Mark Cuban admits to ‘huge mistake’ in retaining Mavs.com reporter after domestic violence incidents

Mark Cuban admitted to keeping Earl Sneed on the Dallas Mavericks’ team beat despite his past as a domestic abuser, he told ESPN.

“It was bad, but we made a mistake about the whole thing and didn’t pursue what happened with the police after the fact,” Cuban told ESPN’s Tim . “So we got it mostly from Earl’s perspective, and because we didn’t dig in with the details -- and obviously it was a horrible mistake in hindsight -- we kind of, I don’t want to say took his word for it, but we didn’t see all the gruesome details until just recently. I didn’t read the police report on that until just [Tuesday], and that was a huge mistake obviously.”

Sneed, a former beat writer for Mavs.com, was fired on Tuesday immediately prior to the details of his domestic abuse were reported in a Sports Illustrated story about sexual misconduct in the Mavericks’ organization.

He was hired by the Mavericks during the 2010-11 season and was charged with assault in June of 2012 for an incident where Sneed “sat on top of [his then-girlfriend] and slapped her on the face and chest,” according to the Sports Illustrated report. Sneed was also retained despite striking his then-girlfriend, a team employee, in the face in 2014, according to the Sports Illustrated report.

She reported the incident to her immediate supervisor and to currently suspended human resources director Buddy Pittman. Sneed was not charged in the incident and continued to work for the team after.

Cuban told ESPN that he neglected to read the police report on Sneed in 2012, but would have fired him if he had. He noted that he kept Sneed on board after the 2014 incident so he wouldn’t continue to be abusive elsewhere -- a decision he said “in hindsight was a mistake.” He required him to get domestic violence counseling.

I made the decision that we would make him go to domestic abuse counseling as a requirement to continued employment, that he was not allowed to be alone without a chaperone in the presence of any other women in the organization or any other women in a business setting at all, and he was not allowed to date anybody [who works for the Mavericks]. From that point on -- and the investigators are going to see if we missed anything else - he appeared to abide by all those rules, as far as I knew.

In the Sports Illustrated report, Cuban said “this is all new to me,” when asked about Sneed’s record and sexual harassment accusations against former CEO Terdema Ussery. But in a statement released Wednesday night through the Dallas Morning News, Sneed thanked Cuban for “his willingness to help facilitate that growth” through counseling after the 2014 incident.

Cuban told ESPN he did not know about any accusations against Ussery, but took responsibility for keeping Sneed on the team’s beat.