Coach Lamar Brown’s West Rebels faced the Powell Panthers in a TSSAA Class 5A state semifinal on Hayworth Field at Scarbro Stadium on Friday, Nov. 25, 2022, in Powell, Tennessee. (Photo by Danny Parker)
BY JESSE SMITHEY
Knox County Schools superintendent Dr. Jon Rysewyk held a press conference Tuesday, June 17, 2025, for local media to provide an update and some results regarding the KCS investigation into two West High School assistant coaches who’d been in the headlines over the last month due to allegations of sexual impropriety with minors/students.
One of the noteworthy items that Rysewyk announced was that West head football coach Lamar Brown would no longer be serving in that role, and that he would be transferred to another teaching position within the school system.
Brown, who had been the head coach of the Rebels since 2017, won 84 games with West and also Class 5A state football championships with the program in 2022 and 2023.
Rysewyk issued a formal memo to Brown on June 17, alerting him to him being relieved and reassigned.
That letter read: “This letter serves as a formal notification that, effective June 17, 2025, you are being relieved of your duties as Head Football Coach at West High School. You are also being reassigned to a full-time teaching position within your certified subject area, effective the same date. Details regarding your teaching assignment will be provided by Human Resources in a separate communication.
“This action follows an administrative review which indicate a lack of oversight in your role as Head Coach — particularly related to the conduct and behaviors of assistant coaches whom you hired and supervised. The actions of these individuals have raised serious concerns and reflect a failure to maintain the standards of leadership, accountability, and student safety expected in your position.
“Additionally, please be advised that there is an ongoing law enforcement investigation. Should any charges or findings emerge from that investigation, further disciplinary action — up to and including suspension or termination of employment — may be considered.
“While you are being relieved from your coaching duties at this time, you may be eligible to apply for a coaching position within the district after a period of two (2) years, contingent upon maintaining good standing with the Human Resources Department throughout that time. You will be required to complete additional trainings on supervision assigned to you by the KCS Athletic Department.”
Brown spoke with 5Star Preps on Wednesday about what had transpired Tuesday and the memo from Rysewyk. See the full interview with Brown and response from KCS below …
BROWN: The biggest problem I have with it is in that second paragraph where it says “particularly related to the conduct and behavior of assistant coaches whom you hired and supervised.” I have a big problem with that comment.
5SP: Let’s start there then. What irks you about that? What’s your biggest issue with that?
BROWN: I’ve got a lot of issues with that statement. I think any high school football coach will tell you they have recommended more that have not got hired than coaches that have been hired. We’re in a little bit of a box when it comes to recommending coaches. And I don’t have the authority to hire or fire anybody. I can recommend a coach. Then I’ll recommend that coach to the athletic director or principal, and they will recommend it to central office. And they go through the hiring process just like everybody else does with background checks and drug testing and fingerprinting. And then, Knox County HR makes a decision on whether or not to hire them or not, based upon all that information. And, the two coaches in question, who they’re questioning me about, Knox County approved both of them. One of them has been there close to 25 years. If I hired him, or if I recommended him, I would have had to have done that from Morristown, Tennessee. So I don’t know how they can say that. Matter of fact, one coach I did recommend in 2017, when I came to West High School, he was hired as a teaching assistant. And then he left for a couple years from a teaching assistant’s job and finished his education and stayed on the football staff. But then, came back and applied at the school teaching and received that job while he was already on the football staff. So he was hired multiple times in multiple capacities for our school. The supervision part gives me some issues, too, because this past spring, I was looking for an offensive line coach. And there was a very good offensive line coach, who just so happened to be my athletic director’s brother. I didn’t include the athletic director in any of this. He didn’t even know I was talking to his brother, as far as I know. So I went to the principal and said, “Can I hire this guy?” And “who is his direct supervisor?” And she said I’ll check with central office. The answer that central office gave her was that the athletic director was his direct supervisor and I couldn’t hire him because it was the athletic director’s brother. I couldn’t recommend him. But, now that it seems convenient, now all of a sudden, I have become everybody’s supervisor. And I’m not saying that the athletic director or principal or anybody at West High School has done anything wrong in this situation. I’m really not. I just think I’m being accused of stuff that I had nothing to do with, had no knowledge of, and they want to throw the hiring and supervision directly on me. Well, I’m also not the coaches’ supervisor in the classroom. And I don’t think it’s nobody’s fault. I think it’s a guy that has been charged with doing something really bad. I had nothing to do with it or know about it.
5SP: With this same letter, and I was going to ask you about it before I knew about it, but some people I talked to yesterday said you have other offers. Are you taking any of those or are you officially taking the reassignment from Knox County Schools? Or declining the reassignment and stepping away from Knox County? Or have you gotten to that point yet?
