The Florida teen who beat his high school teacher’s aide over a Nintendo Switch was sentenced Tuesday to five years in prison.
Brendan Depa, now 18, pleaded no contest last year to felony aggravated battery for the attack on paraprofessional Joan Naydich.
The teacher was left with five broken ribs, hearing loss and a severe concussion, the New York Post reported.
Depa, donning glasses and an orange prison-issued jumpsuit, tossed his head back when Circuit Judge Terence Perkins handed down his punishment for the Feb. 21, 2023, assault in a hallway inside Matanzas High School in Palm Coast.
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He faced a maximum of 30 years in prison, according to the Daytona Beach News-Journal.
The teen was also sentenced to 15 years of probation. When he’s released from prison, he’ll be placed in a group home, court records show.
Depa’s defense attorney unsuccessfully argued that the teen, who has autism spectrum disorder, should receive a probation-only sentence given his disability and age at the time of the attack.
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But Assistant State Attorney Melissa Clark said the brutality of the assault warranted prison time.
“I counted 15 times that he punched her while she was completely unconscious,” Clark told the court, according to the News-Journal. “But for those five people pulling him off, I don’t think she would be here today.”
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The beatdown was captured on surveillance footage that has since gone viral. The 6-foot-6 teen, weighing 270 pounds, called Naydich a “whore” and spat in her face before she fled the classroom.
Depa, then 17, can be seen chasing Naydich into the hallway and shoving her to the ground. The teacher’s limp body can be seen on the floor as Depa stomps on her before repeatedly punching her.
The teen’s mother blamed the school district for failing her son.
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“They are punishing that he is Black, they are punishing that he is large, and they are punishing his disability,” she told the local newspaper after the sentencing. “I think he needs help, and I think he needs treatment. But I don’t think he needs to be put away in a prison where he’s going to be taken advantage of or harmed.”
Depa filed a lawsuit against the school district, alleging that educators failed to create an appropriate treatment plan to address his prior violent outbursts and behavioral challenges.
“The district should be held to account for its failures which have forever changed the trajectory of this young man’s life,” the lawsuit alleges.
