Judge denies bail, at least temporarily, for Danny Lawhorn, accused of sexual assault while coaching young women in the Bria Holmes’ AAU basketball program

A federal judge has denied bail, at last temporarily, for Danny Lawhorn Jr., the former coach of the Bria Holmes Elite girls basketball program who is accused of sexually assaulting three teenage girls who played for the program, as well as drug offenses.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert Richardson denied pretrial release Monday, after a two-day detention hearing, but said he was that he will to revisit the question if Lawhorn returns to court with package of release conditions that include more rigorous supervision.

Richardson said he had misgivings about Lawhorn’s proposal that his mother act as his custodian if he is granted pretrial release. As custodian, she would be obligated to report any additional criminal behavior or violation of the terms of his release. The judge expressed his doubts after the U.S. Attorney’s office accused Lawhorn’s mother of participating in multiparty, jail house telephone calls with her son, in violation of jail rules, and of misleading FBI agents searching for her son’s telephone.

Defense lawyer Jon Schoenhorn disputed the accusation that Lawhorn’s mother misled agents and said he suspects she was unaware of Hartford Correctional Center rules prohibiting calls between more than two parties. Schoenhorn also said Lawhorn’s mother took a part-time job to help pay her son’s legal bills and then turned down the job offer during Monday’s resumed detention hearing when she learned her absence from the home while working could prevent her from being his custodian.

Richardson said he may look more favorably on a surety and supervision package that would allow Lawhorn, 30, pretrial release if Lawhorn returns to court with a proposal that puts him in the custody of someone other that his mother.

Lawhorn is accused of using his position as a coach and advocate to coerce sex acts over the last four years from three teenage girls enrolled in the Bria Holmes’ AAU basketball program in hopes of winning college basketball scholarships. It is a crime under state law for a coach to use his position of authority to coerce women under age 18. In addition to the sex charges, Lawhorn is accused of possession of crack cocaine on one occasion and 300 packages of the synthetic opioid fentanyl on another.

Federal prosecutor Neeraj Patel said Lawhorn should be confined because his sexual behavior and drug charges make him both a danger to the community and a risk of flight. Lawhorn faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years if convicted of a federal sex offense. When arrested on the charges that are the subject of the detention hearing, Hartford police had to pursue Lawhorn on foot and pull him off a fence to take him into custody.

Lawhorn’s detention hearing was held by teleconference. It began Friday, but was rescheduled for Monday because of technical difficulties.

The alleged assaults occurred separately over multiple years and involved girls who were traveling with Lawhorn for basketball tournaments across the state and country, court records show.

The girl at the center of the federal charges that formed the basis of the bail hearing is a 17-year-old international high school student referred to in court filings as MV-1. She stayed at Lawhorn’s Hartford home over the spring while she played for the Bria Holmes program and was persuaded that Lawhorn could use his influence to get her into a U.S. college basketball program.

Schoenhorn argued, among other things, that the charges against Lawhorn will not hold up. On one hand, Schoenhorn argued that the age of consent under Connecticut law is 16. On the other, he claimed that the girl who was is at the center of the federal case never played on Lawhorn’s team, which means he cannot be guilty of using his authority over her as a coach to coerce her into a sex act.

The prosecution claimed in a memo arguing for pretrial detention that Lawhorn admitted during a tape recorded interview with Hartford detectives at the time of his arrest that he exercised control over MV-1 and even recognized that he was engaged in sexual misconduct. Police and prosecutors said Lawhorn typically pressured the young women to give him massages and that turned into sexual assaults.

“Most significantly, in a recorded interview with law enforcement, the defendant admitted that he trained MV-1 and that she played on his basketball team,” the memo asserts. “In referring to the girls that stayed in his home, he stated, ‘I run a program. … I’m trying to get you a scholarship. … although you’re not as good as you’re supposed to be, and no colleges want you now, I gave you a place to stay, right, I gave another person a place to stay, you all come, you all train with me, and I talk to these colleges for you.’

“Later in the interview, the defendant described some of the sexual acts and sexual contact he engaged in with MV-1 after he asked for a massage on June 13, 2021. He suggested he soon realized his actions were wrong, stating, ‘What really kicked in my mind was yo bro she’s 17 … and like she playing on my (expletive) team.’”

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