A former Santa Clara High School teacher and “well-known” coach stands accused of having sex with a student.
Darrin Garcia, 53, has been an athletic director in the Santa Clara Unified School District (SCUSD) since 2022, according to SCUSD. Prior to that role, Garcia was a gym and health teacher at Santa Clara High School, where he also coached track.
He has also been a sports mentor across the county.
On Feb. 12, Los Gatos-Monte Sereno police nabbed Garcia at Kathleen McDonald High School in San Jose where he works, charging him with statutory rape.
“These are extremely serious charges. The safety and security of our students are our top priorities,” SCUSD officials wrote in a statement. “Our priorities of student safety and well-being will continue to guide our actions.”
Police executed the warrant after they received a report alleging that Garcia had a sexual relationship with a student from 2021 to 2023 while teaching at Santa Clara High School, according to police.
In an email exchange, Sgt. Katherine Mann, with Los Gatos-Monte Sereno police, wrote that Garcia no longer lives in Los Gatos, where he allegedly had sex with the girl.
The investigation continues, Mann wrote, with detectives scouring Garcia’s electronic devices and conducting follow-up. She wrote that she does not know whether there are more victims.
Garcia is a father of two, according to a 2016 article in The Roar, the Santa Clara High School student news website. At the time of the article, his son was 11, and his daughter was 13, making them in their twenties. He has taught at Lynbrook High School in San Jose and Saratoga High School in Saratoga, according to the article.
SCUSD has placed Garcia on administrative leave, according to the school district’s statement. The school district conducts background checks with the Department of Justice and FBI prior to hiring employees and gets “timely notifications” if its employees are charged with a crime.
The school district is conducting its own investigation but due to employee privacy concerns, is limited in how much information it can release, according to the statement.
While school officials acknowledge that the news is “shocking and can bring up a range of emotions,” it does not intend to plan to “communicate directly with students” about the arrest.
However, Jennifer Dericco, SCUSD’s public information officer, wrote in an email that school officials met with students Feb. 14 to “share resources, including our school’s wellness team.”
“Working together, we can maintain an environment where all students can remain focused on learning,” school officials wrote in the statement.
How much jail time Garcia will face if convicted will depend on how the Santa Clara County District Attorney decides to prosecute the case, Mann wrote.
The rape charge, California Penal Code Section 261.5, could be either a felony or a misdemeanor. If convicted of a misdemeanor, according to the code, Garcia would face a year in county jail. If convicted of a felony, he could face up to four years in county jail.
A second charge, “bigamy, incest and crimes against nature,” is a felony punishable by “imprisonment in the state prison for the term prescribed,” according to the California Penal Code.
Because Garcia is older than 21, the charge’s severity depends on whether the victim was 16 years old or younger at the time of the crime, information that police and the district did not provide.
However, given the alleged relationship began in 2021, it is unlikely the girl was 17 at the start of it. If the victim were 17 in 2021, that would likely have made her 19 in 2023, making it unlikely she was still in high school.
The law does not ordinarily require statutory rapists to register as sex offenders, according to California Penal Code.
Police are asking anyone with information about this case to contact Detective Riley Frizzell at (408) 827-3558 or police@losgatosca.gov.
Garcia is out on bail.
Contact David Alexander at d.todd.alexander@gmail.com
