Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley today announced a three-count indictment charging a former New York high school basketball coach with sexually assaulting a young player and showing him pornography during a 1976 trip to Boston.

The Suffolk County Grand Jury today returned indictments charging ROBERT “BOB” OLIVA (D.O.B. 12/30/44) of Lynbrook, New York, with two counts of rape of a child and one count of disseminating pornography to a minor. The indictments stem from Oliva’s alleged actions with a New York boy, then 14, at the Sheraton Boston hotel in 1976.

“Cases of child sexual abuse are some of the most painful we see as prosecutors,” Conley said. “The victims can carry feelings of shame and guilt for decades before they’re ready to tell what happened to them. Oftentimes, it’s only in adulthood that they realize the abuse was not their fault.”

Oliva, who was a basketball coach at the time of the alleged offenses, knew the victim as a young player. Prosecutors allege that they travelled to Boston together and that the abuse took place from July 31 through Aug. 1, 1976. Prosecutors further allege that Oliva showed pornography to the boy during the same period.

Conley spearheaded efforts to extend the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse after repeatedly learning of older cases that could not be prosecuted because – as in the Oliva case – the victims did not disclose their abuse to law enforcement until many years later.

In 2006, those efforts paid off when the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse was extended from 15 years to 27 years.

It was a different aspect of the law, however, that allowed prosecutors to pursue the charges in this case, Conley said. Any time a defendant spends outside of Massachusetts is not counted against the statute of limitations. When Oliva returned to New York after the alleged abuse, the clock on the statute of limitations stopped, allowing prosecutors to pursue criminal charges in the 34-year-old case.

The victim disclosed the abuse to Boston Police last year. An extensive grand jury investigation led by Assistant District Attorney Leora Joseph, chief of Conley’s Child Protection Unit and deputy chief of the Family Protection & Sexual Assault Bureau, followed that disclosure and led to today’s indictments after the presentation of numerous witnesses.

Oliva is represented locally by defense attorney Michael Doolin. He is expected to face arraignment at Suffolk Superior Court at a later date.