BishopAccountability.org
	Teenager Tells Pottsville Court 'Nobody Would Have Believed Me' She Kept Quiet about Sex Assault by Coach By Chris Parker The Morning Call [Pottsville PA] October 5, 2005 A sobbing Pottsville Catholic high school graduate testified Tuesday that her former track coach sexually assaulted her but she kept it secret because he was so well respected in the community. "Nobody would have believed me," the girl said through her tears. In fact, the girl said that when Daniel M. Shields was suspended for five days in February when another student accused him of inappropriate touching, her mother supported Shields and called the Allentown Catholic Diocese to complain. After about an hour of testimony from the nervous girl, Shields, 61, of 30 Bryn Mawr Ave., Pottsville, was ordered to face Schuylkill County Court on charges of aggravated indecent assault, indecent assault and corruption of minors. Shields also will face trial on charges of sexual abuse of children, corruption of minors and invasion of privacy for allegedly secretly videotaping the girl who testified and at least two other girls undressing at Pottsville Nativity BVM High School. Shields waived a preliminary hearing on those charges before District Judge James K. Reiley of Pottsville. The hearing on the two assault charges and the other corruption-of-minors charge was held in a county courtroom instead of Reiley's office. The room was filled with a large number of Shields' supporters and a smaller number of the girl's family and friends. Shields has coached track at Nativity for 35 years, the past 11 with the girls team. Head football coach at Nativity for many years, he was an assistant coach at Pottsville Area High School and, for the past five years, at Blue Mountain High School near Orwigsburg. Nativity has suspended Shields, and Blue Mountain fired him. The girl, whose hand trembled as she raised it to take the oath in court, graduated in June. She said Shields was her track coach, gym and health teacher, and a friend of her family. Track was important to her, she said, because she wanted to emulate her older sister, and Shields threatened to remove her from the team if she told. Shields molested her at the school and at his home, where he employed her as a cleaner, she said. Starting in her junior year and continuing through May, the girl said, Shields would make lewd comments, grab her breasts, kiss her, touch her genitals as he stretched her leg muscles during training and press her hands to his genitals and squeeze her buttocks as she exercised. She said he took her shopping in King of Prussia and Allentown. But Shields' attorney, Emmanuel H. Dimitriou, suggested the girl made up the sexual assault story to get back at Shields after she saw the videotape that shows her undressing. The tape was made in April and May. Under questioning by Dimitriou, the girl said she told school officials when Shields was accused in the February incident that he had done nothing to her. Dimitriou repeatedly asked her why she failed to tell anyone of her alleged assaults. "He was a respected man in Pottsville," the girl replied. "Nobody would have believed me." "Your mother and father would not have believed you over a family friend?" Dimitriou asked. "I don't know what they would do," she answered quietly. Dimitriou noted that the girl invited Shields to her graduation party and continued to clean his house. He argued that she no longer had any reason to fear being dropped from the track team and that Shields had not threatened her with a weapon. "I think that defies logic, truth and everything else," he said. Assistant District Attorney Karen Byrnes-Noon countered that "teenagers defy logic" and said the girl was courageous to testify before a courtroom filled with Shields' supporters. She was the only witness to testify. Shields was charged Aug. 18 after a classmate of the girl, Ryan Majesky, gave Pottsville police the tape of the girl and two other girls undressing at the school. The girl testified Majesky stole the tape from Shields' house while he worked there. The girl said she learned of the tape after Majesky showed it to classmates. She and her mother accompanied Majesky to the police station. In September, Shields was charged with two counts each of sexual abuse of children, corruption of minors and invasion of privacy after a search of his home turned up a DVD with images of two teenage girls undressing in the school training room, police said. Police said the video recorder was hidden in a clothes dryer in the training room near Shields' office. Shields had put a sign on the dryer saying "Do Not Touch Anyone," police said. Pottsville police Detectives Steve Guers and Glenn Dove, who investigated the cases, had a TV set up in the courtroom to show the tape and DVD and a large display board with still photos taken from the recordings. But neither was needed when Shields waived the hearing on charges related to the tapes. Shields remains free on $50,000 bail.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.