Swim coach sent 13-year-old girl sexually inappropriate texts. USA Swimming gave him a warning
At 6:18 a.m. on December 27. 2014, Marco Villanueva, a then 19-year-old coach at the Stockton Swim Club, sent a message via Snapchat to a 13-year-old swimmer he was coaching.
“Well I have a friend who wants to get laid also. You come thru for me. I can come thru for you,” Villanueva wrote the girl.
Five minutes later he sent her another message.
“You come thru for me. I can come thru for you. You been flaking on me. Now basically I have your (vagina) ha ha ha,” Villanueva wrote. “…Lol. Eh. I need a cuddle partner!!”
The messages were part of a complaint against Villanueva sent to USA Swimming, the sport’s national governing body, in 2017, according to USA Swimming, U.S. Center for SafeSport documents and court filings obtained by the Southern California News Group.
Villanueva acknowledged the messages as well as other violations of USA Swimming and SafeSport guidelines to Susan Woessner, then USA Swimming’s director of SafeSport, who characterized the behavior as “concerning and very inappropriate,” according to USA Swimming emails and letters.
Yet Villanueva was not suspended but instead given a written warning that allowed him to continue coaching young athletes, according to USA Swimming documents.
Coaches and officials in other sports in recent years have received three-year suspensions from their national governing bodies or the U.S. Center for SafeSport for similar or even less graphic communication. Chris Riegel, a former U.S. champion, was suspended in 2015 for three years by USA Gymnastics for making an inappropriate comment after he acknowledged referring to masturbation without actually using the word during a conversation with a female teenage gymnast.
USA Swimming executive director Tim Hinchey, Lucinda Roberts, the organization’s chief counsel, and Bryan Davis, head coach at the Stockton Swim Club, were all copied on Woessner’s response to Villanueva’s inappropriate behavior and the warning, according to USA Swimming documents.
While USA Swimming was reviewing the allegations against Villanueva, another Stockton Swim Club coach, Shunichi Fujishima, was beginning to have sexual contact with a 12-year-old swimmer at the club, sexual abuse that would continue and escalate after the Villanueva warning, according to police reports and court filings.
Fujishima was arrested in January and charged with sexual penetration with force of a child under 14, sending harmful material to a minor, oral copulation and two counts of lewd and lascivious acts with a child.
USA Swimming has been added to lawsuit filed by the victim’s family in San Joaquin County Superior Court. Pacific Swimming, the local chapter of USA Swimming, and the Stockton Swim Club are also named in the suit. The suit alleges sexual abuse of a minor, negligence and gender violence.
Fujishima began sending nude photos of himself to the girl in June 2017 and later had sexual intercourse with her on numerous occasions and filmed her performing sex acts, according to court filings. Fujishima was banned by the U.S. Center for SafeSport on February 19, 2019.
The Stockton cases call into question Hinchey and USA Swimming’s commitment to changing a culture within the sport where top USA Swimming officials and coaches for decades ignored and covered up the sexual abuse of young athletes.
USA Swimming repeatedly missed opportunities to overhaul a culture where the sexual abuse of underage swimmers by their coaches and others in positions of power within the sport was commonplace and even accepted by top officials and coaches, an SCNG investigation last year found.
While prioritizing success at the Olympic Games and World Championships and the sport’s branding, top USA Swimming executives, board members, top officials and coaches acknowledged in the documents that they were aware of sexually predatory coaches for years, in some cases even decades, but did not take action against them. In at least 11 cases either then USA Swimming executive director Chuck Wielgus or other top USA Swimming officials declined to pursue sexual abuse cases against high profile coaches even when presented with direct complaints, documents showed. With some of the complaints, the decision not to pursue the case was made by Woessner.
Hinchey, who was hired by USA Swimming after Wielgus’ death in 2017, told a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee in May 2018 “While we cannot change the past, we will learn from it and we will do better. Our commitment to preventing child sexual abuse and providing a safe and healthy environment for our athletes is constant and long-lasting.”
The Stockton cases “prove that nothing has changed in the way that USA Swimming handles sexual abuse complaints,” said Bob Allard, a San Jose attorney who represents Fujishima’s alleged victim.
“For Mr. Hinchey to tell Congress that USA Swimming’s ‘commitment to preventing child sexual abuse and providing a safe and healthy environment for our athletes is constant and long-standing’ is simply lip service intended to deceive and mislead the public,” stated Allard. “Less than one year after the (Villanueva) complaint, Hinchey testified before Congress, stating, ‘I am deeply committed to providing a safe and healthy environment for children to grow, play, and compete.’
“USA Swimming allowed the coaches at this swim club to get away with the sexual abuse of their swimmers. If USA Swimming, Pacific Swimming and Mr.Hinchey had acted to stop this culture of abuse at Stockton Swim Club, my client would never have been sexually abused by Coach Fujishima.”
Hinchey and USA Swimming officials did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
“Yes, inappropriate texts were sent and no intercourse happened,” Villanueva said in an email to SCNG. “In the end of the investigation I was told that I wasn’t being the adult in the situation and should uphold maturity and responsibility better in any conversation and I accepted that. I also told this to Susan Woessner.”
Villanueva said he is no longer coaching.
Woessner was forced out at USA Swimming in February 2018 amid allegations she had a conflict of interest when she was involved with a sexual abuse investigation of U.S. national team coach Sean Hutchison because of an alleged “intimately personal relationship” with the coach.
Woessner in an August 8, 2017 email to Villanueva outlined the allegations against the coach.
“Specifically, we discussed and you acknowledged you engaged in the following behavior:
*You engaged in frequent and inappropriate electronic communication with a minor female athlete, including when you were instructed to stop communicating her by her mother and your head coach (Davis).
“Such behavior included:
*Following athletes on Instagram
*Engaging athletes on Snapchat.
*Friending athletes on Facebook.
*Discussing sexual activity.
*Telling you ‘need a cuddle partner.’
*Suggesting that ‘you have a friend to get laid’ and asking her to “come thru for you.’
*You had long conversations with her on the phone in the evenings that were not related to swimming.
*You transported the minor female athlete on various occasions and without the permission or knowledge of her mother, including to and from practice, to get food and to drop her off at social engagements.”
“This type of focused behavior is concerning and very inappropriate,” Woessner continued. “As a USA Swimming coach and an adult it is your responsibility to maintain appropriate, healthy boundaries between yourself and children. You agreed.”
Despite Woessner and USA Swimming’s concern and the nature of Villanueva’s behavior, he was not suspended.
“If we receive any report that you have continued to engage in any behavior such as those examples listed above, we will not hesitate to move forward with disciplinary action against you,” Woessner wrote.
