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World Wide Sports Screw-Up

Dunyasha M. Yetts was once the big man on campus at The Ohio State University. He was the Big Ten wrestling champion of his weight class in 1994 and made it to the semifinal round of the NCAA Championship in wrestling that year.

His passion in the ring was transfered in the sports agent industry. After college, Yetts set up his own agency, World Wide Sports Group, and quickly made a lot of “investor friends.” These friends entrusted Yetts with their money and never saw any return or their initial investment ever again.

Yetts finally admitted that he was involved in an investment scam that took a total of $1.8 million away from his so-called friends [Ex-OSU wrestling champ admits investment scam]. He was involved in mail fraud and was stupid enough to have marijuana shipped to the address of his sports agency. Yetts will now serve 18 months in prison, but could have had a much harsher penalty had he not offered a guilty plea bargain.

I was able to trace the issue back to 2001, when the SEC seemed to have first taken action against Yetts [Securities and Exchange Commission v. Dunyasha M. Yetts, Worldwide Financial Group, Inc, World Wide Sports Group, Inc. and Gordon Yocom, Civ. Act. No. C2-01-1263 (S.D. Ohio)]. One of his associates was tried separately and told to pay $86,495.35 in damages [SEC Obtains Final Judgment Against Relief Defendant Gordon L. Yocom].

I always try to promote all the great things that agents are doing for their clients and others, but in order to truly open up the industry and give you all a glimpse of the entire scene, it is necessary to reveal those who commit stupid crimes. If we can weed out people like Yetts from our business, we will be doing ourselves a big service.

-Darren Heitner

By Darren Heitner

Darren Heitner created Sports Agent Blog as a New Year's Resolution on December 31, 2005. Originally titled, "I Want To Be A Sports Agent," the website was founded with the intention of causing Heitner to learn more about the profession that he wanted to join, meet reputable individuals in the space and force himself to stay on top of the latest news and trends.

Heitner now runs Heitner Legal, P.L.L.C., which is a law firm with many practice areas, including sports law and contract law. Heitner has represented numerous athletes and sports agents as legal counsel. He has also served as an Adjunct Professor at Indiana University Bloomington from 2011-2014, where he created and taught a course titled, Sport Agency Management, which included subjects ranging from NCAA regulations to athlete agent certification and the rules governing the profession. Heitner serves as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, where he teaches a Sports Law class that includes case law surrounding athlete agents and the NCAA rules.

2 replies on “World Wide Sports Screw-Up”

The actual complaint was filed years ago. Yetts just recently put in a guilty plea and will serve time in jail + pay out damages for whatever he can afford.

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