Court records show the pleas were filed Monday morning.

RELATED: Blue Earth Teen Pleads Not Guilty to Aiding and Abetting in Felony Assault

As part of a plea agreement, Dalton Lee Nagel, 18, pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting assault-third-degree substantial bodily harm, a felony, and criminal sexual conduct-fifth degree-nonconsensual contact, a gross misdemeanor.

Nagel had pleaded not guilty to the aiding and abetting charge back in March. The fifth-degree criminal sexual conduct charge was added Monday.

Sentencing is scheduled for July 9. Tonya and Dale Hurley, Colin’s parents, were in court Monday to see Nagel plead guilty.

“Obviously we knew and have always known the truth, but we needed to hear it out of his mouth,” Tonya said.

“Ever since this happened, people have tried to deny it, or minimize it, or ‘this didn’t happen,’ or ‘that didn’t happen,’ or even justify what happened, and now there is no justification,” Dale added.

 

Wyatt Eugene Tungland, of Frost, is charged with third-degree assault causing substantial bodily harm and aiding and abetting third-degree assault – both felonies. His next court appearance is scheduled for July 27.

Two juveniles allegedly involved were also charged with third-degree assault and aiding and abetting. 

The Hurley’s said the incident and its aftermath have had a profound effect on their family. Dale and Colin moved to Nebraska in January, citing backlash from some parts of the Blue Earth community. Tonya plans to make the move as well later this week.

“It feels so much more like my son was the one that was punished, and our family,” she said.

RELATED: Blue Earth Student Assault Divides Community; School Board Works to Build Trust

According to the original criminal complaint, police were notified Tungland had assaulted Colin Hurley, a former teammate on the Blue Earth Area football team, allegedly knocking him unconscious at a party in Winnebago on or about Oct. 19 of last year. Police interviewed several juveniles and created a list of persons of interest. 

Witnesses told police Tungland reportedly punched Hurley while Nagel and two others allegedly held him down. 

Hurley told police he had been in a fight with one of the juveniles, who had held him down prior to the fight. He told investigators he was attacked, pushed down and punched in the face at the party before he became unconscious, according to the criminal complaint.

Hurley showed up to football practice with his face swollen and bruised, the complaint says. He told police the juvenile with whom he was in a fight showed him a video of the attack and there was more to it. 

Hurley’s father said he has moved his son to Nebraska, telling KSTP his family just couldn’t get back to normal following the incident.

Months after a local high school football player was allegedly beaten savagely by four of his teammates, the city of Blue Earth is still reeling.

Public officials in the southern Minnesota town of 3,400 residents near the Iowa border don’t want to talk about what happened. Community members fear for their jobs if they take sides.

Meanwhile, in an interview last week, the father of the 16-year-old victim said that his family is leaving Blue Earth for good and moving out of state.

“My kid was a victim,” Dale Hurley said by phone as he drove to a job interview in Nebraska. “My son is a victim of an assault, I don’t care how you slice it. And here we have to move away from his home to be safe.

“I’m pissed. Really pissed.”

Many in town were stunned in November after learning that four Blue Earth Area football players were being charged with criminal felonies in the alleged assault on their teammate after the team’s final regular-season game a month earlier. The four attackers allegedly beat their victim unconscious at a house party, filmed the attack on a cellphone and showed it to him the next day, according to court records. They also showed it to other students and team members.

The victim suffered a concussion and missed several weeks of school. When he returned, his father said, some students harassed and mocked him over the incident, while some of his assailants followed him around in an attempt to intimidate him.

Tonya Hurley, the victim’s mother, took a leave of absence from her job as a paraprofessional at a local school. With their son at the center of a major scandal involving the school district, it was just too awkward to remain in town, Dale Hurley said.

Adding to the family’s difficulties — the house party where Hurley’s son was beaten took place at the home of Dale Hurley’s boss.

“It’s been impossible to work with her,” he said of his supervisor. “She and I had words. It has made work very uncomfortable.”

A relative of a boy at the party who wasn’t charged in the case followed Dale Hurley home recently and “asked me if I know what I’m doing,” Dale Hurley said. “I said ‘I do.’ And he said, ‘I don’t think you do.’

