Former coach charged with child rape has been attending Seattle school sporting events, judge finds

A former Garfield High School coach charged with raping a student violated his electronic home monitoring conditions by attending numerous high school sporting events last winter, a judge found.

Walter Junior Jones, 47, has had an ankle monitor since 2021 as he awaits trial in King County Superior Court on felony child rape charges. He allegedly repeatedly raped a girls’ basketball player beginning when she was a 13-year-old training with the Garfield team and he was a volunteer weight training coach.

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Under Jones' electronic home monitoring agreement, he was barred from contact with minors but allowed to leave home from 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. daily to work for his girlfriend’s dietary supplement business.

Seattle Public Schools officials notified county detention staff that Jones was seen at at least 13 high school sporting events between December and February, including at Garfield, Chief Sealth International, Ballard, Ingraham and Bellevue High Schools, and Eastside Catholic School. Detention staff told the court Jones was on a work pass at the time of the events, and ankle monitor GPS location records filed with the court confirmed that he was at the schools during the events.

Ankle monitor location records also placed Jones at Garfield High School or the neighboring Garfield Teen Life Center eight additional times in that two-month period.

Neither Jones’ attorney nor Seattle Public Schools replied to a request for comment. Jones’ accuser, now 24, has filed suit against the school district for allegedly allowing first Jones then a second athletic coach, Marvin Wayne Hall, to sexually abuse her for years — in some cases, she said, on school grounds. Hall faces a criminal charge of sexual misconduct in King County Superior Court related to the allegations.

In a hearing, Judge Melinda Young found that Jones’ attendance at the school sporting events was a violation of his electronic home monitoring conditions, and approved prosecutors’ request to restrict his 20-hour daily work pass.

“I’ve never seen an [electronic home monitoring] pass like this,” Young said. “It does, quite frankly, render EHM somewhat meaningless.”

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Young limited Jones’ work pass to end at 10 p.m. and indicated that he is not to be at youth sporting events. She reiterated that, aside from his son, Jones is allowed no contact with minors, including Jones’ girlfriend’s 16-year-old daughter.

The girl’s father, Littleton Miller, said he has been worried about his daughter’s proximity to Jones for years, and has tried in vain to get the court’s attention about the situation.

“It’s crazy to hear a judge re-stipulate that he’s not allowed to be around my 16-year-old daughter when he’s already been living with her," Miller said. "No child should live in fear inside their own home nor have to lock their bedroom door day and night, as she’s consistently been doing.”

“Seattle Public Schools, the courts, and the electronic home monitoring system are failing our children miserably,” he added.

Jones' child rape trial is scheduled to begin on Nov. 13.