West High Starting Quarterback Played the Night After Pot Arrest

The starting quarterback of the football team was arrested and ticketed for possession of marijuana the night before the first game of the season and did not tell his coach about the citation.

Joshua Stoeckmann, 17, was driving a car with two other West High student athletes — ages 15 and 16 — when he was pulled over on North 115th Street for speeding and driving erratically. He was ticketed after officers found about 6 grams of marijuana in the vehicle, police said.

The use of controlled substances, including marijuana, is a violation of the s athletic code of conduct and could have made Stoeckmann ineligible to play in the rivalry game against Wauwatosa East on Saturday.

Had Stoeckmann reported his arrest before the game, school officials could have imposed an immediate suspension.

While the code does not specifically require athletes to immediately self report potential violations, West High School Athletic Director Jeff Gabrielson said "it is the expectation, and they know that."

The code also requires the reporting of suspected violations by "any responsible adult." Stoeckmann was released to his mother at the police station, but she also did not report it to school authorities.

Gabrielson said Monday morning he would not comment on Stoeckmann's status with the team because he had just received the police report from Wauwatosa police and the school’s investigation of a possible code violation had just started.

QB could miss half of season — or more

However, it’s possible that Stoeckmann could have to sit out at least half of the football season because this would be his second code violation.

According to police reports, Stoeckman also was arrested in December for possession of marijuana. Gabrielson said Stoeckman had served the mandatory penalty of being suspended for 25 percent of the season in the sport for which he was then eligible — in the case, it was tennis.

A second violation of the code calls for suspension from 50 percent of the season in the sport for which the student is eligible. But Gabrielson said that’s only the minimum penalty, and that he and West football coach Matt Good could decide to impose an even stiffer penalty.

The code calls for Gabrielson to reach a decision on discipline within seven days after it’s reported, unless he chooses to refer the matter to his principal. The principal has the same time frame to decide the matter unless he in turn refers it to the superintendent.

Gabrielson said he was "very disappointed" in Stoeckmann for not reporting the citation before Saturday's game and was also concerned about the quarterback’s conduct when he was arrested.

"We've not about beating the kid up, though," Gabrielson said. "It's our job to work with him and try to get him making better choices."

Gabrielson said there was no issue as to the outcome of the East-West game, a regular season contest, being questioned since West officials were unaware of the matter and, he said, since "we lost." West lost to East 21-13. Stoeckmann was injured during the Trojans’ last possession and was briefly hospitalized with a mild concussion. He was released from the hospital the same night.

Stoeckmann's two passengers were taken into custody Friday night, but they were released without being arrested.

However, according to the athletic code, it is also a violation to be present where drugs are possessed or being used, so those two also may have action taken against them by the school.

Police K-9 unit involved in arrest

According to the police report:

Stoeckmann was pulled over for speeding and erratic driving at 9:30 p.m. Friday on North 115th Street near Blue Mound Road.

When the officer approached the car, he immediately smelled a strong odor of marijuana. When asked about it, Stoeckmann said he had just dropped off another passenger who had smoked marijuana. He denied having smoked himself and said there were no drugs in the car.

However, the officer who stopped him happened to be the Wauwatosa Police Department's K-9 officer, and he retrieved his narcotics-sniffing dog, Addy, who quickly located a stash of marijuana hidden in a panel behind the driver's seat.

Stoeckmann then said he hadn't smoked marijuana since being arrested for possessing pot in December and must have forgotten he had hidden it there. But one of his passengers, interviewed separately, said that he and Stoeckmann had smoked pot together only a week before and once again earlier in the summer.

Stoeckmann had what the officer called "numerous buds" of marijuana, totaling about 6 grams, wrapped in seven individual bags of just under a gram each.

Calls to the Stoeckmann family were not returned on Monday.

Wauwatosa Patch typically does not identify minors who have been arrested. However, 17-year-olds are considered adults in Wisconsin’s legal system and Stoeckmann’s arrest likely will affect the rest of the team, if he is suspended. The two students with him at the time aren't being named because they were not cited and are juveniles.