“And then he asked me if I had an attorney. Just a bulldog attempt to intimidate me.”

Community mum

In a small, tight-knit community the size of Blue Earth, those intersecting relationships are everywhere, which has made the situation even more complicated.

Four school board members declined to address the issue last week — two didn’t return repeated calls, and two others said they didn’t want to comment. A City Council member also didn’t return repeated calls.

Other community members also declined to discuss the incident, fearing for their jobs or the jobs of family members.

The parents of the alleged attackers, meanwhile, have made public pleas for leniency for their sons.

At a school board meeting earlier this month, the parents of three of the students facing charges complained that their sons were being treated too harshly by the school district in the wake of the attack. The alleged attackers were suspended from school for 10 days and barred from playing sports.

Mayor Rick Scholtes said last week that the best thing for everyone would be to leave Blue Earth alone to deal with the issues itself.

“The articles you guys are writing are making it worse,” he told a reporter. “Because as a community, we’re trying to heal and put this behind us. That’s how I feel and that’s how I think it’s affected the community.

“We just need to let it work its course and be done.”

Scholtes said Blue Earth is being unfairly scrutinized for events that have probably played out in other communities, as well.

“To me, these things happen everywhere, probably, and why are we being singled out?” he asked. “The negative publicity is hurting our community more than anything, and it drives a spike between both sides.

“For me, you have a few kids who made wrong choices, but the rest of the community is still a great place to live.”

Not for the Hurleys, who are reluctantly uprooting themselves from a place that they say always felt like home.

“This has approached a new level of low,” Dale Hurley said. “I get so angry sometimes. I’ve been quiet because I didn’t want to get fired from my job before I had another one.

“But it’s insane the mess it’s caused for us.”

After a beating at an October house party that left an underclassman unconscious, four football players who were allegedly involved were allowed to play in the state football tournament. The game happened in early November, shortly after police had opened the investigation but before the students were charged.

RELATED: Bullying Task Force Formed After Assault of Student Athlete

Since that game, the Blue Earth community has been divided as the four athletes were slapped with felony charges, leaving police, parents and the school district scrambling to figure out what went wrong.

“The boys have lawyers, which leaves them unable to tell their side of the story and leaves them extremely vulnerable,” said Dalton Nagel’s mother at Monday night’s Blue Earth Area School Board meeting. Nagel is one of the 18-year-olds charged for his role in the beating.

“We felt that it put a huge target on his back,” said Naomi Ochsendorf, of her minor son who also faces felony charges stemming from the incident.

She told the school board that she has now pulled her kids out of the district.

Ochsendorf’s sophomore son, as well as another minor, and 18-year-olds Dalton Nagel and Wyatt Tungland all face felony charges for their alleged involvement in the beating of a fellow football player at an October house party.

“What does this have to do with football? It didn’t happen on the football field,” said John Schavey, at whose house the assault occurred. Students and parents have reported seeing a video of the incident circulating at school.

RELATED: Parents Push School Board for Answers, Action Following Assault on Blue Earth Student

The victim’s family wasn’t at Monday night’s meeting, but his father, Dale Hurley, told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS, “These kids beat my son and showed him the video of them beating him in the locker room at school.”

It’s the same video Winnebago police asked the community to turn over at the start of the investigation, but it’s unclear if that has happened.

“Dalton has denied involvement in this incident since the first round of interviews that were done at the school,” said Nagel’s mother in defense of her son.

District officials say they can’t comment on the ongoing criminal case, but they have said they are working to change the school climate. That starts with a bullying task force that meets every six weeks.

The four students facing charges were also suspended for 10 days and are currently not allowed to participate in extracurricular activities. 

RELATED: 2 Blue Earth Area Football Players Plead Not Guilty to Assaulting Fellow Student Athlete

“I am very displeased with the fact that my son and three other boys involved in an incident outside of school and off school property have been attached to this whole bullying task force that was created at the school,” Dalton Nagel’s mother said. “These boys have not been proven guilty of anything in a court of law. Why are they being proven guilty at the school?”

This criminal case continues to move through the court system. The school district conducted its own investigation, which is now closed. 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS is working to learn what the investigation entailed and what resulted.