The jury in the case against former Los Angeles Angels communications director Eric Kay has found him guilty of distributing fentanyl and causing the death of former pitcher Tyler Skaggs in 2019.
The jury, which began deliberations Thursday morning, wasted little time in reaching its conclusion. The 10-woman, two-man jury needed just three hours to arrive at its verdict.
Kay was immediately taken into custody while his family sat in silence as the verdict was read.
“We’re obviously disappointed in the verdict. We thought there were many reasons to doubt the government’s case,” said Reagan Wynn, one of Kay’s attorneys. “This is a tragedy all the way around. Eric Kay is getting ready to do minimum 20 years in a federal penitentiary and it goes up from there. And Tyler Skaggs is gone.”
Skaggs’ wife, Carli, and mother Debbie Hetman, shared an emotional hug upon hearing the verdict.
Sentencing for Kay has been set for June 28. He faces a minimum of 20 years in prison.
“This case is a sober reminder: Fentanyl kills. Anyone who deals fentanyl – whether on the streets or out of a world-famous baseball stadium – puts his or her buyers at risk. No one is immune from this deadly drug,” U.S. Attorney Chad E. Meacham said in a statement.
Kay and Skaggs met in 2017, soon beginning a relationship in which the two used drugs together, sometimes even in the team’s clubhouse. Kay told U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents in 2019 that Skaggs introduced him to a dealer, and paid for both men’s drugs while Kay handled the transactions. Over the next few seasons, Skaggs connected at least four other Angels players with Kay, telling them that Kay could provide them with oxycodone
On June 30, 2019, the Angels flew to Texas for a series against the Rangers. Before the flight, evidence shows, Skaggs asked Kay for several pills. That night, after the team had arrived, Skaggs texted Kay to come up to his room.
Kay told investigators that he did not have pills with him, and that when he arrived in Skaggs’ room there were already drugs on Skaggs’ desk. Kay said he did not ingest any drugs and that Skaggs was conscious when he left.
The next morning, July 1, when Skaggs did not respond to multiple texts and calls from his wife, team security officials checked his room and discovered him dead.
During seven days of testimony, the government tried to establish that no one but Kay could have given Skaggs the pills, the fentanyl in those pills killed him, and that the transaction took place in Texas.
The defense spent its 11 ½ hours of testimony trying to poke enough holes in the government’s case to establish reasonable doubt: Skaggs had several drug sources who could have gotten to him before or after the flight; no one can say definitely that the fentanyl killed him and not the alcohol or oxycodone; there is no evidence that a crime was committed in Texas.
The Tarrant County medical examiner, Dr. Marc Krouse, determined that Skaggs asphyxiated on his vomit after ingesting fentanyl, oxycodone and alcohol. He ruled the death to be accidental. But the government had other experts review Krouse’s autopsy and the toxicology, and they determined that it was the fentanyl was the “but for” of Skaggs’ death: “but for” the fentanyl, Skaggs would still be alive.
Information from the Associated Press was used in this report