Hoopa softball coach charged with alleged sexual assault of minor victim denied OR and supervised release; his lawyer claims sex was consensual and his married client "tried to put the brakes on"

Judge Joyce Hinrichs
Prosecution: DDA Brie Bennett
Defense: Neal Sanders
Courtroom 5

This afternoon, Judge Hinrichs listened to arguments on the defense's request to reduce bail, defendant's opposition to a protective order and request for supervised release.

William Jarnaghan is a Hoopa tribal forestry employee and a softball coach charged with 6 alleged sexual acts with a female victim under 18.

Jarnaghan's family was in court again today. When he walked in, he looked at them but no other acknowledgement.

Judge Hinrichs denied release on OR and supervised release after she heard from both attorneys. However, after three lengthy arguments, Mr. Sanders was able to whittle down bail to $150,000. Judge Hinrichs ruled that while the protective order stays in place that it could be amended in the future.

"The People are asking the Court to deny release of any sort," said DDA Bennett. "The defendant was in a position of authority over minor children. He violated that trust. " She said there was concern Jarnaghan may try and contact the victim and that he presented a danger to other minors.

Mr. Sanders, at first, referred to the part of the Probation report where Jarnaghan was not cited as a risk for failure to appear and kept asking for release on OR. He mentioned how well connected the family was playing up the tribal and community positions. This is so reminiscent of the Kayla Brown case, also from Hoopa. Her family is well connected and influential, so are the Jarnaghans. She made bail and is out of custody.

Judge Hinrichs pointed out that the probation report does not address the kind of charges, the potential of punishment and how that may affect the failure to appear by a defendant, and protection of the public.

DDA Bennett agreed with Judge Hinrichs. While Mr. Sanders said that those factors needed to be considered, he pointed that, "by law, these are not serious offenses." He said there were more serious and violent crimes than what his client was charged with in this case.

Citing the PC 289 (h), Mr. Sanders said,  "This offense merely requires contact between my client and victim" and said that Jarnaghan was a volunteer for the minor's team, and alleged that there was no evidence that there was any inappropriate behavior by his defendant with any minor other than the alleged victim. "This was an isolated incident." Mr. Sanders claimed that his client only had contact with the minor victim because they showed up somewhere at the same place. This was refuted by DDA Bennett.

"In this case, it is a 16 year old victim," said Mr. Sanders. "The age of consent in 30 states and Canada is 16 years old."

DDA Bennett responded, "the age of consent is not 16 in California." She also said that this was not an isolated incident. This is something that went on for months. There was an attempt at grooming in a predatory manner. Counsel is aware that according to police reports, this occurred on campus where he was working as a coach. "

Mr. Sanders said that his client's bail should be reduced because of inability to pay. DDA Bennett cited a case that a defendant's inability to pay cannot be a factor in setting bail.

Mr. Sanders made a remark that the sex was consensual to which DDA Bennett responded, "a minor cannot consent". DDA Bennett also challenged Mr. Sander's comments that no trust had been violated by pointing out that the alleged incidents took place on campus where Jarnaghan was a coach.  Twice Mr. Sanders said, "he tried to put the brakes on and said no, no" and insinuated that the sex proceeded because the minor wanted it to.

Mr. Sanders also said that it was his idea to have Jarnaghan turn himself in to law enforcement so that he was not arrested in front of his children.

DDA Bennett said that the restraining order was in order to protect the minor victim and the defendant was fighting it. She said the victim, her family, particularly her father opposed release, reduction of bail, and were requesting the protective order and were "very concerned" that the defendant would contact the victim and try and "dissuade her from testifying."

DDA Bennett said "during the course of the relationship, the defendant told the victim he wanted to run away with her."

Having lost on OR twice, Mr. Sanders made a last pitch for his client, telling Judge Hinrichs that if his client was granted OR, he would drop opposition to the protective order.

Mr. Sanders was able to use legal vagueness of the bail schedule and some legislation quirks to get the bail reduced and future modification of the  restraining order. There was lengthy discussion back and forth on the bail schedule, legislature, codes and interpretation. I am not going to get into all that because you had to be in court to get the entire context and they were referring to arguments in pleadings I did not have access to while taking notes in court so all the  points were shorthand to the rest of us.

 A good defense attorney knows that if there is a hint of appeal, the Judge will err with caution.  Mr. Sanders is one of the area's more expensive private attorneys and a well-known criminal defense attorney, for a reason. Mr. Sanders did a very good job for his client, as he should. It's the insinuation and smearing of the minor victim and dismissiveness of his client's alleged actions towards a minor that's not kosher.

I did a two posts yesterday with details from yesterday's hearing and background. Jarnaghan's work and family were not mentioned until today in court. I had that information in yesterday's post.

http://johnchiv.blogspot.com/2015/06/hoopasoftball-coach-and-tribal-forestry.html
http://johnchiv.blogspot.com/2015/06/hoopa-softball-coach-charged-with-6.html

No other media source was present in court.