Guilty Plea For One In Texas ‘Fight Club’ Case
By Michelle DiamentAfter one former employee pleaded guilty, a judge ruled Tuesday that cell phone videos cannot be used in the trial of a second accused of forcing Texas institution residents with disabilities to fight each other.
D’Angelo Riley pleaded guilty Monday to three counts of causing injury to a disabled person. A former employee of the Corpus Christi State School in Corpus Christi, Texas, Riley was one of six charged after cell phone videos were discovered in March showing employees forcing residents to fight. Police said fights went on at the facility nearly every night for over a year. Riley is expected to be sentenced Thursday.
Meanwhile a judge said Tuesday that the cell phone videos would not be admissible as evidence at the trial of another former employee, Timothy Dixon. Prosecutors in the case said they would appeal the ruling and Dixon’s case is now postponed.
The judge’s ruling regarding use of the videos in Dixon’s trial will not have any bearing on whether or not the videos can be used in trials for the other former employees reports the Corpus Christi Caller-Times. To read more click here.
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That case sounds a lot like the old time institutions where the residents were treated as subhuman to be used by the staff as they pleased. One would almost expect this in a backward state like Texas, but it should have gone away in the 1970s. I had students back then who talked about staff abuse at their previous institution.
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