Urban Meyer: If Cam Newton Cheated At Florida, Records Weren’t Leaked By His Staff

Urban Meyer has denied he is the source of the cheating allegations made regarding Cam Newton’s time at Florida.

“Our entire focus right now is on preparing for our biggest game of the year against South Carolina,” Meyer said. “For anyone to think that I or anyone on our staff may have leaked information about private student records to the media doesn’t know us very well. It’s a ridiculous claim and simply not true.“The allegations, published by Thayer Evans on FoxSports.com, detail Newton handing in a paper that was not his during his freshman year at Florida, a violation of the student academic honor code that might have had him facing expulsion.
There is the question of how the information got out in the first place, since student records are confidential and protected under the Family Education Rights Privacy Act (FERPA). If the institution did leak them, there’s a serious violation of both institutional standards and the law, but this isn’t necessarily how it happened, either. The source in this case could just as easily be a friend or someone else who is not an employee of the university, which while gossipy is certainly not a violation of any laws.