From . . . www.houmatoday.com
"Ellender's assistant hits player"
Thursday night after footage from a school-bus surveillance camera showed him attacking a pair of his team?s players, authorities said.
Katrell D. Dixon, 28, 2189 Nixon Drive, Houma, an assistant football coach at Ellender High School, was charged with two counts of simple battery stemming from the Friday-night incident.
He has been suspended without pay from his dual jobs with the Terrebonne Parish public-school system. In addition to coaching, Dixon teaches special education at the School for Exceptional Children in east Houma.
School officials say the coach likely will be fired.
Dixon was released from the parish jail within two hours of his arrest after posting a $5,000 bond.
Katrell Dixon is the son of Kenneth
Dixon, Ellender High School?s longtime girls? basketball coach.
Katrell Dixon does not have published telephone number and could not be reached for comment this morning.
Dixon allegedly attacked two teen-age boys about 8:30 p.m. Friday on the team bus as they and dozens of other Ellender football players waited for the bus to take them from the Terrebonne High School stadium to their school.
"It looks like some of the players were Monday-morning quarterbacking and he took it the wrong way, but I don?t know how it escalated to that point," Terrebonne Parish Sheriff Jerry Larpenter said.
The incident happened immediately after Ellender?s 28-0 pre-season loss to H.L. Bourgeois High.
A student wearing jersey No. 8, identified as Brandon Woods on the team roster, is seated directly across the aisle from Dixon and says something to the coach.
Audio on the tape is garbled, but authorities say Woods told Dixon he had hoped to play more than he did.
At that point, Dixon stands a few inches away from the boy and leans over the player in a threatening manner. Dixon sits down and, still chastising the junior wide receiver and defensive back, pushes his right index finger hard into the boy?s temple.
That?s when a second player, seated several rows back and on the same side of the bus as Woods, yells to the coach that he shouldn?t be treating his teammate that way, authorities said. That player, wearing jersey No. 2, is identified on team rosters as senior running back Coty Jones.
The 6-foot-4-inch, 230-pound Dixon, shrugging off other coaches who try to hold him back, bounds over seats and players and hits the Jones in the head so hard that his helmet flies off.
The videotape shows Dixon swinging his closed fist a second time at the boy before other coaches are able to pull him off.
In the struggle to stop the fight and get Dixon off the moving bus, a melee ensues and other, smaller fights break out among players.
Neither Woods nor Jones was injured in the incident, officials said.
Authorities say none of the coaches, the players or their parents contacted them about the incident and that they got the tape sometime Wednesday from school officials.
When detectives saw the footage, one officer said, authorities immediately realized that the situation was serious and an arrest would be forthcoming.
"It was obvious that the coach hit one guy pretty hard and poked the other guy pretty good," said one officer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
School officials say they didn?t learn of the incident until Tuesday morning, when they returned to work after the long Labor Day weekend.
Dixon recently started work at Ellender and is one of several assistant football coaches. But he taught special education at the School for Exceptional Children in east Houma for several years, said board member Greg Harding.
"We?ve taken the matter with the utmost seriousness," Terrebonne Parish schools Assistant Superintendent Philip Martin said.
Martin said Ellender Principal Marilyn Schwartz knew about the bus fight Friday night but did not know the tape existed.
Schwartz said this morning that she had spent the weekend talking with players and coaches about what happened. She viewed the tape Tuesday morning.
Immediately afterward, school officials suspended Katrell Dixon.
"I don?t know that anybody could have predicted something like this would happen," she said. "Once we found out, immediate action was taken."
Cameras have been on a smattering of school buses for a few years, but all school buses were equipped with the devices this past spring. The cameras are there, school officials say, to serve as a deterrent to rowdiness.
"It was immediately clear when we saw the tape," said Martin. "He was suspended immediately."
Although there is a somewhat-involved process to firing a School Board employee, Martin said he did not expect Dixon?s termination to take too long.
"We are very certain this will be a very quick process but we have to make sure we follow the law," said Martin.
Harding, a longtime coach and supporter of Terrebonne Parish athletics, said he was disturbed by what he witnessed on the tape. He said there is some concern among Ellender's football coaches that team morale will be impacted as the Patriots play their season-opener against South Terrebonne High tonight.
Harding said the incident likely not shut down Ellender?s football program and hopes it will instead be an "incident that will gel the team together."
