Concorde Fire Soccer Lawsuit: Defamation, Arbitration, and Appeal

The Concorde Fire soccer lawsuit is a Georgia defamation case, Atlanta Concorde Fire Soccer Association, Inc. v. Graham, brought by a teenage player and her mother after the club dismissed her over accusations that she had sent and received nude photos on a team bus. In May 2020, the Georgia Court of Appeals ruled that the club and two of its employees could not force the defamation claim into arbitration, leaving them to defend the accusations in open court.¹

What Happened at the Coffee Shop

On February 9, 2018, two Concorde Fire employees, James Harris and Garvin Quamina, met the parents of a minor player identified in court records as G.G. at a coffee shop. According to the family’s complaint, Harris and Quamina told the parents in that setting, within earshot of other patrons, that G.G. had been using her phone to send and receive nude pictures on the team bus. She was dismissed from the team.²

The family alleged the accusations were false. Harris reportedly reported the dismissal to the U.S. Soccer Development Academy, and the family said the stigma that followed kept G.G. out of other top youth clubs.¹

The Claims and the Defendants

G.G. and her mother, Margaret Graham, sued the Atlanta Concorde Fire Soccer Association along with three individuals: club CEO Gregg Blasingame, James Harris, and Garvin Quamina. The complaint raised three claims: breach of contract, unjust enrichment, and defamation.¹

The defendants moved to dismiss, for summary judgment, or in the alternative to compel arbitration. Their argument leaned on a participation agreement G.G. had signed in July 2017 with the U.S. Soccer Development Academy and the United States Soccer Federation. That agreement was governed by California law and contained two separate provisions the case would turn on: a broad waiver and release of claims, and a narrower arbitration clause requiring disputes to go before the American Arbitration Association. The waiver explicitly protected “affiliated clubs, teams and companies” and their employees. The arbitration clause did not include that same extension.¹

How the Trial Court Split the Claims

The trial court gave the defendants a partial win. It held that the waiver and release provision barred the breach of contract and unjust enrichment claims, ending both. But it found the defamation claim fell outside the release and refused to send it to arbitration.¹

The Georgia Court of Appeals Ruling

Concorde Fire and its co-defendants appealed the arbitration denial. On May 28, 2020, a unanimous panel of the Georgia Court of Appeals affirmed. Judge Coomer wrote the opinion, joined by Presiding Judge Miller and Judge Mercier.¹

The panel rejected every theory the defendants offered for enforcing the arbitration clause:

They were not parties to the participation agreement, which was between G.G. and the Academy, and they were not “legally-related entities” to the Academy.
They were not third-party beneficiaries. The waiver named affiliated clubs and their employees; the arbitration clause did not. Under California law, a nonparty can only enforce a provision made expressly for its benefit.
Equitable estoppel did not apply. The defamation claim was not “intimately founded in or intertwined with” the participation agreement. Statements about nude photos at a coffee shop were too far removed from the terms of a soccer contract.
No agency relationship existed. There was no evidence the Academy had the right to control the club’s activities, which is the legal test for agency.
Because the defendants were not parties to the contract, there was no “clear and unmistakable evidence” that anyone had agreed to let an arbitrator decide whether the dispute belonged in arbitration.

The defamation claim therefore stayed in court.¹

Why the Two Clauses Produced Different Outcomes

The case turned on a drafting gap inside a single contract. The waiver and release was written broadly enough to reach affiliated clubs and their employees, which is why it killed the family’s contract-based claims. The arbitration clause referred only to “the parties” and never picked up that same affiliate language, which is why it could not reach Concorde Fire or its staff. One commentator noted that an arbitration clause tracking the release’s language would likely have produced a different result, and that courts under both California and Georgia law will not lightly extend arbitration agreements to nonsignatories, especially when the claims involve conduct beyond the contract itself.³²

Where Things Stand

Gregg Blasingame remains CEO of the Atlanta Concorde Fire Soccer Association.⁴ Garvin Quamina has since been listed as a coach and manager with Proven Sports Management and as affiliated with FC Prime.⁵ The U.S. Soccer Development Academy, whose participation agreement the defendants had tried to invoke, was permanently shut down in April 2020, weeks before the appellate ruling came down.⁶

1
FindLaw. Atlanta Concorde Fire Soccer Association Inc v. Graham
2
vLex. Atlanta Concorde Fire Soccer Association Inc v. Graham
3
Marshall Dennehey. Defamation Claim Found Not to Be Part of Arbitration Agreement in Youth Soccer
4
ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer. Atlanta Concorde Fire Soccer Association Inc
5
Proven Sports Management. Bio – Garvin Quamina
6
SoccerWire. Report: U.S. Soccer to Permanently Close Entire Development Academy