A former USA Gymnastics women’s national team coach whose continued coaching presence at a Southern California club sparked Congressional outrage last year has been formally suspended from the sport for two years by the U.S. Center for SafeSport for sexual misconduct involving a minor, according to the center and USA Gymnastics.

Terry Gray, who has also coached at high profile gyms in Ohio and Nevada, was suspended Friday after continuing to coach young female gymnasts at SCEGA Gymnastics in Temecula during a more than year-long investigation by the U.S. Center for SafeSport. The suspension runs through October 18, 2021.

Gray is “suspended from all contact” according to USA Gymnastics. Under the suspension Gray “is not permitted any contact with any USA Gymnastics-sanctioned event, member club, professional member or athlete involved with USA Gymnastics member clubs or events.”

Gray is appealing the suspension, according to the center.

SCEGA said Gray is no longer employed at the club in an email sent to parents Sunday. He was at the SCEGA facility as recently as Thursday.

“On Saturday, October 19th, we learned that one of our team coaches, Terry Gray, received a two-year suspension from coaching activities by USA Gymnastics,” SCEGA directors Kathy Strate and Kathy Bader. “The basis of the suspension was conduct alleged to have occurred in another program four years ago. Due to this situation, Terry is no longer employed at SCEGA. We are working proactively to provide coverage for his groups and ensure a smooth transition for the season.”

Gray and Strate did not respond to requests for comment on Monday.

SCEGA is recognized as a national team training center by USA Gymnastics. Gray appeared in promotional campaigns with Strate on the club’s social media platforms with as recently as September.

The Gray case gained national attention during a U.S. Senate hearing in July 2018 in which angry senators repeatedly cited an Orange County Register report during heated questioning of USA Gymnastics and U.S. Olympic Committee officials.

The Register report, posted a day before the hearing, detailed how Gray and other suspended coaches under USA Gymnastics and SafeSport rules were able to continue coaching young athletes at Southern California gymnastics clubs while under investigation.

Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kansas), the chairman of a senate subcommittee looking into sexual abuse in American Olympic sports, grilled then USA Gymnastics president Kerry Perry at length over the policies and events that resulted in Gray continuing to coach at SCEGA. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut), the subcommittee’s ranking member, entered the Register report into the official record of the hearing.

“I don’t understand the law and a system that the two people that are coaching in Southern California, the flaw that allows them to do that is what?” Moran asked Perry. Perry acknowledged flaws in policies in which some coaches under investigation for sexual misconduct offenses continued to have supervised contact with minor aged athletes pending their disciplinary hearings.

The Gray case, Perry said, illustrates “why we have such challenges” in balancing the need to protect young athletes from potentially predatory coaches while ensuring the rights of the accused.

USA Gymnastics was notified by the USOC created and funded U.S. Center for SafeSport that Gray was under investigation for “sexual misconduct” but provided only limited details of the allegations, Perry said.

USA Gymnastics immediately issued an interim full suspension against Gray, prohibiting him from any contact with gymnastics until cleared in a disciplinary hearing, Perry said. Gray appealed the suspension under provisions in the Ted Stevens Amateur Sports Act.

The hearing panel lifted the interim full suspension, clearing the way for Gray to return to the gym to coach minors with supervision. SafeSport conducts all sexual misconduct investigations.

“In the Ted Stevens Act anybody that is removed from the field of play is entitled to a hearing,” Perry told the subcommittee.

“So you have that in play and you also have the Center which is also problematic in terms of this whole scenario that it is in charge of investigating and has complete jurisdiction over sexual misconduct. So the information they give to us to present to the hearing panel is very limited. So you’ve got this system that’s in place.”

Perry was fired in September 2018.

Strate echoed Perry’s frustration with a lack of information on sexual abuse cases. Perry testified that USA Gymnastics promptly informed SCECA of the suspension by email and first class mail. But Strate complained that the club was not immediately contacted by USA Gymnastics about the suspension.

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Special Report: Maggie Haney still working with gymnasts despite suspension Although Gray was suspended June 29, 2018, SCEGA officials did not confirm the action until three days after officials were told that Gray was on a suspended list on USA Gymnastics’ website by persons in the gymnastics community. SCEGA then called USA Gymnastics to confirm the ban. SCEGA received formal notification of the suspension by mail a day later.

USA Gymnastics told SCEGA “these allegations did not take place in our facility, and dated back to a 2012 allegation,” Strate said in the email.

Gray worked for Brown’s Gymnastics in Las Vegas in 2012. Brown officials did not respond to a request for comment.

He previously worked under Olympic team coach Mary Lee Tracy at Cincinnati Gymnastics, where he coached Morgan White and Alyssa Beckerman. White qualified for the 2000 U.S. Olympic team but was unable to compete at the Sydney Games because of injury. Beckerman was an alternate on the 2000 Olympic team.

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