Ex-Basketball Coach who Admitted to Sex with Teen Died from Heart Attack in Prison

CASTAIC, CA - A former youth basketball coach who died in sheriff department custody in Castaic a week after he was sentenced to a year in jail for having sex with a 16-year-old girl died of a heart attack while playing basketball at the facility, authorities said Tuesday.

The coroner's office identified him as 47-year-old Carson resident Herman Charles Nash, who helped lead the boys basketball team at West Hollywood Pacific Hills to a state championship just three years ago.

The death at the Pitchess Detention Center North Facility at 29340 The Old Road was reported to the Sheriff's Homicide Bureau at 4:54 p.m. Wednesday, according to Deputy Ryan Rouzan.

An autopsy indicated that Nash had suffered a heart attack, coroner's Assistant Chief Ed Winter said. Nash had been playing basketball shortly before he collapsed, and his death has been listed as being from natural causes, Winter said.

Nash, who worked as a personal trainer in the Los Angeles area and as a basketball coach for the Pacific Elite Basketball Club, was sentenced on April 20 to a year in county jail and 52 weeks of sex offender treatment.

Police said after Nash's arrest last June that the girl he abused had received one-on-one training sessions from him.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Anne H. Egerton barred Nash from having any contact with the girl or any other minors other than his own children -- he had five -- and suspended a four-year, four-month state prison term that Nash would have had to serve if he violated the conditions of his five-year probation.

Nash was taken into custody immediately after the sentencing hearing to begin serving his jail term stemming from his March 3 no-contest plea to three counts of unlawful sexual intercourse. He had been scheduled for release on Oct. 9, about halfway through the one-year sentence, according to sheriff's online inmate records.

Defense attorney Robert Schwartz called his client a "beloved figure in the community" and a "remarkable man who made a terrible mistake."

According to a 2013 Los Angeles Times article, Nash was a running back at Manual Arts High School who graduated in 1987 and went on to play at Long Beach State. He went on to become an assistant coach of the boys basketball team at West Hollywood Pacific Hills, leading the squad to the 2013 state championship game after the head coach left during mid-season to coach the El Salvador national team.

Pacific Hills won the title game, but by then the head coach had returned.

--City News Service, photo courtesy of Pacific Hills