BROOMFIELD — Former Broomfield High School wrestling coach Travis Masse had sexual contact many times with a high school student, but the only time he gave her a gift a pair of pink panties and a set of handcuffs on Valentine’s Day of 2009, the girl testified today.
The girl, now married and living in Florida, took the stand and accused Masse of seducing her when she was a 17-year old student in his history and sociology classes and a manager of the wrestling team he coached.
The girl told prosecutors that she never did homework for Masse’s classes “because I was having a sexual relationship with him, so I was getting an A.”
The girl testified that she reported the relationship to police because she felt bad that Masse’s wife, a math teacher and softball coach at the school, was being cheated on as she was raising their child.
The girl, who was on the softball team coached by Masse’s wife, will be cross-examined this afternoon by his lawyer, Pamela Mackey.
In their opening arguments today, prosecutors said Masse preyed on young, vulnerable girls at the school, sending them thousands of sexually graphic messages, and had sex with one of them, a prosecutor said today.
Masse is facing charges of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust, class four felony, and sexual assault on a child by a person in position of trust-pattern of abuse, a class three felony.
Masse — who resigned from Broomfield High School in February 2010 — is also facing a separate felony charge of attempted unlawful sexual contact with a child, a class five felony. A separate trial on that charge is scheduled for May 23.
In her opening statements to jurors, prosecutor Lisa Hunt said Masse began grooming the girl for sex before she reached high school, taking advantage of the fact her step-brothers were being coached by him.
He later asked her to become manager of the wrestling team. The text messaging continued after the girl began having oral sex with Masse while she was in high school, Hunt said. In one two-month period of her junior year, Masse texted the girl 8,970 times, said Hunt.
Their physical relationship escalated and in January 2009, when while on a trip with the wrestling team to Florida, Masse and the girl had sexual intercourse in a hotel room, Hunt said.
This happened while the girls’ father — also a wrestling coach — was on the same trip, said Hunt.
“Parents send their children to school to learn their ABCs,” Hunt said. “They are not be tutored in the birds and the bees.”
Mackey, said Masse — who was married and with a young child at the time of the alleged sexual contact — fell apart because of the pressure of being a young father and award-winning coach.
“He didn’t handle the pressure well,” said Mackey, who defended NBA star Kobe Bryant in a sexual assault case in 2003.
She said Masse did send “vulgar” messages but he did not have sexual contact with the girl.
Monte Whaley: 720-929-0907 or mwhaley@denverpost.com
