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The cellphone videotape was grainy but its content was outrageous enough to qualify for broadcast. Brian Ross filed an Investigates feature that doubled for ABC's A Closer Look and a preview for Tuesday's Nightline. The images were of a so-called fight club at the Corpus Christi State School, one of 13 state-run residential facilities for mentally disabled teenagers. The fights were between the teens under the coercion of the night shift staff. "Residents were told they would be sent to prison or beaten if they did not fight." All six members of the night shift have been fired and indicted. Ross added the astonishing statistic that some 800 employees of the Texas mentally disabled school system have been suspended or fired for the abuse of residents over the past five years, according to a federal civil rights investigation.
How did Ross obtain the footage? "The fight club came to an end only because one of the staff lost his phone two months ago and it was turned in to police, who then discovered the video."
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