Judge refuses man's admitting throwing hot water in woman's face

A judge refused to accept a local man’s guilty pleas Thursday in District Court to when he pleaded guilty charges including dragging a woman by the hair before strangling her, throwing a pot of boiling water in her face and kicking her in the teeth.

Curtis W. Stanley, born in 1965, pleaded guilty to felony assault with a weapon. Stanley also pleaded guilty to charges of felony assault with a weapon and criminal mischief from a 2015 case that’s still waiting conclusion.

District Judge Daniel Boucher refused to accept the pleas, saying Stanley’s answers to his attorney’s questions were unclear and he was unable to find a factual basis for the pleas. Boucher ordered the attorneys to submit scheduling information in order to schedule hearings and a trial.

Boucher found that Stanley had violated conditions of the 24/7 Sobriety Program, a condition of his previous release.

In the latest charges, police dispatch received a call Oct. 2 from a woman who said Stanley had burned her face with hot water. Officers found the woman in her bathroom, applying burn cream to her face.

The woman was taken to the hospital, where officers questioned her.

The woman said she went over to someone’s house to watch football. Stanley was drunk and upset because he had an argument with his wife, He also said the police were looking for him because he didn’t show up for the 24/7 Sobriety Program.

Stanley said he was going to get some pills prescribed and then sell them. The woman said she told him that was “a poor decision and that was why he was in trouble in the first place.”

The woman said Stanley’s wife was mentioned at some point and he “just flipped out.”

He grabbed her by the hair, dragged her into the kitchen, grabbed her throat to strangle her and kicked her in her ribs multiple times. A friend tried to get Stanley off of her and then Stanley stood up and grabbed a pot of boiling water they were cooking meat in.

Stanley threw the water into the woman’s face, scalding the right side of her face, right shoulder and right arm, the court document says.

The woman said that Stanley also kicked her in the mouth before running out the front door and fleeing on his bicycle.

Documents say the woman’s burns worsened as the officer took the report. Stanley had narrowly missed her right eye, she had blistering on her right shoulder, bicep and and forearm, as well as a sharp pain on her left side from Stanley kneeing her. The woman also had a knot on the back of her head and incurred injury to the inside of her bottom lip “from her teeth punching into her lip when she was kicked in the mouth.” Hospital staff members told the officers they also thought the woman had a broken rib.

Stanley was found and arrested.  He is listed on the Hill County jail roster on a $10,000 bond.