On July 12th, 2005, Aaron O'Neal, a redshirt freshman linebacker for the Missouri Tigers collapsed after a voluntary workout and died a short while later. Recently, the Boone County Medical Examiner Valerie Rao announced that Aaron died of viral meningitis. Viral meningitis is much less deadly than it's bacterial cousin, so there is some question regarding the diagnosis.
Another point of contention is that the Mizzou training staff on that day did not take Aaron directly to the hospital and some have said that this delay caused his death and O'Neal's family has filed a lawsuit. I'm not so sure about this given that it's been 6 weeks since Aaron's tragic death and there is still much contention surrounding this diagnosis. How often do otherwise healthy football players drop dead from viral meningitis? In any case, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch has been having a field day with this, pointing fingers and searching for blame. For instance, see this column by Brian Burwell. Guilty and proven innocent, baby.
But then the PD has this utterly classless and tastelss cartoon posted on it website.
This cartoon simply borders on the obscene.