An Act of Cowardice

 

The investigation of Dan Doyle by the Rhode Island State Police and the Rhode Island Office of the Attorney General has included a staggering number of heinous acts, none more despicable than the raid on the Doyle's home in West Hartford, where they have resided since 1978. With the unholy cooperation of the Connecticut State Police, a band of Rhode Island State Troopers drove to Dan's West Hartford home. Along the way, in order to acheive maximum press coverage, the State Police contacted such "public relations partners" as the Providence Journal and Hartford Courant. 

 

The Rhode Island State Police were well aware that the only two people home that day were Dan's wife, Kathy, and their precious son, Danny. 

 

44-year old Danny Doyle is autistic; he has never spoken a word. Many years ago, the Doyle family decided that Danny would never be institutionalized; that he would always be provided with a safe and secure home environment.

 

Dan's financial package at the Institute, modest in comparison to what other salaried positions were available to him over the years, included a plan for the long term care of Danny. (Well known by the Board). The plan encompassed the Doyle family being paid back the hundreds of thousands of dollars the family has loaned the Institute, as well as being reiumbursed for missed paychecks when funds were not available.

 

Dan is the only Institute employee (of well over 1,000 employees over the years, including the hundreds who worked the various Scholar Athlete Games) who has loaned the Institute money and missed paychecks. Over multiple years, Dan had cultivated two major seven figure grants that were about to come to fruition in 2012. Among the consequences of the actions of the State of Rhode Island and a small group of people behind this treachery is the impact on Danny's long term care (though Dan has vowed to retrieve every cent back.) 

 

The Rhode Island State Police representatives who entered the Doyle home, violated every principal of human decency. Dan Doyle has also vowed that every person involved in this cowardly act will be held responsible. 

 

67 Support Dan letters

 

In 2016, a Support Dan website will be launched. The website will include 67 letters of support from a variety of individuals. (Dan turns 67 on January 14.)  The following letter reflects, among other things, the Doyle family commitment to Danny.  Dan's legal team has advised those who have penned letters to hold back on revealing their names, based on the intimidation tactics of the State of Rhode Island. The legal team will resolve this matter by the launch of the website. 

 

Sample Letter of Support

 

July 10, 2014               

 

I first met Dan Doyle in the fall of 1974, when he arrived at Kingswood-Oxford School as a history teacher and Boy’s Basketball Coach.  As a KO student at the time, sports was a big part of my life, and even though I didn’t play on one of Dan’s great teams, he made me feel as if I did.  Whether in the classroom or seeing him on campus, no matter how busy he was, he made me feel that I was the only one; made it clear that he genuinely cared about me as a person.  Even though Dan was the Boy’s Coach, he actually ran a girls basketball clinic in the summer of 1975.  He taught me how to shoot, and when I broke my finger, he dropped everything to attend to me, delegating the overseeing of the camp to a Senior Counselor.  When my mom showed up to get me, Dan walked me out to the car, once again, making me feel as if I was the only one.

 

Several years later, when Dan came back to Hartford, after two years at Brown, to be the head Men’s Coach at Trinity College, he started his fabulous sports camp at Trinity, and he invited me to be a counselor.  The experience would change my life.

 

The camp featured a variety of sports, mostly for elementary and middle school students.  And right away, it became a huge success.  One of the greatest features about the camp was the diversity of the campers.  Dan welcomed kids who would benefit, whether they could pay or not.  We had rich kids, poor kids, kids of all races and nationalities.  It was wonderful!

 

We also had certain kids who, in those days, were categorized as slow or retarded, and this is the reason my life changed.  One of those kids was Dan’s oldest child, Danny, who was about nine at the time.  Danny had been diagnosed as autistic at a time when there was precious little knowledge about autism.  It was clear that Dan was totally devoted to his son.  One day, very early in the two-week session of camp, Dan brought young Danny to camp and asked me, in fact, honored me, by assigning me to be little Danny’s mentor for the remainder of the two-week session.  It was during my mentoring of Danny Doyle that I became inspired to work with special needs children, an inspiration that led me to a long-term career dedicated to these wonderful children.

