Verdict in on Colts Neck youth tennis instructor Terry Kuo in child sex case

FREEHOLD - A Monmouth County jury Wednesday found Colts Neck youth tennis instructor Terry Kuo guilty of all 14 counts at his retrial on charges of sexually assaulting and taking pornographic photos of a student when she was 12 and 13 years old.

The jury of six men and six women deliberated less than three hours from Tuesday until Wednesday morning when, shortly before 9:30 a.m., the panel sent a note to Superior Court Judge Jill Grace O'Malley informing her that it had reached a unanimous verdict.

Kuo, 32, stood trial in the case over the summer, but O'Malley declared a mistrial on Aug. 4 because that jury was unable to reach a verdict after deliberating for six days.

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That wasn't the first mistrial in the case. Superior Court Judge Joseph W. Oxley declared one in February after Kuo urinated in the courtroom in front of a panel of prospective jurors during jury selection.

Kuo, 32, who was often animated throughout the course of the seven-day trial, appeared to show no emotion when the verdict was announced.

His attorney, Joshua Nahum, described his client's reaction to the verdict as "muted.''

The jury found Kuo guilty of three counts of sexual assault, two counts of aggravated sexual assault and one count each of kidnapping, causing a child to engage in child pornography, manufacturing child pornography, possession of child pornography, aggravated criminal sexual contact, criminal sexual contact, endangering the welfare of a child, obscenity and conspiring to tamper with evidence.

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Kuo faces a maximum of life in prison with 25 years of parole ineligibility, said Ryan Lavender, an assistant Monmouth County prosecutor who, with Assistant Prosecutor Kristen Anastos, presented the state's case.

O'Malley scheduled Kuo's sentencing for Dec. 1.

Lavender and Anastos argued at trial that Kuo sexually assaulted and took pornographic photos of one of his tennis students in 2016 and 2017, when she was 12 and 13 years old.

Their presentation included the display of numerous pornographic pictures of the child, found on Kuo's electronic devices.

The victim testified that Kuo gave her cash, gift cards and expensive presents, including iPhones, an Apple computer, Tiffany jewelry and a Louis Vuitton handbag, in exchange for letting him molest her.

"The state is pleased with the jury's result,'' Lavender said after the verdict.

"We're finally able to bring justice for our 12-year-old victim, who is now 19,'' the assistant prosecutor said.

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The victim was not in court for the verdict, although she did attend the attorneys' summations on Tuesday.

"Mr. Kuo is disappointed with the verdict and continues to maintain his innocence," Nahum said. "We will pursue every avenue of appeal.''

While much of the state's case at the trial remained unchanged since August, prosecutors offered some additional evidence this time, including geographical information derived from the photographic evidence that matched the locations where the victim said Kuo took pornographic pictures of her.

At this trial, unlike the last one, Lavender asked the victim how she felt now, at age 19, about some of the decisions she made when she was 12 and 13.

"If it was now, I definitely would have told my mom a lot sooner,'' she replied. "But, when I was 12, I didn't really have a head on my shoulders. I was 12.''

Prosecutors also presented a rebuttal witness at this trial, which they didn't at the previous trial. That witness, a former friend and employee of Kuo, testified that Kuo told him he touched the victim's buttocks. The witness also said Kuo texted him a photograph of the girl's bare rear end.

While portions of the defense case were similar at both trials - that many people had access to Kuo's electronic devices and could have put the pornographic material on them - some of Kuo's testimony differed markedly than from when he took the witness stand over the summer.

Testifying in July about one of the incidents in which the victim accused Kuo of attacking her when she went to retrieve a tennis ball that she hit into the woods at the Marlboro Swim Club, Kuo claimed he witnessed "the possible acts of actors, plural, that may have been involved in the creation of these photos on that particular date.''

Kuo's version of the story at the first trial was that the girl deliberately hit the ball into the woods and, when she went to retrieve it, some children her own age followed her. They emerged from the woods with facial expressions that Kuo said indicated they were doing something they shouldn't have been.

"They knew they were up to no good,'' Kuo said.

There was no mention of children going into the woods with the victim at this trial.

Instead, Kuo claimed to have an alibi that he never brought up at the previous trial.

Kuo testified this time that a photograph he texted to the victim on one of the nights when pornographic photos were taken of the girl at the Marlboro Swim Club proved he was in Brooklyn and not in New Jersey.

Both O'Malley and Anastos noted there was nothing at all in that photograph to suggest it was taken in Brooklyn. And, Lavender, in cross-examining the defendant, pointed out that Kuo still would have had time to drive to Brooklyn that night from the time the last porn photo was shot until when he sent the text message.

Evidence that was introduced at both trials included a manual entitled "How to Practice Child Love,'' which had been downloaded to one of Kuo's computers, and recordings and transcripts of two phone calls Kuo made to his father from the Monmouth County Jail following his arrest in November 2017.

In the first phone call, Kuo instructed his father to open a hidden compartment in a safe in his bedroom, retrieve the items inside, including a computer containing the pornography, and get rid of them.

In the second phone call, Kuo told his father that if he was having a relationship with a 12- or 13-year-old in another country, such as Taiwan or Mexico, "I wouldn't be a criminal at all.''

At the onset of this trial, before jurors were brought in to hear testimony, O'Malley said Kuo had been overheard talking about the make, model and license plate number of her car, where she lives, and a comment about "a judge's son being killed,'' an apparent reference to the murder of a federal judge's son in Middlesex County in July 2020.

Kuo also was overheard talking "about paying someone to have someone killed on the street,'' the judge said.

The conversations were recorded by body cameras worn by sheriff's officers, she said.

Despite those comments, O'Malley declined to recuse herself from presiding over the trial, saying she viewed it as just another attempt by Kuo to delay the proceeding.

"The conduct of this defendant, so thoroughly outlined by our prosecutors during the course of this trial, was nearly incomprehensibly manipulative and predatory,'' Monmouth County Prosecutor Raymond S. Santiago said. "We sincerely thank the jury for carefully weighing the facts and reaching the appropriate conclusion.''

Kuo still faces three more criminal cases, one on additional child pornography charges, one on stalking charges and one on allegations that he headed a widespread identity theft ring.

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O'Malley scheduled a conference on those cases for Oct. 30.

Kathleen Hopkins, a reporter in New Jersey since 1985, covers crime, court cases, legal issues and just about every major murder trial to hit Monmouth and Ocean counties. Contact her at khopkins@app.com.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Colt Neck coach child sex trial verdict: Guilty on 14 counts