Miami-Dade police assist investigation of gymnastics coach accused of sex abuse

Miami-Dade police have joined the Key Biscayne Police Department’s investigation of gymnastics coach Oscar Olea, a new development in the probe of a man accused of sexually abusing underage girls more than a decade ago, Key Biscayne Chief Francis Sousa said.

When families first alerted the island’s police of Olea’s alleged actions 12 years ago, the complaints went nowhere. Police cited families’ reluctance to formally file complaints and get their daughters involved in the justice system. Village police took a renewed interest in Olea last month after a Miami Herald story quoted three unnamed accusers, two of whom were students of the coach.

Olea, 38, previously drew the attention of police in September when the families of a 7-year-old and a 4-year-old, both students, claimed the girls had been inappropriately touched and spoken to in a sexual manner by the coach. An investigation followed but was closed in January with no charges.

However, when those complaints circulated through word of mouth and on the social media app Nextdoor, it stirred rumors about long-discarded allegations. Reporters followed the rumors and found one accuser and the trail led to two others. All said the coach abused them when they were minors and he was an adult..

Sousa had previously told the Herald his department consulted Miami-Dade police after the September complaints, but those alleged incidents did not “meet their criteria at that time to respond.”

That apparently changed after the Herald published its investigation and two of the accusers who spoke to reporters showed up at the police department to make formal complaints. The third, who lives out of state, later talked to police.

During a Monday night public forum organized after hundreds of village residents signed a petition, Sousa announced the involvement of the Miami-Dade police and said the probe was ongoing. He would not discuss the significance of the move.

The information session, called “Protecting our Kids”, included a panel of representatives from the Miami-Dade Police Department Special Victims Unit, the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s office, and the sex trafficking unit.

One resident, Isabel Oswaldo-Cruz, asked why Olea had not been apprehended over the past decade despite being trailed by rumors of inappropriate behavior and then in September by specific allegations.

Laura Adams, an assistant state attorney, did not address the case directly but said that oftentimes there isn’t enough physical evidence to charge someone, even when the prosecutors believe something illegal may have happened.

“In the absence of having the evidence to prove it beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt, we have to, as law enforcement agencies, not go forward with that case,” she said.

But Adams also said that cases become stronger when multiple victims report similar abuse.

“We can oftentimes combine all of those victims together to give more of a powerful voice than just one victim standing alone,” Adams said.

The Key Biscayne Police Department has undertaken no internal investigation to review the original handling of the complaints about Olea, nor does it plan to do so, according to Sousa.