‘No one who can rein in these players?’: UNC football piles up parking complaints, speeding tickets :: WRAL.com

A University of North Carolina football player has been cited at least four times for speeding, including two reckless driving charges, since arriving on campus in January. 

Another player has been cited three times — including once on allegations of driving over 100 mph — since February. And his car has been photographed in on-campus parking spots marked for people with disabilities.

They’re among at least five transfers or key players that UNC highlighted as having re-signed with the program who have been cited for speeding since January — which comes just months after coach Bill Belichick said he had addressed off-the-field issues and players and parents complained about the program’s culture in Belichick’s first season.

The charges were found as part of a new WRAL investigation into allegations of players flouting parking and driving rules across campus, raising questions about who is able to stop the behavior.

For the past five months, long-time university professor Mark Peifer has pleaded with university administrators, leaders in the athletics department and parking authorities to do something about the parking habits of some football players, according to emails and photos reviewed by WRAL. 

Peifer, who is a member of UNC’s cancer cell biology research program, says players have parked in spaces marked for people with disabilities, backed into parking spots against established rules, sped through narrow parking decks and on campus roads and cursed at him.

“Is there no one who can rein in these players, probably only a subset of the football team, who are tarnishing the reputation of our school and of all Carolina athletes?” Peifer wrote in a recent email to UNC’s athletics director, Bubba Cunningham.

It followed a previous note to Peifer in which Cunningham said that he’d addressed the issues with the football program and promised to meet in person as soon as he returned to Chapel Hill from the ACC men’s basketball tournament in Charlotte.

On April 27, Cunningham responded again: “I don’t know how many more times I can apologize. Disappointing to say the least.”

North Carolina hired Belichick, an NFL coaching legend with eight Super Bowl rings and nearly 50 years of experience, in December 2024 to revive the Tar Heels’ football brand and catapult the program into national relevance. Belichick, who turned 74 last month, had not coached in college football before UNC hired him and signed him to a five-year, $50-million contract.

WRAL Investigates found last year that nearly 20%  percent of the 101 players on the roster had been cited for driving violations, accounting for 31 speeding tickets and 10 reckless driving counts.

“Our conduct outside of the building, outside of the program, is important to us, and we stress that,” Belichick told WRAL in November when asked about the driving issues. “We’ve addressed multiple things, not just that. There are other things that go on, besides driving, that we’ve talked about absolutely.”

WRAL Investigates recently performed the same search over the same time period on key returners and new additions to NC State’s 2026 football roster and found no speeding citations.

Asked about the most recent citations and long-simmering parking complaints involving football players, UNC’s athletics department told WRAL in a statement: “We work with our athletic programs to ensure that players are educated about driving safety, and we will continue to work with all of our teams on safe driving education.”

‘Some folks are above the rules’

Peifer, who has taught at the university since 1992, works in the Genome Science Building, from which Kenan Memorial Stadium is visible. The Kenan Football Center, home to the football program’s coaching offices as well as training facilities, is attached  to the stadium. The Genome Science Building and Kenan Stadium are near the school’s iconic Bell Tower and near the Bell Tower Parking Deck.

In the fall, Peifer and others that park in the deck began noticing large trucks, big SUVs and expensive sports cars in the deck. 

“It didn’t take a PhD to figure out that these were probably football players,” Peifer told WRAL in an interview. His complaints were echoed by other UNC employees.

WRAL has confirmed that at least some of the cars in question belong to UNC football players.

“What started to bother all of us, in addition to the fact that they didn’t seem to have to follow the simple parking rules like parking head in, was that now almost always the handicapped spots closest to Kenan in the deck had these cars parked in them,” Peifer said. “That’s just not right. You shouldn’t park in a handicap spot. Nobody should park in a handicap spot.”

He noticed similar cars parking in spots for those with disabilities in other lots as well. Peifer and others, he said, began to report it to the university’s parking enforcement department. They also took photos, which they shared with WRAL. Emails from parking enforcement officials indicate they have ticketed cars and attempted to enforce the university’s rules.

It is university policy that all vehicles park head-in with the rear of the vehicle facing the drive lane and a valid state-issued license plate displayed, according to the university’s parking ordinance for the 2025-26 school year. The rules also state that vehicles may not occupy portions of more than one spot and that it’s “prohibited to park an unauthorized vehicle in a space posted for disability parking.” 

University employees pay for parking based on their salary with higher-paid employees charged more. Fees for zoned permits range from $350 per year to $2,250.

And in November, after WRAL published its previous investigation into players’ speeding violations, Peifer began bringing his complaints to Cunningham and parking authorities.

In a Nov. 19 email on behalf of employees who park in the Bell Tower Deck and addressed to Cunningham and Christopher Dobek, the university’s executive director of transportation and parking, Peifer wrote: “These folks do not seem to think they need to follow the rules the rest of us follow — e.g., park head in and not park in handicapped spots. I’d appreciate it if your enforcement people could enforce the rules on them as they do on the rest of us, to not leave the impression that some folks are above the rules.”

