FORT WORTH -- A pizza deliveryman who died more than a year after being robbed and severely beaten with a baseball bat was a homicide victim, the Tarrant County medical examiner's office has ruled.
Fred Rein died Dec. 30 from complications of blunt trauma to his head and brain due to the assault during the robbery, the medical examiner's office concluded Monday on its website. The ruling's effect on a teen convicted of delinquent conduct/aggravated robbery in the case remains uncertain."I would like to see him charged with murder and put away for a lot longer than what he was given originally," said Jackie Rein, the victim's widow.Tarrant County District Attorney Joe Shannon said his office is studying whether a murder charge can legally be sought against the teen who beat Rein with the bat."If we can't go any further, then we'll obviously have to obey the law," Shannon said. "If it's up in the air, which it looks like it may be, I'm not opposed to making a little case law on it."In January 2010, the teen, then 16, was sentenced by state District Judge Jean Boyd to the maximum of 40 years' confinement after he admitted luring Rein to a vacant house in October 2009 by ordering a pizza, then hitting him in the head with an aluminum bat.A hearing is scheduled for Feb. 17 to determine whether that teen, now 17, should be transferred to the adult prison system or remain in a Texas Youth Commission facility.Two other teens, ages 15 and 16 when they were arrested, pleaded guilty to delinquent conduct/aggravated robbery and received five years in a TYC facility. A fourth teen was arrested and has not been formally charged.Rein suffered brain damage from the attack and he returned home from a North Texas rehabilitation facility in March."He had good days and bad days but he had more bad days than good through the year," Jackie Rein said.She said his behavior was comparable to that of an unruly child, or, at other times, an Alzheimer's patient. During his last few weeks of life, she said, it became evident that her husband no longer knew who she was when he called her by the name of a former nurse."He said: 'You're a really nice lady. When I get to go home, I'm going to take you with me,'" Jackie Rein said.She said she always knew that her husband's death resulted from the attack and is glad the medical examiner's office concluded the same. She points to the teen's history of trouble, including one year probation of for throwing bricks at vehicles from an overpass, as evidence that he cannot be rehabilitated."We love Fred," she said. "He was our family and he's gone. I don't want for him to have died in vain. I don't want this to ever happen to anyone else."Deanna Boyd, 817-390-7655Have more to add? News tip? Tell us
