Longtime college football coach Jim Leavitt was arrested in Pinellas County, Florida, Monday on felony and misdemeanor charges.
According to the Pinellas County Sheriff’s website, Leavitt is facing a felony grand theft charge and misdemeanor charges of simple battery and domestic battery after the incident. Per Andy Slater, Leavitt allegedly grabbed his ex-girlfriend by the arm and took her Louis Vuitton purse, among other items.
Leavitt, 68, was the head coach at South Florida from 1997 through 2009 and was the school’s first football coach. The Bulls were 95-57 in his time with the school, but his tenure ended days into 2010 after the school found that he had struck a player in the locker room during halftime of a game against Louisville. Leavitt denied he struck the player, but USF said that witnesses corroborated the story and the school also found that Leavitt had interfered with the investigation by contacting witnesses to the incident.
His firing came two seasons into a seven-year deal he had signed with the school thanks to its success on the field. USF was 75-44 in 10 years at the top level of college football and had won at least eight games in each of Leavitt’s final four seasons.
In June, the school announced that Leavitt would be inducted into its sports hall of fame despite the way he departed the program.
Before he was hired at South Florida, Leavitt was an assistant coach at Kansas State from 1990 through 1995. He was the Wildcats’ defensive coordinator for his final four seasons with the school as Kansas State’s program became one of the best in the Big 8 under coach Bill Snyder.
Leavitt was an assistant coach for the San Francisco 49ers from 2011-14 before returning to college football as Colorado’s defensive coordinator in 2015. After two seasons with the Buffaloes, he spent two seasons at Oregon and was most recently SMU’s defensive coordinator in 2021.
