Prep Football 2016: Supporters of South's Dixon flood Lee County School Board meeting

Anthony Dixon could not be here to see this community come to life but could the dismissed South Fort Myers football coach feel it?

When they arrived in waves wearing T-shirts supporting his name? Or when they stepped to the podium in front of the Lee County School District school board on Tuesday and wiped away tears? When these athletes, students, teachers, football coaches, parents, community members and friends met afterward and chanted his name?

“We just want to show how important he has been for us,” said South Fort Myers senior Ethan McDaniel, a co-captain of the Wolfpack football team.

What Dixon couldn’t see were moments like the one Robert Souza, a South Fort Myers football player, gave during public comment among an overflow crowd of almost 200.

Hundreds were there to show support for Dixon, who was suspended without pay or benefits Aug. 17 following an investigation into a sexual incident that took place between a number of boys and a teenage girl inside a South Fort Myers High bathroom in May.

Following the investigation, Dixon was released of his duties at South Fort Myers as a security guard and football coach and was recommended for termination pending a review from the school board.

Souza’s two-minute speech became the heart of this journey in front of the decision-makers in this case. The senior football player’s tears gave the lasting image on a night when hundreds appeared inside the auditorium and many spoke in reverence of their suspended coach.

“I was coached four years to tell the truth, to show character, to show integrity and to stand up for what I believe in,” said Souza, who first met Dixon during youth football with his stepdad, Shane Owens. “I believe this man has been wrongfully persecuted. This is a man who has donated so much of his time to myself and my teammates. And I can’t thank him enough.

“When you have a family as a son or daughter, you have to love them,” he continued. “But when you find someone that loves you that’s not a family member, that’s special. And that is Coach Dixon.”

Of the 30 public comments presented to the school board on Tuesday, nearly all of them centered around the suspension of Dixon, which could not be publicly discussed in length because of a privacy statute that prevented the release of the investigation until Friday.

That did not limit the public’s discourse of the subject.

South Fort Myers booster club vice president Priscilla Doyle urged the school board to re-examine its investigation into the matter, claiming that if Dixon “could not adequately supervise” students during the time of the incident, how could other administrators, coaches and staff personnel inside the school at the same time do the same?

The father of a current player, Bill Morris, expressed the idea that Dixon was being painted wrongly by the school district.

“Everything that I’ve understood about this is that he has not been treated how a longstanding employee of the school district should be treated,” Morris said. “And it’s unfortunately symptomatic of the way political bodies often treat their employees. From a bigger perspective, he’s not someone who has warranted this.”

Some believed Dixon's life would be ruined by an eventual firing, that his reputation would be crushed. And for what?

Players like Darfnell Guin, a senior with the Wolfpack football team, hobbled into the auditorium on crutches. He injured his knee a day before the school year began, and over the last weeks had seemed to get a grip on his lost season … before his coach was dismissed.

“It’s a huge loss,” he said. “I didn’t really have a father growing up. I looked up to him as a father. That’s how he was for most of the team.”

The mood inside the auditorium was palpably tense, sometimes bordering on restless. Board meeting regulations were declared beforehand, preventing audience members from standing, clapping or cheering following moments of public comments at the stand.

And yet, early on, some audience members couldn’t resist. Some clapped following Doyle’s comments. Others began to cry after Souza’s remarks.

Once more, they were told to quiet.

Until, as if prompted without plan, they adjusted, raising their hands and silently snapping their fingers together.

"A lot of people felt like there was injustice. I’m bitter. I’m bitter from stuff that just wasn’t fair,” said Riley Ware, an assistant coach on the South Fort Myers football team and one of Dixon’s closest friends. “But today just just shows that we have a lot of people here that care.”

Dixon couldn’t be here to see this, but perhaps he could sense it.