BROWN: I’ve not gotten to that point yet. They have not told me yet where I’m being reassigned to. They’ve not told me what capacity that job will be in. So I really don’t know anything about that job, other than it will not be at West High School. But there’ll come a time and a place to make those decisions. But I have been reached out to by multiple people, and I got to figure out what’s best for me and my family right now moving forward. Hopefully this process will move pretty quickly.
5SP: One of the questions many have is about you being reassigned to a new spot. But there, at the bottom of the letter, it says you can’t coach in Knox County for two years. If you accepted that reassignment, would you coach at all outside of Knox County?
I haven’t gotten to that point to ask that question. Like I said earlier, I don’t know what that reassignment is going to be. It’s not ideal to teach in one county and coach in another. That’s not really who I am. I am a relationship guy. I like being in the community. So I don’t know if that will be an option or not.
5SP: I can imagine that having to be quiet for a month or so, after all this happened, is there anything that you’ve wanted to say publicly to West fans, parents, players or anything you’ve just wanted to get out?
BROWN: Well, I love that community. I love those players. They have been so supportive through this whole process. It’s been unbelievable, their support. They have stood behind me for this last month, since April the 3rd, when some of these allegations started coming out about other people, they have done nothing but support me. And that’s a community I love. I’ll miss those kids. I’ll miss that community. But I think we have built life-long relationships with those kids and parents and that whole community.
5SP: Some of these people I talked to during this, sources if you will, in early June, were saying that meetings between and the powers that be were going well and that it seemed like you were, to them, going to be reinstated. Did you get that feeling? Did you feel like things were going well and would be back to coaching?
BROWN: Yes, I thought things went well in our meetings. I was very truthful and honest with them. I’ve done stuff in this process that I never thought I’d do in my whole life. When I was put on leave, I asked my lawyers to take a lie detector test — just to prove. I knew there’d be people who’d doubt and say “he knew something” or “he knew this.” So I asked Jeff Hagood if I could take a lie detector test. He brought in an FBI polygrapher that had gave over 3,000 polygraph tests, and I took the polygraph test. The average passing score is between a 3 and a 6 on a polygraph test. I scored a 13. The polygrapher said it was one of the highest scores that he had seen in over 3,000 polygraph tests. So, yes, I thought it was going well. I thought I’d be reinstated. I didn’t know that I was going to be charged with other people’s alleged crimes. And that’s what it has turned out to be.
5SP: So Knox County Schools never asked you to take a lie detector test? They didn’t do their own?
No, they did not do their own. I requested one. Paid for it myself. Took it. Passed it.
5SP: I know one of the gripes from the community I heard was that you weren’t able to meet with Rysewyk. Is that because of how these things are set up through Knox County protocols, that you had to go through others? Who do you actually meet with? Who does all these meetings with Knox County Schools?
In my meetings, it’s been HR people. It’s been Mitchell Cox (director of employee relations). It’s been Checovoia Foster-Bruce (Title IX Coordinator, Institutional Compliance Officer). It’s been Becky Wuethrich (KCS investigations). And the Knox County lawyer Gary Dupler. That’s been the only people I’ve been able to meet with. In my first meeting with HR, I requested a meeting with Jon Rysewyk. I didn’t get a yes or a no about that meeting. I don’t know if it was even brought to his attention. On Monday, Jeff Hagood requested a meeting with Jon Rysewyk with me and six community members. He refused that meeting, saying he couldn’t meet about an investigation. We then asked for a meeting with just me and my lawyer and Jon Rysewyk. Once again, he refused that meeting because it was an investigation. The very next day, he holds a press conference saying the investigation is over. We really don’t understand why we didn’t get a meeting at all. I know there’s a lot of people in the community who’s really upset about that. I’m really upset about that, because I believe that the man that’s going to make the decisions ought to have to look me in the eye and hear my story and hear it straight from my mouth. He refused those meetings.
5SP: The information from the lie detector test. Is that all to clear your name, that you had no knowledge of what was going on?
BROWN: Yes. I was asked multiple questions about the two cases that’s going on at West High School. I was asked multiple questions about my integrity. I wanted to clear my name. If for nobody else, I wanted to clear it for myself. And I wanted to clear it for our community, that I didn’t want to leave any doubt that I might have known something and didn’t report it or whatever that case may have been. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life. First time I’d been interviewed by the police in my life over these cases. Matter fact, at the end of that meeting, the detective told me, “Coach Brown, this meeting didn’t go down any road I thought it was going to go down.” I asked what that meant. And his answer was, “It speaks very highly of your honesty, your integrity, and why you’ve been a success in this profession for 26 years and why this community loves you.” I really, at this point, don’t know what else I could have done.
5SP: I know there are people who have been hurt in this, and I know you don’t want to speak on Chad’s situation or take anything away from anyone who’s going through tough times because of this. But for you, mentally, what has each day been like for you, just waking up and living this reality?
