Former Kingfisher Public Schools assistant football coach Micah Nall has been placed on administrative leave in his new district, Western Heights Public Schools, after he was charged with felony child abuse and perjury amid investigations into an alleged culture of hazing in the KPS football program.
Nall was charged in Kingfisher County District Court on Oct. 17 for his role in KPS football activities that allegedly rose to the level of “torture.” It marked the second time in three years that Nall — also an offensive line coach who works with the independent Trench Mafia O-Line Academy — has faced criminal charges related to allegations that he abused and belittled students in the Kingfisher football program.
“During the 2015-2016 football season, [a student] witnessed Kingfisher assistant football coach Micah Nall grab [a second student] by his facemask and punch [that student] in the face three to four times,” an Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation agent wrote in the Oct. 17 probable cause affidavit seeking Nall’s arrest. “Agents were told Nall was verbally abusing minors during the course of his tenure at Kingfisher Public Schools. (…) When [a third student] would miss an assignment on the football field or mess up, Nall would get in his face and call him a ‘fat worthless piece of shit.'”
According to the affidavit (embedded below), Nall admitted he “probably said some hurtful things” to that player, and he admitted it was possible he insulted players with a homophobic slur during practice. Ultimately, OSBI agents and District Attorney Mike Fields reviewed a deposition Nall conducted in the federal civil lawsuit that had been filed against him, Kingfisher Public Schools and other KPS football coaches. Fields charged Nall with perjury for his statements under oath in the deposition that conflicted with his statements in a 2021 plea agreement Nall signed with Fields’ office more than two years prior.
After a separate allegation of abuse had been reported to Kingfisher police in 2021, Nall pleaded guilty to obstructing a police officer during the investigation into an August 2020 “bull in the ring” drill that Nall led and labeled “dirt bag training” on the day’s practice schedule. During the drill, an offensive lineman stood inside a circle of players, and Nall instructed them to engage the lineman one after the other, sometimes hitting the player before he could get back on his feet.
During Kingfisher PD Officer Charles Trout’s 2021 investigation, “Micah Nall did willfully delay and obstruct Officer Trout by lying to him during his interview, by attempting to obtain a written statement from another witness prior to making his own statement, and by attempting to exercise undue influence over the investigation,” according to the criminal information filed against Nall in November 2020.
In May 2021, Nall pleaded guilty to the obstruction charge, paid $661 in fines and costs, and agreed not to coach public or private school athletics for one year.
Within three months, however, Nall took a new job at Western Heights Public Schools in southwest Oklahoma City, and documents obtained by NonDoc list Nall as a Western Heights High School English teacher and assistant football coach, despite repeated claims by district administrators that Nall has only been involved in film editing and “football analyst” duties.
Among other indications he was coaching at Western Heights, Nall’s July 2021 contract with the school included $3,300 in “extra duty” pay in his capacity as “HS. ASST. FOOTBALL.”
Western Heights spokesperson Chris Culver said Nall, 48, was placed on administrative leave after being charged in October. Culver claimed Nall had been a “football analyst” for the district over the past three seasons but has never coached there, despite Nall being listed as an assistant football coach for Western Heights on Max Preps, a website used by high school sports teams to display season information.
“I can’t speak to you on Max Pro (sic). What I can tell you is the information that’s posted on the website is not correct because it has Tim McCarty as our athletic director, and Mr. McCarty is no longer employed with Western Heights, actually, as of last January,” Culver said. “So I’m not sure who controls the information that’s put on the website you’re referencing, but I can tell you that the information even with our head coach is incorrect, so I would assume other information could be incorrect as well.”
Although social media posts appear to show Nall on a football field with players after a Western Heights game, Culver insisted that Nall has not interacted with Western Heights football players as a coach.
“He’s not coaching. He’s the football analyst,” Culver said.
