Temecula, CA: Girls' coach charged with molesting 4

TEMECULA, CA: A 39-year-old California girls' softball coach was charged with molesting four young girls.

Alex Flores, of Temecula, pleaded not guilty to numerous counts of child molestation and is being held in lieu of $1 million bond, the Riverside Press-Enterprise reported Wednesday.

The mother of a 13-year-old team member said Jan. 8 she found on her daughter's cellphone hundreds of sexually explicit text messages between the girl and Flores, including a nude photo of the girl. The discovery prompted an investigation of Flores.

"We discovered more than one of the players entered into inappropriate texting relationships with him where he told them they were beautiful and commented on their bodies. ... He talked about making love in explicit terms," Detective Rachel Frost said.

Some of the alleged molestation incidents happened in Flores' home over the past two years and continued until his Jan. 10 arrest.

Another incident allegedly occurred at a Coachella Valley hotel in September when Flores took team members for a softball tournament.

After the girl's mother reported Flores to the Sheriff's Department, investigators, armed with a search warrant, listened while they had the girl phone Flores to tell him her mother knew of the messages.

Flores recommended ways the girl could lie to her mother, such as claiming the nude photo was meant for someone else and saying someone had used her cellphone.

Flores simultaneously texted another girl on the team, telling her to lie on his behalf.

"If your mother could go on the computer and read your text messages, you would have been in trouble a long time ago sweetheart," Flores said to the girl.