, John's wife. "All
they wanted was to grandstand and get publicity by punishing
John. Everybody else loses."
Fayne Williams
and Lisa Scott
joined Glenn on His Side
with Glenn Sacks on Sunday, January 9. To listen to
the audio archive of the show, click
here.
Glenn also discussed the overturning of
Andrea Yates' murder conviction--see
In Defense of a Flawed but Decent Russell Yates (Houston
Chronicle, 3/11/02).
To learn more about the child support system
and its inequities and abuses, see:
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