A Florida high school teacher who was the victim of a brutal stomping by a hulking student over a conflict about a video game system is refusing to help the teen’s defense team in the lessening of his sentence.
The February incident made national headlines for the sheer brutality of the vicious attack by the black 6’6″ 270-pound Brendan Depa on Joan Naydich, a white paraprofessional at Matanzas High School in Flagler County, who was savagely thrown to the ground by the oversized thug and then stomped on and pummeled before school staffers were able to prevent her from being killed.
(Video: YouTube/KPRC)
The then 17-year-old student was sent into a murderous rage after teachers ordered him to stop playing with a Nintendo Switch, hardly a reason that would merit such a violent response but such is the state of American schools where teachers are at constant risk of being attacked by their own pupils.
The stomping earned Depa – who is now 18 years old – a first-degree felony charge and in addition to the black mark on his record, the autistic brute is facing the prospect of spending decades behind bars, a punishment that the victim doesn’t seem to be willing to assist the defendant in avoiding, according to a report.
Naydich, who was hospitalized and released after the attack, has “shown no interest in mitigating what penalties Depa might face,” according to Flagler Live.
Depa was initially charged as a juvenile for the attack but the charges have been upgraded. The thuggish student had three previous arrests prior to the attack on Naydich and was involved in a “disciplinary issue” last month after a fight with a fellow inmate at the Flagler County jail.
“We were talking about my case, and he said I’m going to prison. A large black man attacks a small white woman guilty, so I attacked him,” Depa said of the jailhouse brawl, according to the Daytona Beach News-Journal.
Initial reports on the incident said that Naydich had confiscated the game from the student although she has denied doing so, not that it would have justified the beatdown if she had.
JUST IN: 6’6” 270 pound black male student attacks a white teacher at Matanzas High School for taking away his Nintendo Switch during class…
Video reveals the unconscious woman being brutally assaulted and struck in the head roughly 15 times. https://t.co/pZAJzhaykv
— Chuck Callesto (@ChuckCallesto) February 24, 2023
“This could have been a homicide,” said Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly. “When you push people down like that, they hit their head, you never know the outcome.”
“There is no agreed plea deal between the two sides, leaving it to what would be an open plea, meaning that Depa will leave it in Circuit Judge Terence Perkins’s hands to decide what his penalty ought to be. He can face anywhere from probation to 30 years in prison. Even though he was charged as an adult, the judge can also opt to sentence him as a juvenile,” Flagler Live reported.
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