Dallas Mavericks hire former AT&T exec after report of hostile workplace

DALLAS (AP) — Mark Cuban let his new CEO do most of the talking Monday when former AT&T executive Cynthia Marshall was introduced to the public a week after a report that painted a picture of a hostile workplace for women in the Dallas Mavericks owner’s franchise.

In his first meeting with reporters almost a week after the Sports Illustrated story that also included allegations of sexual misconduct against former team president Terdema Ussery, Cuban wouldn’t address how much he knew about those complaints.

Ussery worked for Cuban for 15 years and was investigated by the Mavericks over similar allegations in 1998, two years before Cuban bought the team. Cuban has hired two former prosecutors to investigate the complaints and the franchise’s workplace practices.

“All of that will come out from the investigators’ report, so I’ll defer to that,” Cuban said in one of several brief responses as he sat next to Marshall, who has been given authority by her owner to decide how the club will respond to the independent report.

Marshall was senior vice president of human resources at AT&T when she took on the additional role of chief diversity officer in 2015.

Sports Illustrated reported Ussery made sexually suggestive remarks to several women. He spent 18 years with the team before going to the sports apparel company Under Armour in 2015, a job he left after less than six months.

The SI report said team website reporter Earl Sneed was twice involved in domestic assault cases while working for the Mavericks, including a guilty plea in a case that was dismissed when he met the conditions of the agreement.

Sneed and former human resources director Buddy Pittman were fired in the wake of the report, which included allegations that executives weren’t responsive when women complained of workplace violations.

Marshall said all current employees would be interviewed, and that she intended to meet with former employees as well.

“The process failed somewhere,” said Marshall, who retired from AT&T last May with more than 30 years of telecommunications experience going back to 1981 with Pacific Bell. “I don’t know why it failed. And so that’s what we have to dig out. So I will be meeting one-on-one every single employee of the organization. I’m calling it my own `March Madness.”‘