Mother says Stephens County dropped daughter’s sexual assault case because of autism, now advocating for rights

STEPHENS COUNTY, Texas (KTAB/KRBC)- Since 2023, Courtni Bridges has been engaged in a legal investigation into the alleged sexual assault of her, then, 13-year-old daughter who was attending Breckenridge ISD at the time. Bridges told KTAB/KRBC that the incident itself has put immense strain on her family, but the reason she decided to come forward was because of the way the case was handled. Stephens County Attorney, Gary Trammel, informed Bridges back in February that the county would not be pursuing the case any further due to several mitigating factors.

“He just dismissed the case, and the first reason he had listed was because she had autism. He said that she broke down during her forensics interview, that she became emotional, and that he didn’t think she’d be willing to testify. I couldn’t believe that he wrote that in the letter. I honestly didn’t even have to finish the rest of the letter. He had ended it with, if I had any more evidence or anything new come up, that I could reach out to them and we would follow up. But that’s not what happened and that’s not true,” Bridges said.

Trammel told KTAB/KRBC that he feels the case was more than adequately investigated through his own efforts and those of the Stephens County Sheriff’s office.

“Multiple times I sat down with the investigator and asked him, ‘okay, go back and do this, go back and talk to this person, go back and try to find this’…the Chief Deputy did a great job; he went above and beyond what is typically done in a normal suit,” said Trammel.

Trammel said the lack of evidence and Bridges’ apparent decision not to request a second forensic interview were the major deciding factors as to whether or not to pursue further.

“If there was enough evidence, we would have filed the case…I even ran it by one of the Texas Rangers, and it was consensus from everyone that there just wasn’t enough evidence to file this case… The fact that she had autism, once again, is just a very minor part of my decision that we could not move forward with this case,” Trammel said.

Bridges, however, says this has not been her experience or understanding of the case. Bridges stated that she has had little correspondence with the investigating officials despite their offers to reach out over the past few years. All the uncertainty and trauma, she says, weigh extremely heavily on her daughter.

“I did follow up. They, most days, would ignore my phone calls. I never got phone calls back, I think I talked to Gary Trammel one time in the last two years….It was an absolute nightmare, the last two years…She was hospitalized like 6 times across the state in different residential treatment facilities. She missed her entire 8th grade year,” said Bridges.

While Trammel has made it clear to KTAB/KRBC that the case could be reopened if more compelling evidence can be presented, Bridges is looking ahead. She says this case is much larger than she or her daughter alone. She now hopes to see some good change come out of this ordeal.

“It’s not okay…And I want everyone to know it’s not okay. I don’t want this to happen to anybody else. It’s a hard one, and it’s one I wasn’t sure I wanted to move forward with. But if this saves other kids from going through it, then I’m gonna do it,” Bridges said.

Now, Bridges is continuing the fight for her daughter’s civil liberties. She has started a petition on Change.org titled ‘Protect Children From Legal Neglect in Texas’. At the time of this article, that petition has 1,123 signatures. In addition to those efforts, Bridges is working with the Texas Against Sexual Assault Association, Texas Autism Society, and a Denton Attorney to make legislative change regarding the autism and mental health response training required of police and other authorities that might have to respond to such a situation.