SANTA ANA, Calif. — Both the wife and the mother of Tyler Skaggs testified on Monday as plaintiffs in their wrongful death civil suit against the Los Angeles Angels. Carli Skaggs, Tyler’s wife, was questioned by both sides, while Tyler’s mother, Debbie Hetman, still has to be cross-examined by the team’s attorneys.
In emotional testimony, both Carli and Debbie talked about their relationship with Tyler, his death and its aftermath. On cross-examination, Carli was pressed on whether she was aware of her husband’s drug use.
Carli and Debbie, along with Tyler’s father, Darrell Skaggs, are the three plaintiffs in the suit. Their case is centered on the contention that the Angels knew or should have known that the team’s ex-communications director, Eric Kay, was providing pills to Tyler.
Kay is serving 22 years in federal prison for providing the fentanyl-laced pill that Tyler ingested, leading to his death on July 1, 2019.
“I don’t want anyone going through what I’m going through,” Carli said early in her testimony. “It’s extremely important to me that the Angels are held accountable for their actions and inactions.”
Direct examination began with Skaggs attorney Shawn Holley asking Carli if she was angry. She said she was, both at the Angels, and at her husband, because he isn’t there to talk about how she feels about what happened.
She talked about their six years together: How Tyler unsuccessfully courted her in 2012; how they went on a first date a year later; and the day he sat her down in his room, looked her in the eyes, and asked her to be his girlfriend.
She recounted his marriage proposal, the way he shared their engagement news immediately on social media, and their wedding day.
Throughout their relationship, Carli said, she was unaware of Tyler’s drug use. The two had smoked marijuana together, she said. And Tyler’s mother, Debbie Hetman, had mentioned “in passing” after Tyler’s Tommy John surgery in 2014 that he’d dealt with a pain pill issue the previous year.
On their honeymoon, Carli said, the two met another couple and hung out in their new friends’ hotel room. Carli left early, while Tyler stayed. When Tyler returned to their hotel room, Carli said he threw up and appeared off. She texted the couple, and the husband responded by acknowledging that he’d offered Tyler an MDMA pill.
“I was not happy about it,” Carli said.
Carli testified about her final messages to Tyler. He stopped responding mid-conversation in the early hours of July 1, 2019. “U know better than to get drunk and fall asleep without texting me,” Carli sent him.
In the morning, when he hadn’t responded, she began calling teammates and the hotel. It wasn’t until later that then-Angels GM Billy Eppler called Carli to inform her that Tyler had died.
“‘Don’t tell me. Don’t say it,’” Carli remembered telling him. “I just kept saying that.”
She called Hetman, Tyler’s mother, shortly thereafter. The Angels hadn’t notified Hetman, Carli said, and she was tasked with delivering the news.
“It was the worst phone call I’ve ever made,” Carli said.
Toward the end of her direct examination, Carli discussed her life now. She never lived in the house that she and Tyler bought, instead renting it out to support herself financially. She also receives Tyler’s pension.
She does volunteer work with the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office, working with victims. She also assists the Los Angeles Police Department on search and rescue operations, specifically focused on missing people with diminished mental capacity. Carli works with Debbie in operating the Tyler Skaggs Foundation, which supports youth sports.
Carli, 38, said she hasn’t been in a serious relationship in the six-plus years since Tyler died. Just weeks before his death, she said, Tyler brought up his desire to start a family. Carli’s close friends have gone on to have children. She loves being “auntie Carli,” but says “it’s also a reminder of what I don’t have.”
The Skaggs family is arguing for damages that include loss of love, which is likely why their lawyers brought up this line of questioning.
“It’s been a lonely six years,” Carli said. “I’m terrified to be deeply in love with someone. Because I’m scared to lose that. I don’t have the capacity to deal with any more pain. But I do hope that for myself.”
The Angels had hoped to question Carli for longer, but the judge required that they be cut off after going for around the same amount of time as the Skaggs side. As a result, the cross-examination by Angels attorney Elizabeth Lachman included numerous elongated breaks as Lachman jumped from different lines of questioning in different binders, and had several private conversations with lead Angels attorney Todd Theodora.
At one point amid elongated silence, the judge — who has encouraged attorneys to pick up the pace of the trial — asked Lachman, “Is there a question?” During another pause, the judge called for a sidebar. Shortly thereafter, Lachman finished her questioning and indicated they’d recall Carli during their own case in chief.
Lachman’s line of questioning largely centered around whether Carli had any awareness of Skaggs’ drug use.
The Angels lawyer asked about the Aug. 2014 conversation in which Hetman told Carli about Tyler’s past drug use. This was the day Tyler had Tommy John surgery, and Hetman had expressed some concern about Tyler using pain medication during his recovery.
Carli said that she didn’t investigate Hetman’s comment any further. She said she didn’t believe Tyler’s drug use to be a current issue, and that he’d kicked the addiction by the time they began officially dating in November 2013.
Lachman questioned Carli on an inconsistency in her testimony. During her deposition, she’d referred to Tyler abusing Percocet pills. But during her testimony, she said she only knew it to be pain pills.
Lachman also raised a text message exchange between Tyler and his mother during his post-Tommy John surgery recovery on August 15, 2014. In the message, Tyler asks his mother for “one more,” seemingly referring to an unnamed pill.
“They r on my dresser. Have Carli get one,” Debbie texted back. Carli testified that she did not recall ever getting Tyler a pill. She was not on the text exchange.
In a 2018 text message sent by Carli to Tyler during his bachelor party in Las Vegas, she laments the presence of one of Tyler’s friends. She texted him asking if that friend was “keistering the drugs.” Tyler responded that the friend was not.
In another 2018 text message exchange between the couple, Carli asks Tyler “are you allowed to have those,” relating to an unspecified medication. Carli said in court that it was referring to a vitamin that she was concerned might come up as positive in a drug test, not an opiate.
Lachman ended her questioning by asking: if Carli knew about Tyler’s drug use, would she have tried to get him help?
“If he expressed to me he had a problem,” she said, “absolutely.”
Hetman testified for less than an hour to end the day. She talked about Tyler’s childhood, his fixation with In-N-Out Burger, and growing up living together in a two-bedroom apartment. Debbie was the Santa Monica High School softball coach. As a kid, Tyler attended every one of her team’s practices.
Hetman’s attorney, Daniel Dutko, asked about her son’s 2013 Percocet addiction, which she said the family handled proactively. They sent him to a medical doctor who specialized in psychopharmacology, and to a psychiatrist. She testified that they notified Dr. Neal ElAttrache, the surgeon who operates on Angels players, before Tyler’s Tommy John surgery. She said she also disclosed Tyler’s addiction to his agents, Ryan Hammil and Nez Balelo.
Dutko used the line of questioning to create a distinction between Hetman’s actions and those of the Angels, who had Kay treated by the team’s Employee Assistance Program professional, Dr. Eric Abell. He asked Hetman if she’d sent her son to a team psychologist who did not have the requisite expertise, to which she said no.
He also showcased text messages from June 2014, which showed Hetman making sure that her son was getting drug tested, and reminding him to send the results to her.
The day ended with Hetman describing the day she learned of Tyler’s death. She’d seen it on the news, she said, around the same time she received a call from Carli. She broke down sobbing in her husband’s arms.
“I had just talked to Tyler on Sunday morning,” Hetman said, recalling learning about his death on a Monday. “I had just seen him pitch on Saturday. I was so mad. I was so angry that he was gone. It literally was the worst day of my life.”