In 2011, a six-month investigation by
The Boston Globe disclosed allegations from one adult woman who was coached as a girl by Hewitt's assistant coach. The investigation was prompted by the revelations of a former student in March 2011, who claimed that, beginning in the 1970s, Hewitt
abused or
harassed her when she was as young as 10 years old. Interviews with contemporaries in the United States and South Africa indicated that there had been no rumours about misconduct by Hewitt at the time of the alleged events. The South African Tennis Union investigated after 1992, but no legal action was taken against Hewitt. On 15 November 2012, after months of investigation, Hewitt lost his place in the International Tennis Hall of Fame: "His legacy ceases to exist in the Hall of Fame", said Mark Stenning, executive director of the International Tennis Hall of Fame. "As of today, his plaque will be removed from the Hall of Fame. His name will be removed from our website and all other materials, and from the perspective of the Hall of Fame, he is suspended from the Hall of Fame." On 6 April 2016, Hewitt was officially expelled from the Tennis Hall of Fame.
Conviction Hewitt was charged in June 2014 with rape of two underage students in the 1980s and 1990s, and went on trial in 2015. On 23 March 2015, Hewitt was found guilty of two counts of rape and one of
sexual assault of minors by the
South Gauteng High Court in South Africa, and was sentenced in May to an effective six years in jail. One of his victims was 13 in 1980 when Hewitt, who was her tennis coach, raped her.
Heather Crowe Conner of
West Newbury was a 14-year-old in 1975 when Hewitt began raping her. == References ==