Phillip Koons is a Hall of Fame high school football coach in Ringling, OK. He is also listed as the Ringling High School Principal and his wife the school counselor. Other family members also are on staff and his sons are assistant coaches. He is alleged to have abused students verbally and physically. There is no official in the school whom students could turn to who is not connected to Koons.
He has been charged with outraging public decency after an Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation probe. His students claim he has harassed them with racist and homophobic slurs, told them they needed his permission to talk to their parents, force them to practice nude, and tell them he was their “daddy.” He promoted a cultlike atmosphere that left them isolated from friends and family.
He had been suspended pending the investigation but was reinstated when it was time for football practice to begin.
- The Daily Beast: Famed High School Football Coach Charged Amid Shocking Abuse Claims
- Kfor: ‘It doesn’t make any sense’: Ringling High coach to be reinstated despite ongoing state investigation
