“Really Loved, Really Appreciated” — Stephen Boyle’s Future in Coaching Is in Limbo — Even After a Not‑Guilty Verdict

Mooresville, N.C.— Stephen Boyle did everything the system asked of him and more.

He stepped away from the wrestling room, faced criminal charges in open court, trusted a jury with his freedom and his name — and that jury found him not guilty. Yet he remains a man the school system treats as if he is still under suspicion: allowed to teach in Iredell‑Statesville Schools, blocked from coaching wrestling, and now facing a recommended non‑renewal of his contract. To his attorney, Michael Levine, that is not just a bad look. It is a fundamental failure to respect who Stephen Boyle is and what a not‑guilty verdict is supposed to mean.

Levine did not approach Boyle’s case like a routine file. In our interview, he made it clear that he chose to represent Boyle pro bono because of the combination of the facts and the person. He described Boyle as “really loved” and “really appreciated,” emphasizing that this is not the kind of coach kids and parents tolerate — it’s the kind of coach they trust. Levine called him “one of those guys who goes above and beyond for his kids,” That is the Stephen Boyle he came to know.

Long before his name was linked with criminal charges, Boyle was a fixture in the North Carolina wrestling community. He was known for hard, demanding practices, for holding athletes accountable, and for building structure around kids who needed it. Parents didn’t send their sons to him expecting coddling; they expected challenge and growth. Teammates and families saw him at tournaments, on buses, in classrooms, and in the wrestling room — always in the same role: the adult who insisted they could do more. That history sits underneath everything that came next and is central to how Levine frames the case.

The criminal case sprang from a practice‑related encounter with a student‑athlete that led to charges of simple assault and misdemeanor child abuse. Overnight, Boyle went from respected coach to headline. Levine spoke about how jarring that shift was: a man whose life had been built around helping kids suddenly painted as a threat to them. “From day one, this case was about a coach doing his job in a high‑intensity sport and being treated like a criminal for it,” Levine said. He stressed that in wrestling, controlled physicality and intense corrections are part of the job, not evidence of cruelty.

Levine’s view was that the incident in question had been ripped out of its wrestling‑room context and repackaged as a crime. “You can’t take the realities of a wrestling room and pretend it’s the same as a hallway fight,” he told me. To him, that was the core mistake: evaluating a coaching decision through a lens that had no understanding of what serious wrestling practice looks like. He said the state tried to transform a tough coaching moment into a criminal narrative, and that narrative simply did not match the wrestler, the coach, or the sport.

In court, Levine’s goal was to bring that context back in. He wanted the jury not just to hear about a single moment, but to understand the setting in which it occurred, and the person at the center of it. “The evidence didn’t show a violent criminal,” Levine said. “It showed a wrestling coach in a wrestling practice.” He also knew the jury was seeing more than just legal arguments — they were seeing the supporters in the gallery. Wrestlers, parents, and community members came because, as Levine put it, “you don’t get a courtroom full of teenagers and working parents unless you’ve been the person kids trust to push them and to show up for them.”

When the verdict came back not guilty on both counts, Levine felt it simply confirmed what those closest to Boyle already knew. The jury had seen what he saw: a demanding coach, not a criminal. For most people, that would have been the end of the story — a painful chapter closed. For Stephen Boyle, it was only the end of the criminal case. The fight over his future was just beginning.

According to Levine, when the district finally allowed Boyle to come back to work, it did not restore him to the classroom right away. Instead, he said, Boyle was placed on the grounds crew, doing manual labor on school property. Levine viewed that assignment as a message. This was not a seasoned educator being welcomed back; this was a man being pushed to the margins. He told me that putting a veteran teacher and coach on the grounds crew “felt like a message” and that, in his view, it was “a way to probably try to get him to quit” without ever saying those words out loud.

Eventually, Boyle was reinstated as a teacher. On the surface, that sounds like the system correcting itself. But even in that return, a key line never moved. The district still refused to allow Boyle to resume coaching wrestling. For Levine, that is where the injustice is starkest. “It makes absolutely no sense,” he said. “The school system is saying, ‘We trust you to stand in front of a classroom, to manage students, to teach them every day’ — but somehow they don’t trust the same man to coach those same kids in the sport he’s dedicated his life to. If he’s safe and fit to teach, he’s safe and fit to coach.”

