AUGUSTA — Residents of Augusta may notice the lack of signage at Allen Field in the city.
According to Augusta Mayor Michael Taylor, the sign was destroyed by juveniles late Thursday night.
“The sign was taken down and destroyed by juveniles on Thursday,” Taylor said. “We know who did it.”
Taylor would not comment any further on the sign or the incident, but did say he was waiting on Augusta Police Chief Matt Jones to decide what steps need to be taken.
The Allen Field sign has been a controversial topic in Augusta for many years, reigniting in October 2018.
In 1978, Augusta City Council approved a measure to name the town’s baseball field after a man named Harold Allen, who was a summer league baseball coach in Augusta for many years until November 1985, when he was arrested by the Augusta Police Department and charged with two counts of first-degree sodomy.
Allen was lodged in the Mason County Detention Center. While in custody, he attempted suicide and was taken to Meadowview Regional Medical Center, where he stayed until he committed suicide by hanging in December 1985.
According to reports at the time, the charges stemmed from allegations of abuse from two boys on his baseball team. The names of those individuals have never been released, but since then two others have come forward with complaints about Allen.
Greg Cummins, former Augusta police chief, was one of the investigating officers and he still remembers the evidence he found in Allen’s house.
“We had been receiving complaints for a while about Harold Allen,” Greg Cummins said. “We had witnessed numerous boys going in and out of his house. Phil Cummins, my brother, was chief at the time and he took the first complaint. A father said his son had been molested by Harold Allen. There were two young boys involved with the case at that time. We interviewed the children and had them examined. We were able to obtain a search warrant for the house.”
According to Greg Cummins, some of the evidence against Allen included photographs of young boys, a videotape, books and magazines.
Greg Cummins brother, Phil Cummins, who was chief at the time, also worked on the case in 1985.
Phil Cummins said he had heard complaints about Allen for several years before he was arrested.
“When I became police chief in 1978, I was told that there were two people who were going to give me trouble,” Phil Cummins said. “There was an arsonist and Harold Allen. I was also told that if I went after Allen, I’d probably be fired. He was the kind of person who controlled everything about the kids in town. He was the baseball coach and he could control who made the team and who didn’t. He just had control over the youth. I had my suspicions about Harold Allen based on what I heard and what I saw.”
Phil Cummins also said he believes the department had a good case against Allen at the time of his arrest.
In October 2018, a freedom of information letter from The Ledger Independent to the Augusta Police Department was met with a response from the APD that evidence from Allen’s case was no longer available, likely due to being “destroyed some time ago, given their age.”