Culver said Nall’s 2021 contract had been negotiated under a previous superintendent and HR director who were not able to code his employment in his extra duty contract as an analyst, so he was listed as a coach. Culver said Nall’s new contract labels him as an analyst and not a coach.
“We did not have a way to code it as an analyst, although he was not a coach. He did not coach children. He wasn’t around children,” Culver said. “As of last year, when they did contract negotiations, they did get that changed correctly to show a football analyst.”
But Nall could still be facing repercussions from the deferred 2021 case, which Fields dismissed and expunged in May 2022 after Nall purportedly avoided coaching at Western Heights even though he was listed as an assistant coach in his contract with the district.
In addition to being charged with child abuse Oct. 17, Nall was also charged by Fields with perjury for statements he made about the case in his deposition for the federal lawsuit.
“The defendant knowingly made two or more statements under oath and penalty of perjury which directly contradicted each other,” Assistant District Attorney Hope Bryant wrote in the Oct. 17 criminal information for Nall. “To wit: a sworn statement under oath at the defendant’s sentencing hearing in Kingfisher County Oklahoma case number CM-2020-159 on May 12, 2021, and a sworn statement under oath in a deposition taken in the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma case number CIV-22-089-G on July 20, 2023.”
According to the probable cause affidavit signed by OSBI agent Phillip Ott, Nall was asked in the civil lawsuit deposition if he lied about the incidents relating to the 2021 investigation. Nall answered that he did not lie even though he pleaded guilty to the obstruction charge in November 2020.
Ott’s affidavit also included allegations that Nall knew about and condoned “The Ring,” an area of the locker room “where wrestling and boxing matches between football players would take place.”
“OSBI agents interviewed six former Kingfisher High School football players who reported Nall, an adult, wrestled with a student football player (…) under the age of 18,” Ott wrote. “Nall completed a deposition on July 20, 2023. Nall admitted he wrestled [the student] in the Kingfisher locker room. Nall admitted it was ‘a very, very poor decision…’ on his part. Nall admitted he told the other students to put their phones away because he did not want anyone videotaping the incident.”
A lawyer for Nall did not respond to a phone call seeking comment.
KPS settles lawsuit involving Jeff Meyers, Micah Nall, others
Earlier this month, Kingfisher Public Schools and plaintiff Mason Mecklenburg reached a settlement agreement in the federal civil lawsuit against Nall, suspended Kingfisher head football coach Jeff Myers, and assistant coaches Derek Patterson and Blake Eaton. The case had been set for trial Dec. 5.
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At the time the settlement was announced, Nall had multiple motions pending before U.S. District Court Judge Charles Goodwin that could have concluded the case without a trial.
The first motion asked Goodwin for summary judgment in the case. Each of the defendants filed a motion for summary judgement in August.
Their arguments relied, in part, on the qualified immunity principle that protects government officials from trial when they are acting in their official capacity. If the settlement had not been reached and Goodwin decided that the facts of the case were not in question and that the law was on the defendants’ side, he could have ruled in their favor and averted a trial altogether.
Goodwin had said at a recent hearing he expected to rule on the summary judgment motions sometime in the middle of November.
Additionally, Nall filed a motion Nov. 10 asking Goodwin to stay further proceedings until his criminal charges were resolved. In the motion, Nall’s attorney argued that his testimony — or lack thereof — could hurt his position in both cases.
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“A stay is needed so that Nall is not forced in the untenable position of either giving up his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination by testifying in this case or exercising that right at the consequence of the jury drawing adverse inferences against him that will be extremely detrimental if not fatal to his case,” Nall’s attorney wrote in the motion.
In civil lawsuits, defendants are allowed to invoke their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, but juries are also allowed to draw adverse inferences against the defendant for doing so. In criminal trials, juries are typically instructed not to hold a defendant’s choice to invoke their Fifth Amendment right against them.
Nall’s criminal case is still moving forward. His next court date is scheduled for Jan. 2.
Read the Oct. 17 Micah Nall probable cause affidavit
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