A Brooklyn 14-year-old’s high school football dreams came to a bloody end when his coach smashed his head into a wall, his anguished mom claims — and now she’s heading to court for answers.
Shayson Willock was allegedly pummeled so badly by coach Nicholas Nugent in a James Madison High School stairwell last September that he lost consciousness and needed six staples in his skull, according to a criminal complaint and civil lawsuit.
“I don’t know who to trust,” mother Deslyn Willock fumed to The Post, questioning school administrators who she felt largely swept the incident under the rug — and left it up to her to report the attack to the NYPD.
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“I don’t know if I can trust the teachers,” said Willock, who filed a $2.5 million lawsuit Monday against Nugent, the city and the Department of Education. “I don’t know if I can trust the coaches. I don’t even know if I can trust the justice system. I don’t know who to trust at this point, because I felt like everyone failed me. Everyone failed my son.”
Nugent was arrested days after the Sept. 18, 2023, incident — when he allegedly flew into a rage after the child dozed off during a team video review. The coach was charged with multiple counts of felony assault, endangering the welfare of a child, harassment and menacing, according to the criminal complaint against him.
He is now out on supervised release — although the DOE wouldn’t say if he was still employed by the school district.
Reached by phone this week, the coach said he couldn’t speak about the case.
“I’m shocked by the phone call to find out it’s a news thing, but hey, it is what it is. It’s all good,” Nugent said. “That’s why we’re going to trial, because I’m all about defending my freedom. I’m all about defending my rights.”
The DOE didn’t answer a list of questions about Nugent’s employment or the incident and instead issued a short statement.
“The safety of our students is our number one priority,” DOE spokesperson Jenna Lyle said. “We will review the lawsuit.”
The city’s law department declined to comment, citing the pending litigation.
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The lawsuit and family claim that Shayson was getting over a rough bout of COVID and was having trouble staying awake during the after-school video review in a classroom when Nugent kicked the kid out and followed him into the hallway.
Nugent then allegedly slammed Shayson into the wall multiple times and pushed him into a metal pole — before the teen ran back into the classroom with blood gushing from his head and Nugent in pursuit.
The high schooler said that’s when he passed out.
“He was trying to tell them that he needed to go to the bathroom so I could wipe off the blood,” Shayson said.
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When Shayson’s mom got the call that her son was bleeding from his head, she said, administrators told her that her son fell back during the argument even as she could hear her son screaming, “He hurt me, he hurt me.”
Willock claims she arrived before any ambulance did, despite coming from Queens and with an emergency room less than 500 feet away.
“I saw my son just lying there, bleeding from his head,” she said.
Shayson got six staples, was concussed — and hasn’t played football since, he and his mother said.
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Later MRIs suggest there could be a brain contusion and damage to his spine, said Willock’s lawyer, Richard Kenny.
“He has a compromised cervical region with multiple herniations,” Kenny said, “which is wholly abnormal for anyone remotely close to his young age.”
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Willock said she had to take leave from work to care for Shayson, who was out of school for a month and spent nights writhing in pain.
And although school principal Jodie Cohen was in touch and expressed concern over her son’s health, she felt officials didn’t seem to be concerned with the coach or reporting the incident to police.
“I don’t even think other parents really knew,” Willock said, noting she took her son to police herself days later to report the alleged attack.
Shayson has since switched schools, and by some measures, is thriving, but he said he can’t imagine playing sports again even if his doctor were to give him the green light.
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“I just didn’t like football anymore,” Shayson said, adding he stopped playing because “I didn’t know if it was gonna happen again.”
But his mom hopes that with time, Shayson will heal and they’ll get justice for what was taken from him.
“When the situation had just happened, he would tell me that he felt like he doesn’t have a life anymore,” Willock said. “He feels like everything was taken away from him.
“As a mother,” she said, “I would love for him to play football one day again.”
