Key Biscayne gymnastics coach Olea reaches plea deal on child sex charges
More than a decade after he allegedly sexually abused at least three minors, a former Key Biscayne gymnastics coach spotlighted in a Miami Herald investigation last year has reached a deal with state prosecutors to plead guilty to four felony sex charges, including two related to the sexual abuse of a minor.
The agreement was revealed Thursday in a Miami-Dade courtroom days before Oscar Olea, 40, was set to go to trial on the sex abuse allegations.
He has been incarcerated since his Feb. 28 arrest last year, after Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Alberto Milian judge called him a ‘likely pedophile’ and ordered that he remain in jail until his trial.
Olea is scheduled enter his guilty plea and be sentenced next week, at a hearing where victims will testify about the impact of his abuse. Under the terms of his deal, Olea would be sentenced to 12 years in prison and 10 years of probation as a sex offender following his release. Olea would also need to enter a sex offender treatment program, according to a copy of the agreement reviewed by the Herald. The deal needs to be ratified by Milian.
Olea’s arrest last year came weeks after the Miami Herald published its Key Biscayne’s Dark Secret investigation, which told for the first time the story of five of the coach’s alleged victims: Four former students who were minors at the time of their alleged abuse and Olea’s colleague at the community center where he worked, who told the Herald he began abusing her when she was a minor.
Olea stood in the court room Thursday in an orange jumpsuit and handcuffs, clasping his own hands. His hair was grown out and he appeared to have aged during his time in custody. He flatly said “yes, sir” when Milian asked whether he had read and signed the agreement.
Milian told Olea that he has until next week to change his mind about the plea and go to trial.
The announcement of the agreement between the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s office and Olea, replaced a scheduled hearing in which the prosecution was going to make its case for allowing other victims to testify against Olea beyond the victims whose experiences formed the basis for the charges Olea faced.
The charges against Olea were based on his alleged abuse of two victims more than a decade ago.
Both victims’ families had sounded the alarm about Olea to the police, but Olea faced no consequences until after they went public to the Herald.
One of the victims and her mother went to the Key Biscayne Police Department in March 2012 with a love letter Olea had sent the 14 year-old girl.
The mother of the second victim spoke with then-Key Biscayne police chief Charles Press in late 2011 to tell him that her daughter had been raped by Olea.
Both families declined to press charges against the gymnastics coach, and there has been no indication that the police department investigated further.
In 2023, the parents of two of Olea’s more recent students also went to the police with allegations that the coach had abused their daughters, who are still minors.
The Key Biscayne Police launched an investigation, but the State Attorney’s Office closed that case in December 2023 with no charges.
The victim who had received a love letter from Olea at the age of 14 told the Herald how the coach had allegedly groomed her.
She said that he acted as an older brother to her during a difficult period of her life when her parents were going through a divorce, but that the brotherly relationship ended when he started to kiss her and sexually assault her during her private gymnastics lessons. She estimated that she had been assaulted around 10 times overall, at the American Gymsters gym, Olea’s house and in his car.
Both of Olea’s now-adult former students went back to the police days after the Herald investigation was published. His former colleague, who told the Herald Olea abused her when she was a minor, also reported her alleged abuse to the police around the same time.
The Key Biscayne Police Department quickly opened a new investigation and Olea was formally charged by the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office and and taken into custody less than a month after the Herald investigation was released.
Miami Herald reporter Clara-Sophia Daly contributed reporting.
This story was originally published August 14, 2025 at 12:13 PM.