 

Several months after camp concluded, while away in college in Maine, I received a note from Dan that he was promoting a Sugar Ray Leonard fight in Portland, and that my two brothers and I would be welcome to attend as his guests.  It was thrilling to be present at the event as it was so gratifying to see Dan pull all of this together, a skill that would be repeated so many times in his career.  I was particularly amazed that while he was promoting Sugar Ray, he was developing Trinity College into a National Basketball Power.  But then, just a few years later, Dan made a momentous decision.  It would be one that would have a wonderful and widespread impact.

 

Young Danny was not making the progress the Doyle family hoped for, and despite being one of the nation’s leading young coaches, Dan resigned his position at Trinity to spend a year working with young Danny. It would be hard to define how meaningful that decision was on so many fronts, but I will share one compelling example.  When Dan Doyle resigned from Trinity, the news was national in nature, and it awakened people to the need to unlock the dark mystery of autism.  It is fact that Dan Doyle’s year with his son touched thousands of lives and spawned much needed and heightened interest in autism, and much needed research.

 

And speaking of research, a prime example of this decision also defined Dan Doyle.  You see, he donated a good portion of his savings from the Sugar Ray Leonard promotions to fund an autism research project at the University of Connecticut Health Center.  It was one of the very first such research projects undertaken by a medical school.  It is impossible to calculate how much Dan’s decision to spend that year with his son had on the advancement of autism research and public enlightenment of this very difficult affliction.  What is known is how that year bonded Dan and Danny and the Doyle family.  Danny is now in his early 40s and still lives at home with and is attended to by his parents.  Ironically, two of the newspapers that provided a great deal of coverage of Dan that year with his son have also disgraced themselves with their unfair coverage of this current ordeal.

 

I will add that in order to advance the needs of special children, Dan ran for, and was elected to the West Hartford Board of Education in the early 1980s.  He spent four volunteer years advocating for those children with special needs.

 

In closing, I would like to share one of my most cherished memories of the Trinity Sports Camp.  It is one of my favorites because it not only affected me, but every staff member and camper, in the most positive of ways.

 

I have already mentioned the wonderful diversity of campers and staff that made up the camp.  Well, Dan decided that he wanted to do something very special for the camp:  he wanted to bring in a major celebrity to talk with the campers and staff.  He wanted the person to be one who would especially touch the hearts and minds of those kids from at-risk neighborhoods, kids Dan felt needed a real boost.  Dan chose arguably the biggest name in New England sports at the time, and he arranged for this superstar to come to the camp on an off day from his major league baseball season.  Dan even arranged a private plane to bring the man from Boston to Hartford.

 

When the man showed up, Dan’s plan was for the staff to stand outside the Trinity gym to personally greet him.  This man was being given a very hard time by the Boston press and Dan told us, “Don’t pay any attention to what you’re reading.  This is a terrific guy.  Make him feel welcome.”  And he was a terrific guy and we did make him feel welcome.  When he arrived, he spent time with the staff outside the gym and he could not have been nicer, just as Dan predicted.  He knew he was welcome and it showed on our faces, with his smile, and in his heart.

 

After greeting each staff member, he greeted Dan warmly, and said, “Dan I’m late because of the plane situation, so I would like to come back again.”  Dan quickly replied that it was not necessary, but he praised the superstar for being so thoughtful.  The gesture made all of us see exactly what Dan meant when describing this man.  Dan then asked the staff to enter the gymnasium, and a few moments later something happened that I bet every person in that Trinity Gym remembers to this day.  For when Dan walked into the gym, accompanied by future Hall of Famer, Jim Rice, the roof nearly blew off, such was the thunderous ovation and extraordinary joy felt by everyone fortunate to be present.

 

Bringing these gifts of inspiration to young people that day, and countless other times throughout his career, has been at the core of Dan Doyle’s remarkable work; work that has touched thousands throughout the world.  Dan has had an impact as positive as any human being I have ever known.