At Fort Worth trial on pitcher’s death, 4 players say they got pills from Angels staffer
Four current or former Major League Baseball players took the witness stand in U.S. District Court in Fort Worth on Tuesday and testified that they received illicit painkilling pills from a Los Angeles Angels press relations employee.
Matt Harvey, a pitcher who is a free agent, said that on June 30, 2019, the day before his then-Angels teammate Tyler Skaggs died in a Southlake hotel room, he learned at the ballpark that he would not be flying that night with the team to Texas from Anaheim for series with the Rangers and Astros.
Disappointed with the travel decision, Harvey avoided other players whose spirits were higher.
“I felt left out,” he testified.
Harvey said that he asked Eric Kay, the director of the Angels press department, for a oxycodone pill. Harvey said that he asked Kay to leave the blue pill at his locker.
Harvey testified that his displeasure about not making the Texas trip later cooled, and he decided not to take the pill.
The next day he learned that Skaggs was dead.
“I threw the pill away,” Harvey testified.
Prosecutors allege that Kay provided Skaggs, 27, with a fentanyl-laced oxycodone pill that they allege killed him.
Kay’s trial began last week, and a jury is hearing evidence to determine whether he is guilty of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute a controlled substance and distribution of a controlled substance resulting in death and serious bodily injury.
Prosecutors rested their case on Tuesday afternoon, and Kay’s defense attorneys will begin to present on Wednesday.
Harvey testified that he and Skaggs previously ingested oxycodone at Angels Stadium and that, separately, Harvey has used cocaine.
After Skaggs died, Harvey took a flight to Texas and spoke briefly with Kay, who told him they should stay “together during this time,” Harvey testified.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office offered Harvey immunity from criminal prosecution in exchange for his truthful testimony.
Colorado Rockies first baseman C.J. Cron testified that he received small blue pills from Kay on perhaps eight occasions.
“Just a dumb decision, I guess,” Cron testified of his use of the narcotic.
Former Angels pitchers Cam Bedrosian and Michael Morin also testified that they received pills from Kay.
Also on Tuesday, Skaggs’ widow told jurors of her frustration in trying to get a response from her husband once he was in Southlake. He was usually quick to respond to her text messages.
“My husband wasn’t responding to my texts because he was dead,” Carli Skaggs testified.
About two weeks after Skaggs’ death, Kay shared with another press department employee an account of the hours before his body was found by an Angels security guard. Kay had been traveling with the team.
“He said he had something he needed to tell me,” Adam Chodzko testified.
On a car ride, Kay said that Skaggs had sent a text message to invite Kay to come to his room at a Hilton hotel in Southlake. Kay first declined, then went, he told Chodzko.
Skaggs had three lines of opiates on a hotel menu, Kay told Chodzko.
“He said he watched Tyler do the three lines,” Chodzko testified.
A forensic pathologist who performed the autopsy of Skaggs testified last week that his death was caused by a mixture of three substances that led Skaggs to aspirate, but stopped short of concluding definitively that Skaggs would have survived had he not ingested fentanyl.
Had Skaggs consumed only alcohol and oxycodone, the other elements of his mixed intoxication, there was “reduced probability” that he would have died, but it “can’t be eliminated,” Dr. Marc Krouse testified.
In her opening statement, Assistant U.S. Attorney Lindsey Beran told jurors that they would hear evidence that Skaggs would not have died but for ingesting fentanyl.
Kay, who has pleaded not guilty, rejected a plea offer in the case, Beran told U.S. District Judge Terry Means at a pretrial conference. She did not describe the terms of the offer.
Kay, 47, was indicted in July 2020.
This story was originally published February 15, 2022 at 1:53 PM.
