Tennis coach gets probation for sexy texts

A former Main Line school tennis coach was sentenced to five years' probation Friday for sending suggestive text messages to a 15-year-old girl on his team.

Charles Meredith, 54, is to be under sex-offender supervision during his probation but will not have to register as a sex offender.

He pleaded guilty in Montgomery County Court in June to one count of corruption of minors. Meredith coached tennis at the Country Day School of the Sacred Heart in Radnor, and was arrested in December 2013 after the 15-year-old reported to police that he had kissed her and sent her inappropriate text messages.

The text messages included telling the girl that her short tennis skirt was "so hot," prosecutors said, and texting her at a team dinner, "You're my dessert."

Police also said Meredith took the girl to a gym in Plymouth Township in August 2013 to meet a personal trainer called "Big Daddy." No trainer was there, the girl told police, and Meredith kissed her in the parking lot before taking her for ice cream and telling her not to tell anyone.

Charges related to the kissing were dropped when Meredith agreed to plead guilty to the corruption charge for sending the text messages.

"He was preying on a 15-year-old girl," said Assistant District Attorney Kristen Feden.

Feden argued for prison time and said the girl's high school years had been disrupted by Meredith.

"He abused his truth with my school and teammates, and he took away my innocence way too early," the girl said, speaking tearfully from the witness stand.

James Freeman, Meredith's attorney, said that the text messages were not intended to be sexual in nature and that Meredith meant to send one of them to a friend rather than the girl.

"This is not a sexual offense," he said.

But Judge Wendy Demchick-Alloy told Meredith that he had harmed a young girl and a school community that trusted him.

"This is not a no-harm, no-foul situation," she said. "It was extremely damaging, what you did, because of your position."

lmccrystal@phillynews.com610-313-8116@Lmccrystal