David Andrew Adams

PARKERSBURG — A former local swimming coach was sentenced Friday to five to 25 years in prison on sexual abuse charges.

David Andrew Adams, 38, of Parkersburg, was sentenced by Wood County Circuit Court Judge Jason Wharton to not less than one nor more than five years on each of five counts of first-degree sexual abuse. The sentences will be served consecutively, so the earliest he would be eligible for parole is after five years, according to his attorney, William Merriman.

Adams, a former YMCA swim coach, will also be subject to 50 years of supervised release, according to the Wood County Circuit Clerk’s Office. Under the terms of a plea agreement approved in December, he must pay $10,000 in restitution for each count and register as a sex offender for life.

Adams entered an Alford plea, which allows him to not admit guilt but acknowledge there was enough evidence for him to be convicted of the charges.

“He decided it would be in his best interest, even though he maintains his innocence, to accept this plea,” Merriman said.

He said this was due in part to the way the prosecution presented the case and “over-charged” his client in the indictment, which was returned by the Wood County Grand Jury in September 2024.

David Wayne Hancock of the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office served as the special prosecutor on the case.

He could not immediately be reached for comment Friday, but his office said their policy usually is to refer questions about sentencings to the circuit clerk’s office.

Adams was originally indicted on two counts of felony sexual assault in the first degree, three counts of felony sexual assault in the third degree, 11 counts of felony sexual abuse by a person in a position of trust, two counts of felony sexual abuse in the first degree and nine counts of felony sexual abuse in the first degree.

At the plea hearing in December, it was said that Adams touched girls in a sexual manner under the guise of coaching them as part of the Parkersburg Sharks team at the YMCA of Parkersburg.

A mother of one of the girls, who wished to remain anonymous, said after Friday’s sentencing that other parents and victims were not happy that Adams didn’t get a longer sentence but felt good about seeing him in an orange prison jumpsuit.

“It looked like there was finally some accountability for his actions,” she said. “None of us are thrilled with the sentencing.

“Even today, he did not apologize or show a bit of remorse or even accept any accountability or responsibility for what he did.”

There was opposition to the plea deal among at least some victims and their families, which Hancock acknowledged in the December plea hearing. He said the state believed the victims’ claims but wanted to spare them from having to testify in a trial. He also said some details in the claims had changed over time, which could have led members of a jury to have reasonable doubt.

Merriman said Friday that he believed there were compelling arguments for his client to be found not guilty, but “you do not ever know what a jury will do.”

Merriman had requested alternative sentencing – either home confinement or probation – and said a required psychological sexual evaluation indicated Adams was a good candidate.

The mother who wished to remain anonymous said Friday that it felt like Adams was receiving a slap on the wrist for what he had done. If the case had gone to trial, she said, the court would have seen how guilty he was and he would have faced a much longer sentence.

“I think it is a slap in the face of the victims,” she said, adding she believed Adams was treated better than the children in the case. “I think he got away lightly. We are happy that he will at least be serving five years in a correctional center.”

Staff reporters Brett Dunlap and Douglass Huxley contributed to this story.

Evan Bevins can be reached at ebevins@newsandsentinel.com