John Gouveia, former president of Team USA Softball, accused of sex crimes with child

Posted on July 7, 2022     |     Sexual Abuse

John Gouveia, a former president of Team USA Softball, has been arrested and charged with eight counts of lewd and lascivious acts with a child younger than 14 according to the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office.

The Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office announced the charges Tuesday, July 5 and described the situation as an “active and ongoing criminal investigation.” The office asked members of the community to come forward with further information.

“I think this is important for the community to know what’s going on with this particular suspect,” said Sgt. Rod Grassmann, a spokesperson for the sheriff’s office.

Gouveia had previously worked for the national governing council for girls’ softball from 1991 to 2019, which officials said included travel nationally and internationally as commissioner of USA Softball of Northern California, as well as the president of USA Softball.

The sheriff’s office said that Gouveia also worked with the Hayward area recreation and park district for 25 years as general manager before retiring in 2016. Anyone with information that could assist this investigation is urged to contact the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office.

Manly, Stewart & Finaldi has represented hundreds of child sexual abuse victims of coaches and employees in California schools and Olympic Governing Bodies like USA Softball. We were the lead attorneys helping sexual abuse victims in recover $852 million from the University of Southern California.  We are also the lead attorneys representing Olympic athletes and victims of former US Olympic Women’s Gymnastics Team Doctor Larry Nassar and secured $890 million in settlements for our clients. We secured a $243.6 million settlement on behalf of sexual abuse victims at UCLA.In each of these cases we have helped victims and families get justice by conducting a thorough investigation of the organization and the school. We secured a settlement of $140 million on behalf of 81 child sexual abuse victims at Miramonte Elementary School in Los Angeles. This was the largest child sexual abuse settlement by a public school district in history. In many cases we have discovered that administrators and executives know that the perpetrator was a danger to children and either did nothing or actively covered up the crimes.