Kids Using Steroids; Senior Snap Flap
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Sports is a national obsession. We pay the pros big bucks, cities shell out major money for stadiums, and most of us can name a favorite basketball or football team. But in Texas, football is more than a game; it's practically a religion.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So that means you're Boobie's (ph) backup?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm actually Boobie's backup backup -- I'm third string right now.</s>BILLY BOB THORNTON, ACTOR: You know which way you're supposed to run? I ain't talking about the play. I know what the play was. I know what the play was, OK?</s>PHILLIPS: You can feel the tension. Last year's movie of the book "Friday Night Lights" showed us just how large the high school game looms in the lives of many Texas towns, and now a big city Texas paper, "The Dallas Morning News" has uncovered something sinister in high school locker rooms. The series of reports, which started earlier this month, investigates the widespread use of steroids by students. Reporter Gregg Jones from "The Dallas Morning News" join us now to talk about his series. Gregg, great to have you with us.</s>GREGG JONES, "THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS": Thanks for having me.</s>PHILLIPS: Well, I think we set it up, explaining through the book and through the movie, but unless you live in Texas, sometimes you don't realize how huge football is in that state.</s>JONES: No question about it. I mean, football is huge. Sports in general are huge in Texas, although I would say that what we found in this instance that this is not just a Texas phenomenon, that teen steroid use is going on across the country.</s>PHILLIPS: All right, well, let's talk about it. What tipped you off, what got you on this trail, and what really triggered you to pursue this, this focus?</s>JONES: I think that, in general, the increase awareness of steroid use, obviously, the Olympic scandals, the BALCO scandal in the Bay area, all those revelations; it begged the question of what is going on at the high school level? Obviously we also know that there's steroid use going on at the college level. And so we wanted to look at the high school level and see what was happening, and we did have the one case here in a suburban Dallas high school in Plano (ph) West where a baseball player, Taylor Hooten (ph), had used steroids and committed suicide in July 2003. So I think that that got the wheels turning.</s>PHILLIPS: Yes, there are a lot of personal stories and characters throughout your stories. Taylor Hooten is definitely one of the primary players in this, and talk a little bit more about that. His father actually started a huge push to educate families on kids and steroid use, and has there been a link between why he committed suicide? And has it been tied to the steroid use?</s>JONES: Taylor's death, it came after a period of several months where he was using steroids. And from the interviews that we've done with his girlfriend, with his friends, with his parents, he clearly had a radical change in his temperament. He had all the classic rage symptoms that are often associated with steroid use, and he also suffered from depression. And at the time he died, he was combating depression as well, and that is one of the side effects of steroid use as well. So whether you can definitively say that steroid-related depression caused his death, I'm not sure you can. But certainly, Don Hooten and his wife, Gwen, are convinced that is the case, and it does happen.</s>PHILLIPS: All right, so from Taylor's story now to the high school that you investigated, Culleyville (ph) High School. Let's talk about coach Chris Cunningham. He denied his athletes used it. Then he kind of came forward and said it was a problem. Let's talk about this high school and what you found out in the locker rooms there.</s>JONES: We were already into our investigation of high school steroid use when we saw an interview that a Culleyville mother had anonymously given to the weekly newspaper in Culleyville, which is between Dallas and Ft. Worth.</s>PHILLIPS: Is this the woman you identify as Michelle?</s>JONES: That's correct.</s>PHILLIPS: One of your sources. And her son Patrick. Of course you didn't name their names, but go ahead.</s>JONES: That's correct. And so we -- immediately after that came out, I got in touch with her. We started talking. We -- she allowed us to interview her son, and so at that point, we started investigating his description of steroid use among athletes at Culleyville Heritage High School. And we very quickly uncovered information that led us to believe that his story was credible, and that there certainly as more that needed to be looked into. The school had begun an investigation into the allegations the mother raised. She actually phoned the school in late September and said, my son is using steroids, or has used steroids, and he has described steroid use among Culleyville athletes. The school's investigation was somewhat slow. They were very skeptical at first. They were dismissive of what the mother had to say. When we interviewed coach Cunningham in mid-November, he was adamant that he did not believe he had any football players and, in fact he didn't believe he had any athletes in the school that were using steroids. But after our interview, at that point, the school's investigation seemed to pick up steam, and within three to four weeks after that, nine athletes confessed to coach Cunningham that they had used steroids.</s>PHILLIPS: Well, Gregg, your series is picking up steam. Legislation now in action because of your investigative series. I encourage every parent to check it out, in "The Dallas Morning News." Gregg Jones, thank you very much.</s>JONES: Thank you.</s>PHILLIPS: To Florida now, where tradition and tolerance are clashing today. A high school student near Jacksonville took on the establishment, and lost, sort of. Roger Weeder (ph) from our affiliate WTLV takes it from there.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're leaving right now? All right, bye.</s>ROGER WEEDER, WTLV REPORTER (voice-over): Kelly Davis has taken a stand. She chose to wear a tux for her senior class picture.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If I would have worn the drape and looked back 10, 15 years, then I think I would regret it.</s>WEEDER: At Fleming Island High, Davis doesn't hide her sexual orientation. Neither, she says, is wearing a tux about making a statement.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I had a choice between a tux and a drape, and I chose one of the two.</s>WEEDER: The school says the senior class picture is a statement. Clay County tradition dictates boys in tuxes, girls wearing drapes. The principal, Sam Ward...</s>SAM WARD, PRINCIPAL: This is about uniformity, about dignity of that photo, maybe about gender, but absolutely nothing to do with sexual orientation.</s>WEEDER: The principal has the support of his boss.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Her sexual preference is her preference, and that's OK. But the school shouldn't be the platform for her to make this statement.</s>WEEDER: Kelly's mother spent nearly $1,000 on two full year-book pages. Here, Kelly's in a tux. And her yearbook editor Kerry Sewell (ph) says it's a shame.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't want to have to look to the back of the book to find my friend's picture. I want her to be with the rest of us in the section.</s>PHILLIPS: Sorry about that. We don't usually report on lost cat stories, and usually I don't get caught drinking water on the air, but what the heck? Check out this cat. And will the owner of the tiger that was shot yesterday roaming around California please come forward? We'll talk to the man who's trying to find you. And a potential global pandemic. A young survivor and how she faced down the dreaded disease, coming up next.