Bridgeton coach charged after teen sexual assault in Nixon Avenue home

Bridgeton police charged 73-year-old Robert A. Marino, known as Robert “Ronnie” Marino, after a 16-year-old boy said he was sexually assaulted inside Marino’s Nixon Avenue home. Prosecutors said the charge was filed July 4, a day after the alleged attack, putting a youth coach already tied to local sports under immediate criminal scrutiny.

Police said the teen was staying at Marino’s home on July 2, where Marino allegedly showed him gay pornography for hours and gave him alcohol before the assault. The victim later told investigators that Marino performed oral sex on him and that he stopped the assault by jabbing Marino with his knee. In the account described in the reporting, the teen later recorded a conversation in which Marino acknowledged what happened and apologized.

The location sharpened the concern in Bridgeton and across Cumberland County because the alleged abuse did not happen on a field, in a locker room, or at a school event. It happened in Marino’s own home, which investigators treated as part of a wider relationship between an adult youth coach and a teenager. That connection has pushed questions beyond the criminal charge itself and into the way young athletes are supervised when adults involved in sports have access to them outside formal practice settings.

Police also contacted area sports groups after Marino’s arrest, a sign the case reached beyond one family and into the network of teams, leagues, and organizers that put adults around teenagers. For parents, that raises immediate questions about whether coaches were properly screened, whether background checks were current, whether any one adult had unsupervised contact with players, and whether children knew how to report troubling behavior before it escalated.

The case widened further when a second alleged victim came forward and accused Marino of sexually assaulting him while he was a teenager. That added another layer of concern for Bridgeton’s youth sports community, where the central issue is no longer only one arrest on Nixon Avenue but whether the systems meant to protect children were strong enough to catch warning signs sooner.