Coach Gets Probation on Molestation Counts

A Lawndale Little League coach accused of molesting four of his players pleaded no contest this week to two misdemeanor counts of sexual battery and was sentenced to perform community service, serve three years probation and undergo psychological counseling.

William Anthony Boguille, 23, entered the plea Tuesday in South Bay Municipal Court as part of an agreement with the district attorney’s office that spared him a possible prison sentence.

Defense attorney Susan Strick said Boguille did not molest the boys but agreed to the no-contest plea in exchange for dismissal of four felony charges of lewd and lascivious conduct that could have resulted in an 8-year prison term upon conviction.

An investigation of the Little League coach began last month after the father of a player complained to the Sheriff’s Department.

Deputies said witnesses told them that Boguille regularly pulled down his players’ pants and spanked them on the field at Rogers-Anderson Park and at the boys’ homes. Investigators were also told that Boguille touched one boy’s penis, ostensibly to dry off liquid that the child spilled in his lap, Deputy Dist. Atty. S. Zahava Aroesty said.

The original charges against Boguille centered on his contact with three 12-year-old boys and a 13 year old whom he coached for the Giants in the major division of the Lawndale Little League.

None of the incidents were so egregious or sustained as to warrant the original charges of felony lewd and lascivious conduct, Aroesty said. “The nature of the acts was on the borderline between roughhousing and sexual conduct,” she said.

The plea arrangement was justified because Boguille was a first-time offender who agreed to counseling and because the children suffered no physical injuries, Aroesty said. She said the parents are satisfied with the outcome.

Under terms of his probation, Boguille is prohibited from coaching youth sports or from contacting children under 15 without another adult present.

Strick said that the incidents were innocent and that Boguille saw spankings as “an appropriate method . . . to encourage players to put 110% into their Little League.”

Boguille spanked the children because that was how he was disciplined when he was a child, said his sister, Faye Ireland. “He is a young man who has never been in trouble in his whole life,” Ireland said in an interview.

“The children were never hurt,” Strick said. “I think they would have continued to play for him. They loved Mr. Boguille as a coach.”

Boguille entered the plea “rather than risk the exposure of eight years in state prison,” Strick said.

Lawndale Little League President Jim Watson said the plea agreement is satisfactory with league officials.

The league plans to ask the Sheriff’s Department to perform criminal background checks on future coaching and managerial applicants, Watson said, even though Boguille had no record that would have been detected by such a procedure.