The six-foot-six, 270-pound Florida teen who savagely beat a teacher unconscious over a Nintendo Switch in February 2023 has been sentenced to five years in prison despite pleas from his mother to take his autism into consideration.
Brendan Depa, now 18, was a 17-year-old student at Matanzas High School in Palm Coast when security cameras captured him brutally attacking Joan Naydich, a paraprofessional who has been forced to live off of donations after suffering the terrifying ordeal.
In the video, Depa can be seen running up to Naydich, then 57, in the hallway and throwing her to the ground, stomping on her, and beating her head and body with his fists:
In Flagler County, Florida, a 17-year-old student at Matanzas High School is alleged to have ambushed and physically attacked a teacher's aide, leaving her unconscious, according to police. pic.twitter.com/sNuaxx1q88
— Inside Edition (@InsideEdition) February 27, 2023
The assault left the teacher with five broken ribs, a severe concussion, and hearing loss, she told Fox 35 in November. Her speech has slowed, as she also suffers from ongoing cognitive issues as a result of the beating.
“Everybody that knows me or knew me [before the attack] knows that I’m a totally different person now,” Naydich said. “My whole life was just turned upside down.”
She showed no interest in helping Depa get a lesser sentence after he was tried as an adult and pleaded no contest to felony aggravated battery charges in October.
“He definitely needs to be in jail,” Naydich told the New York Post in January, adding, “He needs to be in jail for what he did to me. I’m in my own jail of sorts every single day I wake up.”
She also alleged that the teen had spat in her face and called her a “whore” before the attack took place and after he found out that she directed another staff member to confiscate his Nintendo Switch gaming device.
Leanne Depa, who adopted her son when he was just five months old, broke down in tears at the sentencing hearing, telling the judge, “I beg you to let him come home with me.”
While facing a maximum of 30 years in prison, Depa got away with just five years behind bars and 15 years of probation, the Daily Mail reported.
“Brendan, he has had a hard life,” Leanne Depa explained in court, saying that her son “felt abandoned” after being sent to live in a residential treatment facility in North Carolina when he was 14.
“He struggles with autism and behavioral issues, but … I was able to manage Brendan because I knew Brendan, and I knew his triggers, and I knew his needs and his strengths”
Assistant State Attorney Melissa Clark said that Depa assaulted doctors and staff when he was previously in the facility.
After he got out of the facility, Depa was sent to a group home, where he had to be restrained at one point before returning to his mother’s house and public school in 2021.
According to Leanne Depa, electronics are his biggest “trigger.”
“I had told the school that being hungry was a trigger, that noise was a trigger, that being told no was a trigger, that being corrected in front of other people was a trigger, and electronics was a huge trigger,” she said in court.
After the sentencing, the distraught mother claimed the judge punished her son based on his race.
“They are punishing that he is black; they are punishing that he is large, and they are punishing his disability,” she told the Daytona Beach News-Journal.
She added that the school district failed Brendan.
“I think he needs help — absolutely, 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,” Leanne Depa said.
Depa can file an appeal but is still ordered to have no contact with Naydich, the New York Post reported.
