‘I regret my actions,’ former New Jersey club field hockey coach on pleading guilty to charges of endangering the welfare of a child

The Somerset County Courthouse in New Jersey, where club field hockey coach Brett Clay pled guilty and was sentenced. Photo: File

Earlier this year, a Somerset County criminal judge in New Jersey banned a club field hockey coach from ever being able to work with youth in the Garden State.

Brett Clay, 40, pled guilty in December 2024 to charges of endangering the welfare of a child. He was sentenced in February by Judge Robert J. Wilson.

“I regret my actions,” Clay said during the hearing. “Stupidity is the best I can put it down to. And, I don’t play victim in anything that I’ve lost in terms of reputation, career. All of that. I accept that I give it up. I’m just looking forward to getting home and moving and, also, hoping that gives the victim and the family less anxiety of me still being here.”

Clay was arrested in April 2024. He made bail and eventually pled guilty.

He was sentenced to three years of probation, but because his work Visa ran out during his arrest, he is no longer in compliance with federal law, his attorney said. Clay agreed to leave the country, return to South Africa, where he is from, and to never work with or coach minors under the age of 18 in New Jersey.

Wilson ordered Clay to comply with a psycho-sexual evaluation, receive treatment, register on the New Jersey Megan’s Law Sex Offender Internet Registry list, and fulfill a DNA sampling prior to his departure.  

Clay was accused in early 2024, by one of his former female field hockey players, of inappropriately text messaging her.

The field hockey player’s parents discovered messages sent between Clay and their daughter in 2024. When the athlete was questioned about them, she said they had been texting for years. They then went to the authorities.

Due to the graphic nature of the messages, Clay was arrested.

Throughout the 256 pages of their thread of messages, authorities discovered that Clay persistently asked the athlete to share with him either non-explicit or explicitly detailed sexual stories, Wilson said. Clay had even told the athlete that he had “developed a plan for them to be together in the future.”

Brett Clay has been banned from working with minors in New Jersey. Photo: Somerset County Police

Clay’s messages included sexually graphic details about himself.

The nearly 45-minute February hearing began with the athlete’s dad approaching the judge.

He said: “to raise children, trust is an essential element in our community. You cannot supervise your child all the time, teachers, bus drivers, and any adult in charge require trust. Mr. Clay was my daughter’s youth sports coach. I trusted him to be a professional, to be a teacher, a mentor, what one would expect a youth coach to be.”

He said when he read the text messages shared between his daughter and Clay, he felt “horrified” and “overwhelmed” that Clay had made numerous requests for graphic content of her.

“His actions and his lack of moral and ethical judgment, he should never be allowed to be around children again,” he said.

Clay’s text messages were simple gestures in the beginning. He would ask where she was and what she was doing, according to the authorities. The text messages then became more intense. He started to ask her for naked photos and offered to pay her for the stories she was telling him, Wilson said.

She said, at that time, she didn’t think anything of the text messages. She told investigators that she was only playing along to receive money, Wilson said. Clay, being her coach, added a feeling of pressure that she had to text him.

The athlete was not at the hearing.

“I’m really, really, sorry for what you’ve gone through obviously,” Wilson said to the family during the sentencing. “I am going to sentence this man in accordance with this plea.”

Clay has agreed to: “not teach or coach anyone under the age of 18; not work a supervisory position of anyone age 18 or younger; not apply or volunteer in any position that involves children under the age of 18; and, not apply for employment in public or private schools in the state of New Jersey.”

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