That split — teacher, but not coach — is not a technical detail. It is a daily reminder that, in the eyes of the district, Boyle is still marked by accusations the legal system has already rejected. A jury cleared him. His attorney believes the evidence never supported the story told about him. His community has shown up for him. Yet in the place where his professional life is decided, he continues to be treated as if the cloud has never fully lifted.

Then came the letter.

On May 14, 2026, Iredell‑Statesville Schools sent a formal notice addressed to Stephen Boyle at his Mooresville home, sent “VIA EMAIL and CERTIFIED MAIL.” On Human Resource Services letterhead, under the district’s slogan “Together, Ensuring Student Success by Igniting a Passion for Learning,” the letter begins: “This letter serves as formal notification that your contract will be recommended for non-renewal for the 2026-2027 school year with Iredell-Statesville Schools.” It continues, “This decision is based on a review of employment-related concerns and information that has impacted the district’s ability to continue your employment assignment.”

In a few sentences, the district signaled that not only would Boyle not coach, but he might not remain employed by the school system at all. The letter advises him of his rights under North Carolina General Statute 115C‑325.3, saying he may request written notice of the reasons for the recommendation and/or a hearing before the Board of Education, provided he makes that request in writing within ten calendar days. If he does not, the letter warns, he will “forfeit your right to receive this information or request a hearing.”

To Levine, this letter is proof that, even after a not‑guilty verdict, Boyle’s past is still being used against him in ways the public does not see. The phrases “employment-related concerns and information” and “impacted the district’s ability to continue your employment” are broad, opaque, and, as far as he can tell, never explained openly. The letter is official, clinical, and, in his view, devastating. It reduces years of work and a hard‑won acquittal to a few lines of administrative language.

Meanwhile, the district has offered almost no public explanation. To try to get answers, I reached out by phone to the officials in a position to speak. I called Superintendent Dr. Jeffery James, Principal Nicholas Allen, and Athletic Director Joe Simboli. None of them returned my calls. When I reached Chief Human Resources Officer Dr. LeVar Mizelle, he said the district could not comment on a personnel matter. That statement — and the language in the non‑renewal letter — are the only official responses so far to a situation that has defined Boyle’s career and reputation.

Levine sees that combination of silence and shadowy language as deeply wrong. “A not-guilty verdict has to mean something,” he told me. “If the legal system clears you, but you’re still treated like you did something wrong, then we’ve just created a new kind of permanent accusation that follows you forever. That’s not what due process is supposed to look like.” In his view, the district is hiding behind confidentiality while effectively punishing Boyle for charges a jury rejected.

He also worries about the broader message this sends to coaches everywhere. “Coaches need to know that if they’re doing their jobs in good faith, if they’re following the rules, that the system will not abandon them the first time someone gets hurt,” Levine said. “If what happened to Stephen becomes the norm, you’re going to lose a lot of good coaches. People will be too afraid to do the very job they were hired to do.” For him, Boyle’s case is not just about one man; it’s a warning about what can happen when fear and liability concerns outweigh fairness and context.

At the center of all of this is Stephen Boyle himself: a coach, a teacher, a man whose life has been built around wrestling and education. For years, he has been the one kids turned to for extra work, for structure, for someone who believed they could push through one more drill, one more period, one more match. Now he stands in a strange limbo. A jury has said “not guilty.” His attorney says the evidence never showed a criminal. His wrestlers and their families have shown their loyalty. Yet his school system has placed him on grounds crews, held him out of coaching, and moved to recommend his contract not be renewed.

Levine keeps returning to the same point: who Stephen Boyle really is. “He’s really loved, he’s really appreciated,” he said again, underscoring that the people who have worked most closely with Boyle have already delivered their own verdict on his character. In the end, the question is whether the institution that employs him will ever fully acknowledge that — not in quiet letters or legalistic phrases, but in actions that restore him to the work he has always done for kids.

Until that happens, Stephen Boyle’s story remains a powerful, unsettling example of what it looks like when a man wins in court but keeps losing in the system that’s supposed to know him best.

If you want to support Stephen Boyle or ask district leadership to reconsider how he is being treated, you can contact the following officials directly:

Superintendent of Schools

Dr. Jeffery James

jeff_james@iss.k12.nc.us

704-872-8931

Principal (Lake Norman)

Nicholas Allen

nicholas_allen@iss.k12.nc.us

704-799-8555

Athletic Director (Lake Norman)

Joe Simboli

joseph_simboli@iss.k12.nc.us

704-799-8555

Chief Human Resources Officer

Dr. LeVar Mizelle

levar_mizelle@iss.k12.nc.us

704-924-2009