Sun Valley Coach Accused of Asking Boy, 15, for Sex

A basketball coach at a Sun Valley high school has been charged with one count of child annoying after he allegedly asked a 15-year-old male student to engage in sexual activity, authorities said.

Mark Erwin, 43, was arrested about 6:30 p.m. Thursday at his home in Pasadena, said Detective Gary Lyon of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Sexually Exploitative Child Unit. Erwin, a coach at John H. Francis Polytechnic High School, was charged in Malibu Municipal Court with one count of annoying or molesting a child under 18 years of age, a misdemeanor, Lyon said.

He was released from the Parker Center Jail on $1,000 bail, authorities said.

Erwin, who recently was named basketball coach, has taught math at the Sun Valley school for 2 years, said Assistant Principal Gerald Kleinman, who described him as “hard-working and diligent.”

Erwin was not working at the school at the time of his arrest, Lyon said. He had been transferred to a non-teaching post at the Los Angeles Unified School District’s Senior High Schools Division on Nov. 14 while police conducted their investigation, he said.

Police said Erwin had recently befriended a 15-year-old male student at the high school. In addition to giving the boy rides to and from school, Erwin took the youngster on weekend outings, police said.

On one weekend trip to Malibu Beach on Oct. 30, Erwin allegedly asked the boy to engage in a sex act with him, Lyon said. The boy refused and reported the incident the next day to a school counselor, who notified police, he said. There was no actual contact between Erwin and the student, Lyon said.

After concluding their investigation, investigators obtained an arrest warrant for Erwin on Thursday, Lyon said.

Authorities said Erwin was accused of inappropriate behavior while a teacher at the Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies in 1986. Several parents of students at the school had complained that Erwin offered their teen-age boys rides to and from school, Lyon said. In one case, he said, Erwin allegedly offered to tutor a young boy in exchange for “hugs and tickles.”

Lyon said the school principal contacted police, but authorities did not have enough evidence to charge Erwin with any criminal activity.

Erwin was transferred to Poly High shortly after the police ended that investigation, authorities said.

He is scheduled to be arraigned in Malibu Municipal Court on Dec. 12.