Judge sets $1 million bail, blasts former tennis coach

Ramsey County District Judge Diane Alshouse was clearly fed up Friday with Daniel Erik Hubbard Wilson, the former Visitation varsity tennis coach accused of criminal sexual conduct with one of his former players.

Time and again, the judge told him as he stood before her in court, he has ignored her orders not to contact the 17-year-old girl in any way.

"The court is at a loss for what to do with you. Your behavior is reprehensible," Alshouse said, before launching into a blistering admonishment of the 27-year-old coach for acting like a "sexual predator, a stalker."

When Alshouse was done, she ordered Wilson to jail — and set his bail at $1 million.

Wilson, dressed in orange jail overalls, was escorted out of the courtroom by deputies, his head bowed.

He was arrested most recently after he reportedly had been in touch with the girl by accessing her Gmail and Yahoo accounts using her passwords. Andrew Johnson, an assistant Ramsey County attorney, said the girl and Wilson would write new drafts and leave them there, without sending them. The girl's parents discovered the messages on her laptop before they were deleted, Johnson said.

Instead of the girl being able to use this time to heal, Johnson said, the continued contact with Wilson "just sends her on an incredible downward spiral."

On Friday, Wilson was formally charged for the third time with violating a harassment restraining order.

Exactly a week before, he was charged in Hennepin County with a felony for violating a restraining order by contacting the girl. He was arrested Nov. 26 after he allegedly appeared outside her therapy session. He was charged last week with a misdemeanor by the Minneapolis city attorney's office, but that case was dismissed so the county attorney's office could file the felony charge.

And, in October, Wilson was charged in Ramsey County with violating a harassment restraining order by allegedly tricking the girl into following him on social media and then secretly meeting with her.

Wilson also allegedly tried to persuade the girl to change information that led to the sexual assault case against him, according to the Ramsey County charge filed in late October.

The original charges allege that Wilson had the girl at his home and sexually assaulted her multiple times over a year. He had coached her at Visitation School in Mendota Heights and also served as her private coach. Wilson was suspended and then resigned from his job as varsity coach.

On Friday, Alshouse told Wilson that he may love the girl, that the girl may even believe she loves him.

"I don't care," the judge said. "You're 27. She's 17. This has to stop."

Wilson's continued behavior, she said, had the judge questioning his mental health.

"This is not helping your case. You're giving ammunition to the state and you haven't even settled your case yet," she told Wilson.

Alshouse ordered Wilson returned to jail and said he is to have no Internet access and no telephone access, except to talk with his attorney.

After Wilson was escorted from the courtroom, Alshouse asked if his family was present. They were. The judge then had the former tennis coach return to the courtroom so he could hear her warn his family against helping him make bail. If they put up their home or other property as collateral, she said, they could lose it.

"You are not a good risk," she told him.

Afterward, Janel Dressen, an attorney representing the girl and her family in the restraining order, said of the judge's decision to set bail at $1 million: "We're pleased that she's taking this seriously. She did the right thing."

During the hearing, Wilson's attorney Eric Olson, argued that $1 million was excessive. Wilson is not accused of murder, he told the judge. Olson declined to comment after the hearing.

Johnson said the high bail may be the only way that Wilson gets the message to leave the girl alone.

"We knew he'd be trying to contact her. We believed it," Johnson said. "But it's been really unusual. Honestly, in most cases, they stop."

James Walsh • 651-925-5041