Youth Football Coach Accused of Punching Teen Player After ‘Heated’ Game

A coach on Saturday punched a juvenile player on the opposing team after a youth tackle football recreation league game in Murrieta, California, police said.

The postgame confrontation erupted on the field at Vista Murrieta High School, and local police responded shortly after 5:40 p.m., the Murrieta Police Department (MPD) said in a statement on Tuesday.

Eibylardo Funes, a 50-year-old coach for the Murrieta Broncos, was arrested on charges of battery and willfully harming a child, accused of assaulting 14-year-old Harlem Edwards, a player for the Perris Panthers.

Newsweek reached out to the MPD via email on Tuesday for comment.

The teen’s mom, Neenah Kaowili, told local media that she watched as her son was “punched in the face” by the opposing coach.

His mom told local station NBC4 that she feared her son wouldn’t be the same after he recovered. Kaowili told Newsweek that she was unavailable to speak on Tuesday night.

Edwards suffered a concussion and had a seizure on the field after being struck, according to a video his mother posted to Instagram and Facebook. Edwards was still in the hospital on Monday but his condition was unclear as of Tuesday night.

The youth league game was played at the high school but did not involve a coach within the Murrieta Valley Unified School District. Newsweek reached out via email on Tuesday to the president of the Murrieta Jr. All-American Youth Football League for comment and to try to contact Funes.

Despite what she described as an “extremely heated” game, Edwards did nothing to provoke the attack, Perris Panthers Youth Football Athletic Director Monique Moreno told Newsweek in a phone interview Tuesday night.

She said that in her more than eight years of experience in youth football, she had never witnessed anything like Saturday’s incident, which she told Newsweek was captured on the field’s video cameras.

“I don’t know why he would even hit the field in that aggressive way,” Moreno said of Funes. “Obviously, in the video, it shows him running onto the field and I believe he’s chasing another child first, and then makes his way to Harlem and Harlem is the one that gets hit.”

Moreno said that while she originally wasn’t at the game, she was asked to come to the field by the Panthers coaching staff, which said “there was a lot of aggression” from the Broncos. She said the referees weren’t doing their job and “failed to control the game.”

“I definitely send my love and prayers to their family,” Moreno told Newsweek. “I know that it was very traumatizing for them, especially having their 10-year-old and their 3-year-old there at the field watching their older brother on the ground.”

Funes has since been suspended from his coaching position, the Murrieta Broncos confirmed to the Los Angeles Times. Despite the coach’s suspension, Edwards’ family and the Perris Panthers Youth Football community say it’s not enough and are seeking justice and calling for Funes to apologize.

“Take responsibility for what you did,” Moreno said. “Apologize, genuinely and sincerely. You hurt many people that day. Their teens were taunting my kids, taunting the coaches. My kids were crying. My kids were on the floor hoping that their teammate would be OK. I feel like they should acknowledge that, and they should apologize. I feel like their chapter should be suspended. To me, I think that that’ll do us some type of justice.”