It’s been tough, Jesse. I’ve went through — (Lamar Brown pauses to gather himself) … every emotion in the world. It started out with a coach being charged with something that’s awful. I hurt for those victims. I hurt for our community. I hurt for my family. It’s been hard. But, it’s been a roller coaster. Lots of ups and downs. It’s definitely one of the toughest things I’ve been through in my life. The bright side of things, I’ve lost about 20 pounds. I’m in a little bit better shape than I was when it started. But I would take those 20 pounds back not to have to go through this.
5SP: Is there any else you want to convey that’s just been sitting on the runway, so to speak?
BROWN: There are a couple of things. It’s been really hurtful through this that, you know, I think the superintendent said this the day of his press conference, that five teachers — with two of those being the accused — have been disciplined. But it’s been crazy to me that there’s been no communication about anything through this. The only emails or anything else that’s been sent out has been about me. They sent an email out when I was put on leave. That was the first email they’d sent out about the whole situation. Sent out an email yesterday. Had a press conference yesterday. And it’s not coincidence that that press conference was held the day I got released from coaching. I don’t believe that’s a coincidence at all. It’s hard. It seems like I have became the face of this whole thing. And I don’t feel like I deserve that or my family deserves that or the West High community deserves that. It’s been hard. And, you know, I was told by Knox County Schools about this decision yesterday at 3 o’clock. While I was in that meeting, the email had been sent out about that decision. And in that meeting, I was getting texts from players, telling me what had been decided. From what I understand, there was an email sent out Monday night from the superintendent to the school board members. And that email was leaked out to the media and it had been floating around in the community ever since Monday night, before I was told anything about this decision or what was going to happen. I don’t think that’s the way a business or school system or whatever should be operated. I think that speaks volumes about what is happening. Matter of fact, my wife got some information the middle of last week that this was going to happen. I just didn’t believe it. It’s crazy that that information gets leaked out to everybody but they won’t have a meeting with me or community stakeholders. They won’t sit down and meet with us for 15 minutes. I don’t understand that all. In yesterday’s meeting, I asked them some questions. I asked them questions about the email that was sent to the school board. They want to say there’s a police investigation going on about me. There’s not a police investigation going on about me. There is a police investigation going on about the accused. And they just make the statement that there’s a police investigation when they talk about me, and it leads people to assume that it’s totally about me. And that stuff has been very hurtful through this. I know Jon Rysewyk had made a statement at his press conference yesterday that there had been other incidents inside our football program. And he’d looked at our program and every athletic program in the county. I would say that we do have more discipline issues in our program than most programs in our county just because last year we had 147 football players. That is probably double what anybody else had, in the least. So with that, you do have a few more discipline issues. But, also, we can’t get anymore coaches from the county with 147 than you can if you have 80 players. We still only get the same amount of coaches. In that meeting yesterday, HR just basically got up and walked out when I was asking those questions about the email and police investigation. They just said “we got a 3:30 meeting.” And got out and left me, and my lawyer and the Knox County Schools lawyer sitting in there by ourselves and didn’t answer the questions. I don’t know. It’s been a tough road. It’s hard when the people — you try … I’ve made mistakes. I’m not perfect, just like nobody else is. But I have tried to do my best for that school system and that school and it’s hurtful when the people you work for come at you about what somebody else did. It makes you feel like you’re being singled out. You hear that one of the coaches was a football coach. Well it’s not talked about that he was a basketball coach also. He was a member in the social studies department in our school. That stuff’s not talked about. It’s just “well, Lamar Brown should have known this was going on.” But nobody else has any responsibility to know but me. I think that’s just attacking my character. I didn’t get into this profession to be rich or have fame. If that was what I was worried about, I’d have gotten in another profession. The only thing I have is my reputation, and my reputation is pretty dang good in this profession. It seems like they just want to tear that apart.
— end —
5Star Preps reached out to Knox County Schools for response to Brown. The school district offered the following: “The internal investigation KCS conducted was comprehensive and included all evidence pertinent to the parameters of the investigation. KCS is not a law enforcement agency. As such, our investigations are limited to appropriate adherence to and implementation of policy and procedure.
“It is not protocol for the superintendent or for any employees beyond the investigation team to meet with staff under review. Any KCS employee under investigation is given due process through interviews with the investigative team.
“Maintaining the integrity of the investigative process is always a priority for our team. This protects the rights of any employees under review and ensures access to a fair and consistent process.
“It would not be appropriate or fair for the superintendent to meet with individuals under investigation or to meet with member of the community about ongoing investigations. Doing so could compromise the integrity of the investigation and create inconsistencies in the investigative process.
“Our process is designed to protect the rights of any individuals under investigation and to ensure decisions are based in facts and evidence relevant to the nature of the investigation.”