Champion Window Field is a stadium in Florence, Kentucky

Florence, Kentucky

Florence is a city in Boone County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 29,951 at the 2010 census.-History:The Florence area was originally known as Crossroads, because of the convergence of several roads from Burlington and Union at Ridge Road...

. It is primarily used for baseball

Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...

 and is the home field of the Florence Freedom

Florence Freedom

The Florence Freedom are a professional baseball team based in the Northern Kentucky city of Florence, located near the city of Cincinnati. The Freedom are a member of the West Division of the Frontier League, an independent baseball league...

 independent league baseball team of the Frontier League

Frontier League

The Frontier League, based in Sauget, Illinois, is a professional, independent baseball organization located in the Midwestern United States, Western Pennsylvania, and Southern Ontario. It operates mostly in cities not served by Major or Minor League Baseball teams and is not affiliated with either...

. It originally opened in 2004 and holds 4,500 people.

2004 Ownership Scandal

In July 2004, shortly after the opening of Champion Window Field, contractors began filing liens against the Florence Freedom, accusing the team of not paying for work done on the stadium. Eventually, 33 liens totaling $4.7 million were filed. In August, Fifth Third Bank

Fifth Third Bank

Fifth Third Bank is a U.S. regional banking corporation, headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio and is the principal subsidiary of holding company Fifth Third Bancorp ....

sued team part-owner Chuck Hildebrandt for failing to repay multiple loans taken out to finance the stadium construction. As part of the lawsuit, it was revealed that Hildebrandt had used 204 acre (0.82555944 km²) of land that he did not own as collateral for the loans, and that he had given the bank a forged document as proof of ownership. Hildebrandt was later the subject of a federal white collar crime investigation and sentenced to prison in October 2005. The team was sold in November 2004 to a new ownership group led by Clint Brown, who was not associated with Hildebrandt's ownership group.

Freedom attendance

Season	Total Attendance
2004	68,250
2005	94,191
2006	89,969
2007	99,333
2008	106,707
2009	102,086
6-year Total	560,536