Plea deal offered in cyber bully case

MARBLE FALLS, Texas (KXAN) - Parents of six Marble Falls teens charged with telephone harassment t for allegedly sending lewd and obscene text messages to a Dripping Springs football player are considering a plea deal in the case, according to the teens' defense attorney Eddie Shell.

Benjamin Causgrove, Donald Holland, Garrett Reitz, Zach Wagner and Jacob Wieweck, all age 17, along with another minor, are charged with harassment via telephone, a misdemeanor.

The messages contained homosexual slurs and profanities.

An arrest warrant shows one message said, "You better be prepared to get ripped limb from to ******* limb Friday night you big *****."

Another read, "Oh, so you are going to be a little ***** and not text back *****?"

Lt. Leroy Opiela with the Hays County Sheriff's Office said the Dripping Springs football player found those messages on his phone and told his parents.

An upcoming football game between the Marble Falls Mustangs and Dripping Springs Tigers was apparently behind the messages.

"The young man felt threatened by these messages," Opiela explained to KXAN last November.. "The letter of the law is on his side."

The misdemeanor charge carries up to a six-month prison sentence, but Shell said a pretrial diversion is being offered.

Under the offering, if the teenagers complete an undecided amount of community service, write letters of apology and take a bullying class, they will avoid jail time and fines.

Shell added that if the offer is taken, in two years, these charges would be expungable from the teen's records.

As of Wednesday, parents had not yet accepted the offer.

Shell said all six teens waived their rights to appear in court Thursday.