Convicted sex offender re-arrested in NC was working with young drivers on race team

Kallie Cox
·2 min read
FILE IMAGE - E33 race team competes at tracks like Hickory Motor Speedway

The owner of a Rowan County racing team has been charged with sex offender registry violations, according to the county sheriff’s office. The team specializes in training young drivers in the area for NASCAR and international teams, and the owner supervised multiple juvenile drivers, officials said.

Joel Richard Courage, the owner of E33 Motorsports based in Mooresville, was convicted in 2008 for 11 sex crimes with a minor in Sacramento, California, according to the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office.

Courage is registered in Guilford County as a sex offender. He was recently charged by the Guilford County Sheriff’s Office, accused of violating sex offender registry requirements, according to a news release on Friday by the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office.

During the Guilford County Sheriff’s Office’s investigation, deputies discovered that Courage owns a race team that employs several minors as drivers.

Every sex offender in the state is required by law to register with the sheriff’s office if they have to work directly with minors. Courage failed to do this, the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office said.

After learning that Courage supervises several of the young drivers, the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office charged him with a sex offender employment violation, according to the release.

Already, Courage had been charged by the Guilford County Sheriff’s Office, with seven counts of failure to register, falsification of verification notice and failure to return a verification form required under state statute, according to the Greensboro News and Record, which reported on Courage’s arrest earlier this month. He was arrested on Aug. 9 and was released the next day after posting a $100,000 cash bond, the News and Record reported.

The warrants against Courage from Rowan County were served on Thursday and he was released after posting a $25,000 secured bond, according to the sheriff’s office.

Courage has been indefinitely suspended from NASCAR, according to the sheriff’s office.