That’s the Aug. 7 ruling from the Utah Supreme Court, which said the 3rd District Court should not have dismissed the charges against coach Lani Wilcox because her belief that the student would hurt other players or an assistant coach wasn’t “objectively reasonable.”
“We reverse the district court’s dismissing the charges and remand for further proceedings,” the justices wrote.
Wilcox’s defense attorney, Clayton Simms, did not immediately respond to KPCW’s request for comment Monday, Aug. 11.
The now 65-year-old Wilcox was accused of grabbing the then-16-year-old teen and taking her to the ground in a chokehold after the slap. Summit County prosecutors charged the coach with one count of third-degree felony aggravated child abuse and a class B misdemeanor count of damage to a communications device.
At a 2023 hearing to determine whether Wilcox was justified in her actions, Simms argued Wilcox had restrained the player to protect others and said a jury would likely find she had acted in self-defense.
Judge Richard Mrazik dismissed the case, saying prosecutors failed to prove the use of force was not justified. That was despite his belief that the student posed less of a risk to others once she broke free from Wilcox and began walking away.
Prosecutors appealed to the state’s highest court to challenge Wilcox’s defense-of-others claim, asking justices to decide whether the use of physical force was proportional with the perceived threat – or in other words, reasonable.
In its ruling, the court said Mrazik “erred in concluding that Wilcox’s belief that [the student] was an imminent threat to others on the tennis courts was objectively reasonable.”
On appeal, justices said, prosecutors established that a reasonable person would not believe the student might attack other players or the assistant coach.
“At best the evidence showed that Wilcox used force too early, given that [the student] would need to travel a meaningful distance before she could attack anyone else with the tennis racket or her own hands,” the ruling states.
The ruling is the first one decided by the court since the Utah legislature handed judges the power to decide if use of force was justified before sending a case to trial. Historically the decision was left to juries.
If Wilcox is convicted of the third-degree felony child abuse charge, she could spend up to five years in prison. The class B misdemeanor count carries a possible penalty of six months in jail and/or a $1,000 fine.
No new hearings have been set in the case.