"Ellender's assistant hits player"
Thursday night after footage from a school-bus surveillance camera showed him attacking a pair of his team?s players, authorities said.
Katrell D. Dixon, 28, 2189 Nixon Drive, Houma, an assistant football coach at Ellender High School, was charged with two counts of simple battery stemming from the Friday-night incident.
He has been suspended without pay from his dual jobs with the Terrebonne Parish public-school system. In addition to coaching, Dixon teaches special education at the School for Exceptional Children in east Houma.
School officials say the coach likely will be fired.
Dixon was released from the parish jail within two hours of his arrest after posting a $5,000 bond.
Katrell Dixon is the son of Kenneth
Dixon, Ellender High School?s longtime girls? basketball coach.
Katrell Dixon does not have published telephone number and could not be reached for comment this morning.
Dixon allegedly attacked two teen-age boys about 8:30 p.m. Friday on the team bus as they and dozens of other Ellender football players waited for the bus to take them from the Terrebonne High School stadium to their school.
"It looks like some of the players were Monday-morning quarterbacking and he took it the wrong way, but I don?t know how it escalated to that point," Terrebonne Parish Sheriff Jerry Larpenter said.
The incident happened immediately after Ellender?s 28-0 pre-season loss to H.L. Bourgeois High.
A student wearing jersey No. 8, identified as Brandon Woods on the team roster, is seated directly across the aisle from Dixon and says something to the coach.
Audio on the tape is garbled, but authorities say Woods told Dixon he had hoped to play more than he did.
At that point, Dixon stands a few inches away from the boy and leans over the player in a threatening manner. Dixon sits down and, still chastising the junior wide receiver and defensive back, pushes his right index finger hard into the boy?s temple.
That?s when a second player, seated several rows back and on the same side of the bus as Woods, yells to the coach that he shouldn?t be treating his teammate that way, authorities said. That player, wearing jersey No. 2, is identified on team rosters as senior running back Coty Jones.
The 6-foot-4-inch, 230-pound Dixon, shrugging off other coaches who try to hold him back, bounds over seats and players and hits the Jones in the head so hard that his helmet flies off.
The videotape shows Dixon swinging his closed fist a second time at the boy before other coaches are able to pull him off.
In the struggle to stop the fight and get Dixon off the moving bus, a melee ensues and other, smaller fights break out among players.
Neither Woods nor Jones was injured in the incident, officials said.
Authorities say none of the coaches, the players or their parents contacted them about the incident and that they got the tape sometime Wednesday from school officials.
When detectives saw the footage, one officer said, authorities immediately realized that the situation was serious and an arrest would be forthcoming.
"It was obvious that the coach hit one guy pretty hard and poked the other guy pretty good," said one officer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
School officials say they didn?t learn of the incident until Tuesday morning, when they returned to work after the long Labor Day weekend.
Dixon recently started work at Ellender and is one of several assistant football coaches. But he taught special education at the School for Exceptional Children in east Houma for several years, said board member Greg Harding.
"We?ve taken the matter with the utmost seriousness," Terrebonne Parish schools Assistant Superintendent Philip Martin said.
Martin said Ellender Principal Marilyn Schwartz knew about the bus fight Friday night but did not know the tape existed.
Schwartz said this morning that she had spent the weekend talking with players and coaches about what happened. She viewed the tape Tuesday morning.
Immediately afterward, school officials suspended Katrell Dixon.
"I don?t know that anybody could have predicted something like this would happen," she said. "Once we found out, immediate action was taken."
Cameras have been on a smattering of school buses for a few years, but all school buses were equipped with the devices this past spring. The cameras are there, school officials say, to serve as a deterrent to rowdiness.
"It was immediately clear when we saw the tape," said Martin. "He was suspended immediately."
Although there is a somewhat-involved process to firing a School Board employee, Martin said he did not expect Dixon?s termination to take too long.
"We are very certain this will be a very quick process but we have to make sure we follow the law," said Martin.
Harding, a longtime coach and supporter of Terrebonne Parish athletics, said he was disturbed by what he witnessed on the tape. He said there is some concern among Ellender's football coaches that team morale will be impacted as the Patriots play their season-opener against South Terrebonne High tonight.
Harding said the incident likely not shut down Ellender?s football program and hopes it will instead be an "incident that will gel the team together."