Youth basketball coach offers $5,000 to buy teen from his parents, Florida police say

A youth basketball coach refused to let a teenager leave a sleepover at his house, forced him to say he wanted to stay and offered his parents $5,000 to buy him out, Florida law enforcement said.

Carl Lombardo, a 58-year-old former Boys and Girls Club coach, is charged with a litany of crimes against children, including sex offenses, human trafficking and interference with child custody, the Marion County Sheriff’s Office announced Sept. 19.

Information about his attorney was not available in court records as of Sept. 20.

The investigation began Aug. 31, when the 15-year-old’s parents reported that Lombardo refused to return their son to them after a sleepover at his Ocala home with the teen’s other siblings.

He sent the family a video of the teen allegedly writing a letter saying he wanted to stay with Lombardo, deputies said.

But after examining Lombardo’s phone, deputies found several other videos of Lombardo coercing him, telling him, “Stop crying, do it” as the teen was overcome with emotion, investigators said.

Lombardo allowed the teen’s siblings to leave, but he told the children that their brother belonged to him now and that he would shoot their mother if she tried to get her son back, the children told deputies, according to the affidavit.

The child’s father confronted Lombardo via text message about holding his child and accused him of sexually assaulting the children, according to text messages included in the affidavit.

“Lombardo said he was not concerned because he works with schools and his reputation is spotless,” the deputies said.

The parents called police and the teen was taken home, sparking an investigation that revealed Lombardo had a pattern of having the five siblings stay at his house for days at a time, during which he had inappropriate contact with the children and assaulted them, deputies said.

As deputies questioned the children and Lombardo, they learned he had bought them gifts, had photos of himself “cuddling” the children and had also taken pornographic photos of the children, investigators said.

Lombardo told investigators that on separate occasions he offered to buy the children from their parents, offering $5,000, according to the affidavit.

Deputies said Lombardo used his “position of authority and trust” as a coach to “gain access and control over child victims and engaged in a pattern over a two-year period of slowly normalising the behaviours in which he engaged”.

He was charged with human trafficking of a child for commercial sexual activity, interference with the custody of a child, lewd or lascivious sexual assault of a victim under 12, lewd or lascivious sexual assault of a victim 12 to 16, lewd and lascivious exhibition and two counts each of production of child pornography and production of child pornography, according to the sheriff’s office.

Detectives believe Lombardo may have harmed other children and are asking anyone with information to come forward by calling Detective Henrik Osthed at 352-351-4710.

Ocala is located approximately 80 miles northwest of Orlando.

If you have been sexually assaulted and need someone to talk to, call the National Sexual Assault Hotline for help at 1-800-656-4673 or visit the hotline’s online chat room.

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