WINONA, Minn. – A Winona High School assistant track coach, already accused of sexual misdeeds with three students, now has been charged with violating a fourth student. Police investigators said that on Wednesday they found a Snapchat conversation between the coach, Eric Birth, and a high school senior back in 2018. The student, now in her 20s, confirmed there had been a relationship. Investigators immediately began paperwork for a new criminal complaint. County prosecutor Karin Sonneman filed the complaint within 24 hours with Winona County District Court. In summary these are incidents alleged against Birth:
> 2016. A five-month affair with a high school junior on the track team.
> 2017. At two-month affair with a high school junior on the track team.
> 2018. An encounter with a high school senior who, although on the track team, was not assigned to Birth’s tutelage.
> 2022. An assault forced on a high school senior on the track team.
Everybody masked. Birth signing up phys-ed students in gym during the CoVid crisis. This photo from September 2021.
The woman in the latest criminal complaint told police investigators that she and Birth had intercourse when she was 17. He was 27 or 28at the time. This, she said, was at her home out in the county while her parents were at work. The woman also told investigator that she had been called into the high school principal’s office back then and asked about stories that Birth had “done stuff” with some girls. The woman, now her 20s, said she lied to the principal telling him that nothing had happened. She was scared, the woman told a police investigator.