Academy owners reeling after coach's arrest

When Jay Fisher and Rich Malacina took over St. Charles Gymnastics Academy about eight months ago, they didn't do it as good investors. They did it as good dads.

Fisher, of South Elgin, and Malacina, of Elburn, each had daughters who had attended the academy for years. And word of its closing left them worried their girls might have to leave a place that had become something of a second home. So they stepped up to the plate and took the business under their care, along with several longtime employees who were like family.

Among the employees was 33-year-old Shawn Bowlden of St. Charles, a coach adored by the academy's families and known for his generosity.

"He's been a very good guy, an excellent coach, always professional," Malacina reflected this week. "It's hard for us to see him as a felon."

Needless to say, word of Bowlden's arrest last week on 10 counts of child pornography possession blindsided Fisher and Malacina -- as business owners and fathers.

"My first instinct was, 'This is going to be bad,'" Malacina said. "Families trust and know us. We sympathize with them. My own girls were with (Bowlden) for six years. They're devastated by this."

Bowlden began working at the academy, 720 N. 17th St., in 1998, coaching girls' gymnastics teams. His coaching style was an immediate hit with parents and students. In 2004, he also was featured in the Daily Herald after donating a kidney to a colleague.

All of these things only add to the difficulty those who worked with him or entrusted their children with him have in believing authorities' allegations that he harbored 10 pornographic images involving children on his home computer. (Two days after his arrest, Bowlden's roommate, a gymnastics coach in Hanover Park, was booked on similar charges.)

Police say there's no indication that Bowlden had inappropriate contact with students. But the owners were quick to do their own interviews with families anyway, by phone and e-mail.

No one has reported anything out of the ordinary, Malacina says, and, so far, no one has told him of plans to pull their kids from the academy. That could mean the case might not be the fatal blow the business owners couldn't help but fear.

"I actually feel bad for the people who work there, being under such scrutiny right now," empathizes parent Leah Lee of South Elgin, whose 4-year-old son is in a preschool class. "But they've really handled it well."

Lee said a lot of parents take up the academy on its offer to watch their children during classes. Her son wasn't in Bowlden's group, but she said even friends whose kids were under him aren't so distraught by the allegations that they'll leave.

"For many of us, there wasn't an opportunity for anything odd to go on," Lee said. "And my son loves it there; I wouldn't take that away from him."

Malacina spent the weekend going over policies and procedures to put a renewed emphasis on supervised instruction and background checks, even though that was already common practice. The academy also fired Bowlden, even though he has not been convicted.

"You don't know what the outcome is going to be," Malacina said of the pending court case, "but nobody takes a chance with their kids.

"We wouldn't either."