The next day, he received a reply indicating that his emails had been sent to the parking services manager and parking enforcement manager. “They are both aware of the issue and enforcement will be citing the area heavily this week,” a member of the university’s transportation and parking department wrote.

Peifer sent at least four more emails within the next week. On Nov. 30, a day after Belichick’s first season with the Tar Heels ended with a blowout loss to rival NC State, Cunningham wrote back.

“I appreciate your notes and I have spoken to the football staff,” Cunningham said. “Disappointed it has not changed behavior.”

Cunningham has been the school’s athletics director since 2011. On July 1, he will move to a new role as senior adviser to the chancellor and athletics director. Steve Newmark, a former NASCAR executive with deep ties to Chapel Hill, will become athletic director. Newmark has been executive associate athletics director since August.

“I thought he [Cunningham] actually was probably right up there with the chancellor and running the university, but I found out when I wrote to him that he doesn’t have any control over the football program anymore,” Peifer told WRAL in an interview. “He clearly was frustrated and ultimately angry about this behavior and didn’t seem to be able to change it.”

‘Undercutting’ the Carolina Way

UNC began spring practice on March 24 in preparation for Belichick’s second season. The team wrapped up about a month later without a public spring scrimmage, which has fallen out of favor in college football.

In March, Peifer sent a lengthy letter to Cunningham and asked that it be sent to Belichick and football general manager Michael Lombardi. The subject of the letter was “Carolina Football players on-campus behavior is an embarrassment to UNC and to Carolina Athletics.”

“They must have some sort of meeting that ends at 5 p.m. Because each day, when we are leaving work, they are getting in their vehicles, revving their motors so loud you probably could hear it in South Building, and then racing one another at literally 40 mph down the narrow lanes of the deck,” Peifer wrote. “This further escalated yesterday when I told one of the students to slow down. He pulled forward, and revved his engine in a way that flames literally came out of the dual tail pipes, and then cursed me out as he left.”

South Building is home to the chancellor’s office and is 0.6 miles from the Bell Tower Deck. 

In another email to Cunningham and UNC Chancellor Lee Roberts, Peifer wrote: “The football team’s behavior is undercutting decades of efforts by Carolina coaches and athletes to build a national reputation for integrity, the Carolina Way.”

The pressure campaign may have worked — for about six weeks. In an April 27 email, Peifer wrote that “Mr. Cunningham’s intervention did, for a while, stop the most egregious behaviors.” He said the number of cars parked in spots for disabled drivers had declined and he noticed fewer speeding cars in the parking decks.

But Peifer wrote that as of the time of the email parking in spots marked for people with disabilities had resumed. 

Earlier this week, on May 5, he sent off another missive: “Apparently UNC football players have decided final exams are the perfect time to demonstrate their privilege and their immunity to the rules that apply to all the rest of us, on campus and in our community,” Peifer wrote in an email addressed to Cunningham and colleagues.

The final day for classes at UNC was April 27. Final exams were held between April 29 and May 7.

Peifer attached photos of cars parked in all spots marked for people with disabilities behind Wilson Hall, Mitchell Hall and the Sonja Haynes Stone Center.

“All of our efforts to get some effective action have failed,” he wrote. “Parking [enforcement officers] may even be issuing tickets. But nothing is having any effect, including what I think were genuine efforts by Mr. Cunningham. They also continue to race down Belltower Drive and South Road. … I guess when an innocent bystander is killed this will get some attention but then it will be too late.”

Speeding, reckless driving allegations

The allegations are not contained to campus.

Demon June, the team’s leading rusher in 2025 and one of the players the program chose to highlight as re-signing, has been cited three times since February, including for reckless driving for allegedly going 101 mph in a 65-mph zone on March 19 in his lime green Dodge Charger. 

It is the same car the Peifer took photos of backed into a disabled-parking spot. The sign is clearly visible in the photos. He’s taken more than two dozen photos of cars in spots marked handicap or requiring a disability pass and/or backed into spots instead of parking with the license plate visible.

June didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment made through the UNC athletics department. 

Transfer tight end Jelani Thurman appeared in 35 games, including all 30 over the last two seasons, for Ohio State. He was on the Buckeyes’ 2024 national championship team and earned Ohio State Scholar-Athlete recognition in 2023 and 2024. And he is one of the Tar Heels’ top-rated transfers, committing to the team in early January.

Thurman was cited for driving 63 mph in a 35-mph zone on Jan. 19. The officer noted that the driver said he was new to the area. Two weeks later, on Feb. 3, Thurman was cited for driving 66 mph in a 35-mph zone, reckless driving, not having insurance and having an expired registration.

On April 2, Thurman was again cited for speeding, reckless driving and an expired tag when, according to the citation, he was going 101 mph in a 65-mph zone. On April 29, Thurman was cited for speeding again, accused of going 92 in a 70-mph zone, as well as having no registration.

Thurman, who didn’t respond to a WRAL request for comment through the athletics department, told the officer that he was going back to Georgia to sell the green Dodge Durango because “it was causing too much attn [attention].”