Former Rockwall-Heath football coach, 12 others sued over push practice that hospitalized athletes

The mother of a Rockwall-Heath High School student is suing the school’s former head football coach and 12 assistant coaches after a report found intense practices left her son and others. student athletes admitted last year.

Valencia Smith’s son — a minor who is not named in the lawsuit — was seriously injured during an eighth-period drill as punishment by then-head coach John Harrell and his assistant coaches, according to a lawsuit filed in district court Rockwall County. Monday.

She accused Harrell and the other coaches of negligently forcing students to do excessive exercise without water or rest, knowing it could cause injury — namely, a muscle condition called rhabdomyolysis — and ignoring instructions from the school’s athletic director not to use corporal punishment to discipline athletes.

“It’s not a situation where guys are complaining just because they were tired after a practice,” Mike Sawicki, Smith’s attorney, told KERA News. “Rhabdomyolysis is actually a documented, known, dangerous physical condition caused by overuse that can have serious permanent consequences. Just asking people to deal with the situation, not seeking treatment or acknowledging that they might have been hurt could have made things significantly worse for some of the boys.”

Smith is seeking more than $250,000 in damages. Sawicki said her son is still receiving treatment for his rhabdomyolysis symptoms, but did not elaborate.

Harrell declined to comment when reached by phone Thursday. Rockwall ISD could not be reached for comment — the district is closed until Jan. 6, 2025. The law firm that represented Harrell in the previous lawsuits is also closed and did not respond to a request for comment.

The lawsuit draws most of its claims from a March 2023 27-page investigative report prepared by the outside law firm Adams, Lynch and Loftin, which was commissioned by Rockwall ISD. Sawicki provided the report to KERA News.

At least 26 Rockwall-Heath student athletes were either diagnosed with rhabdomyolysis, which occurs when damaged muscle tissue releases proteins and electrolytes into the blood, or had symptoms consistent with the condition, according to the report. All of these cases came from student-athletes who participated in practices during the first period of athletics on January 4, 5, 6 and 9, 2023, or the eighth period athletic practice on January 6, 2023.

The report states that Harrell created a training plan for the athletes, including what was supposed to be a quick warm-up. Harrell said it was his assistant coaches who oversaw the workouts while he went to the weight room.

Eighth-period students confirmed they will be assigned push-ups for a variety of conduct issues during warm-ups, which they said include wearing the wrong clothes, making mistakes, attitude problems or negative interactions with coaches and teammates, and not putting in enough effort.

The investigation found that coaches would require the entire group to do push-ups rather than individually calling out students who made mistakes. Water was available during the training, but few of the students went to get water, according to the report. During the interviews, these students said that they would never ask for permission to drink water during training because it would make them look weak.

The report says a student who wanted to wash the blood off his knee tried to get water but was unable to get it from the team’s mobile water tank.

Penalties for push-ups began about six seconds after warm-ups began, and students would be forced to restart their sets multiple times, according to video evidence detailed in the report. After the last set, Harrell talked to the students in the weight room and an assistant coach told him the group had committed 23 mistakes. Some students used the calculators on their phones and concluded that they did 16 push-ups by mistake, or about 369 push-ups.

Some parents echoed the statement that their children were forced to do 300 to 400 push-ups without water breaks, but the report found that it was unlikely that all eighth-graders would actually do all of the nearly 400 push-ups based on the video.

Later on Friday, January 6, was when athletes began reporting swelling and dark urine, symptoms consistent with rhabdomyolysis. Harrell said he didn’t know what the condition was before athletic trainers told him that’s what they thought the athletes were dealing with, according to the report.

Shortly after the students were admitted, he was on his way to the hospital to visit them before being called to a meeting with district officials, the report said.

Although the investigation found that Harrell did not intentionally or knowingly cause the outbreak of rhabdomyolysis, it nevertheless concluded that his practices were recklessly implemented and endangered the health of his athletes and violated the Educator Code of Ethics . The inquest found no evidence that the boys were responsible for their own injuries.

Harrell was placed on administrative leave shortly after the hospitalizations and later resigned from Rockwall ISD.

Harrell was previously sued in September 2023 by parents Osehotue Okojie and Maria Avila in two separate lawsuits, but Sawicki — who represented those families — said the two cases were settled for an undisclosed amount.

Sawicki’s team was made aware of the investigative report only after those initial lawsuits were filed, he said. He added that Smith’s lawsuit is moving forward because an insurance company representing the coaches has declined to settle her case.

“I’m not trying to make Coach Harrell out to be a bad individual, but he made a careless mistake about threats that he should have known about that could affect these boys and they affected these guys,” Sawicki said. “So we’re just hoping to hold him accountable.”

The report said other students may have been diagnosed with rhabdomyolysis but did not seek medical help – and those who did chose not to come to school with their diagnoses.

Parents and students rallied around Harrell after he was placed on leave, attending a school board meeting in January 2023 wearing “Keep Harrell” shirts and expressing admiration for his leadership.

But other students and parents were afraid to come forward about their symptoms because of how the school community reacted to cases of rhabdomyolysis, according to the lawsuit.

Some students said they were harassed online, including in a conversation with the Snapchat team, according to the complaint. Some parents said online comments insulted the injured players and questioned their masculinity. The lawsuit called it a “whisper campaign” that discouraged affected students from complaining.

The messages between the coaches showed that some of them believed that the students’ symptoms were caused by the use of nutritional supplements. At least one assistant coach contacted the students to find any connection between their rhabdomyolysis diagnoses and supplement use, but there was no specific evidence to support that claim, according to the report.

The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services confirmed last year that it was conducting an investigation into what happened, but did not release any other details. A DFPS spokesman said Thursday that details of the investigation are confidential.

The report recommended Rockwall ISD hire a full-time certified strength and conditioning specialist to work with coaches as they develop training plans. Investigators also recommended the district ensure that the athletic director properly oversees offseason practices and that athletic trainers and administrators receive rhabdomyolysis training.

The hope for the lawsuit, Sawicki said, is that this case will prevent other students from developing rhabdomyolysis, which can cause permanent disability or even death.

“It just takes a little common sense at first,” he said. “It’s like, you know, doing the speed limit or stopping at a red light — you just have to be aware of the threat.”

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