DATE: Thursday, November 20, 1997           TAG: 9711200499

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY JON FRANK, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: PORTSMOUTH                        LENGTH:   90 lines

TRACK COACH'S TRIAL BEGINS IN VIDEO CASE AFTER DELAYS

A former Wilson High School track coach accused of making sexually explicit films finally went to trial on Wednesday, more than two years after he was charged with secretly videotaping teen-age girls undressing in a school locker room.

John W. Crute, 47, is charged with enticing 18 girls - some of them as young as 14 - to undress at Wilson while he filmed them with a camcorder hidden in a storage closet.

Crute doesn't deny making the tapes, but pleaded not guilty on Wednesday, claiming that the tapes are not sexually explicit.

``John Crute is guilty of making the films, there is no contesting that,'' William P. Robinson Jr., one of Crute's two attorneys, told the jury of eight women and six men on Wednesday. ``The question is whether or not these films are sexually explicit.''

Although Robinson admitted that some of the tapes show the girls' breasts and pubic areas, he said they are spliced to tapes of sporting events, the situation comedy ``Home Improvement'' and HBO movies that ``come into the homes of all residents of Tidewater who subscribe to Cox Cable.''

But prosecutor Martin Bullock promised the jury that the 16 tapes he will show them during the trial will prove the sexually explicit nature of what Crute did.

``A picture can speak a thousand words,'' Bullock said. ``But a videotape can say a million. . . . Unless the defense can do something to make those tapes disappear, then you will hear the million words these tapes speak.''

Eleven girls came forward one by one to testify on Wednesday. Most of them broke down in tears as they saw themselves undressing on a big-screen television as the jury and Circuit Judge Von Piersall watched.

The girls said Wednesday that Crute deceived them into thinking they were making a track poster that would show both proper and improper attire for track meets.

Crute, who made the tapes between 1990 and 1995, would sometimes pick the girls up at their homes and drive them to Wilson for the photo shoots.

Crute would tell the girls to go to the girls locker room, where he had arranged clothing near an open locker.

``When I got in the locker room, everything was already set up,'' one of girls, who was 16 at the time, testified on Wednesday. ``The uniform was hanging on the locker.''

Crute would then meet the girls outside the locker room and shoot still photographs of them in the track outfits. Some of the girls changed clothes almost a dozen times for Crute during the photo shoots.

The girls said they did not know that while they were changing clothes, Crute was also videotaping them. He did it by positioning the track outfits by a locker that was directly in front of the camcorder that he concealed in an adjoining storage closet. A hole in the wall allowed Crute to film the girls.

Often, Crute could be heard on the tapes talking and laughing with the girls as they undressed. He made comments, apparently from a storage room or hallway, about ``thigh tattoos'' and revealing track outfits that were so skimpy they ``ride up your rear end.''

Crute was caught when Terrence Green, a basketball coach and security guard at Wilson, discovered the concealed camcorder on July 31, 1995. The camera was turned over to police the next week.

Police eventually raided Crute's home, where they confiscated almost 400 tapes from his private video screening room.

One of the girls testified Wednesday that she was ``sick, shocked and stressed out'' when she learned that the photo shoots were really occasions where she had been the target of Crute's camcorder. Another said she felt ``betrayed and angry'' when she learned of the videotapes.

At the time of his arrest, Crute was known as one of the most successful girls track coaches in South Hampton Roads. The charges shocked the city of Portsmouth and the region's athletic community, where Crute had a reputation for developing athletes who went on to successful college track careers.

The case gained additional notoriety when Robinson, a state delegate, was able to continue the case for months, claiming a legislative privilege that permits legislators time to perform their government duties.

On Aug. 14, the last time Robinson claimed the privilege in this case, parents of the girls erupted in outrage at the delays. Claiming that many of their daughters are now college students who have to make trips back to Portsmouth to testify, they publicly demanded that the 2-year-old case come to trial.

On Wednesday, Judge Piersall also heard a motion made by the defense to dismiss the charges against Crute because of the search warrant that was used to search the home that he shared with his parents. Defense attorney S. Earl Griffin said the warrant was improperly worded and did not indicate why the home was being searched.

Piersall took the motion under advisement and said he would rule on it later.

If the search warrant is ruled invalid, the charges against Crute would have to be dismissed, prosecutor Bullock said Wednesday. ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]

John W. Crute KEYWORDS: TRIAL VIDEOTAPE COACH

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