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Wrestling coach busted for texting former student

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Posted 9:44 PM 2/9/2012 : Wrestling coach busted for texting former student

THREE POINTS - A west side community is stunned after a trusted coach gets busted and is now being called sexual predator.

Ricardo Moreno, also known as Richard Harris, reportedly sent inappropriate text messages, to a 15-year-old girl.

She was a former student at Altar Valley Middle School where Moreno was an assistant wrestling coach.

The Pima County Sheriff's Department said the high school girl made a stop back at her old school to visit some friends and that's when the texting started.

Dawn Barkman with the Pima County Sheriff's Department said, "It was unsolicited texts. There was something there where she told him to stop and he didn't. He continued with the inappropriate texting and she finally notified the wrestling coach.

The coach she told was the head coach, the suspect's boss. He immediately called the Sheriff's Department who eventually went to the suspect's house and arrested him, but deputies weren't the only ones quick to take action; the district did too.

Dr. Nathan McCann is the Superintendent for the Altar Valley School District. He said, "That's it, its termination. This is inexcusable behavior. We have great faith in all of our staff to do what's best for kids and any time someone violates that trust it's a serious issue."

So serious, that he's already taking steps to make sure it never happens again.

McCann said, "I'm going to take a recommendation to the governing board at the next meeting that all of our coaches go through the same increased background checks that we do for all of our certified members of our staff."

McCann said better back ground checks on coaches isn't just important for the kids' safety, it's also an important move to gain the public's trust again. McCann said he just hopes that trust hasn't been damaged too much on what he calls an extremely disappointing but rare incident.

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