Inquiries made about umpires, KKK

0 Comments | USA TODAY, January, 2008 | by Paul White

Wayne McDowell says he wasn't suspicious about the man who began asking him questions about his Catlettsburg, Ky., neighbor, major league umpire Greg Gibson, until the subject of the Ku Klux Klan came up.

"He made me believe he was friends with Greg and that Greg knew he was doing this," McDowell said. "That's how he got into my house. At first he sounded genuine, but then I sensed something was wrong. The question that really caught my ear was about the KKK."

McDowell said Tom Christopher, supervisor of investigations in Major League Baseball's security department, talked with him and another neighbor this month in McDowell's dining room. Similar interviews have been conducted in the neighborhoods of many major league umpires, three of whom -- Gibson, Ron...