Jury deliberating in Barton County case

WICHITA, Kan. -- Jurors began deliberations Tuesday in the trial of a former Barton County Community College track coach who is accused of participating in a scheme to fraudulently use student work programs to get around a Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference prohibition against athletes receiving full-ride scholarships.

Jurors adjourned around 5 p.m. and will resume deliberations this morning.

Lance Brauman faces eight counts in U.S. District Court in Wichita, including embezzlement, theft and mail fraud. He is accused of using federal work-study and campus jobs programs while at Barton County to pay athletes for work they did not do and for allegedly causing false academic credentials to be sent to other schools on athletes' behalf. Brauman currently is an assistant track and field coach at Arkansas.

Defense attorney Lee Davis told the jury in his closing argument that practice of using work-study funds to "zero-out" athletes' bills started at the community college long before Brauman took a job there.