A Maryland private high school announced the retirement of its longtime football coach Thursday after a player said the coach tried to choke him while kneeling on his chest in a recorded interaction that the student said began as horseplay.
A cellphone video shot by another student and verified by The Associated Press shows coach John Ricca pulling 17-year-old Errance Meeks Jr. over a table and onto a gymnasium floor and then struggling on top of him for about 15 seconds during a physical education class Feb. 4.
Thomas Powell, president of St. John's Catholic Preparatory School in Frederick, said the 32-second clip doesn't show events before and after the interaction that he watched on school surveillance video as part of a thorough investigation.
Meeks, a senior co-captain of last season's 10-1-1 Vikings team, said in a telephone interview that the episode began when he playfully rubbed Ricca's shoulders from behind as the coach sat in a chair.
[...] this incident, "I would have thought it was a cordial professional relationship," the elder Meeks said.
