Former NFL cornerback Shareece Wright is among 12 plaintiffs accusing a former Southern California high school trainer of sexually assaulting them while they were students, per court documents and interviews obtained by ESPN's John Barr.
Wright told ESPN's Outside the Lines that he hopes coming forward will "stop it from happening to other kids."
"The less it's kept a secret, the harder it is for it to continue to happen," Wright said.
Wright alleges that when he was 15 in 2002, former athletic trainer Tiffany Strauss-Gordon, who was 21 at the time and is the daughter of former Colton football coach Harold Strauss, "became increasingly flirtatious, displaying favoritism toward him and giving him a pet nickname, behavior he now recognizes as grooming," per Barr.
The alleged abuse escalated over the next three years, and Wright claims that Strauss-Gordon touched him inappropriately and performed oral sex on him during treatment sessions in that timeframe.
When he was 17 and in his junior year, Wright alleges that he had "multiple sexual encounters" with Strauss-Gordon in the school's training facilities. He also alleges that he had sex with Strauss-Gordon during weekly team dinners at Harold Strauss' home.
Wright told ESPN that players and coaches also joked about Strauss-Gordon's behavior. They referred to oral sex as the "Tiffany treatment."
"You've got football, you've got the coach's daughter, you've got a permissive school environment where it's allowed to happen. I mean, you've got sort of a perfect storm of sexual abuse that could be covered up easily," Wright's attorney, Morgan Stewart, told ESPN.
According to a police report obtained by ESPN, school officials knew of allegations against Strauss-Gordon dating back to 2011. She told police in 2022 that she was placed on a temporary leave in 2011 during an internal investigation and was allowed to return after meeting with school officials.
No charges have been filed against Strauss-Gordon, who has denied the allegations, because of a lack of sufficient evidence, the San Bernardino County District Attorney's office told ESPN. She has been on unpaid leave from the school since the lawsuits were filed in 2022.
Wright was a third-round pick of the then-San Diego Chargers in 2011. He spent four seasons with the franchise and also played for the Baltimore Ravens, Buffalo Bills and Houston Texans over his eight-year career.
