Judge recuses herself after dodging defendant's flung feces in Harris County courtroom

Judge Te’iva Bell marched into the inmate holdover room to garner a guilty plea from a defendant being isolated to minimize contact with others. The prosecutors and court reporter joined her as part of a last minute attempt Thursday to prevent the defendant, Jaccorick Nwigwe, from getting too close to the judge or anyone else in the ceremonial courtroom because of an earlier incident. That incident happened Tuesday when Nwigwe asked visiting Judge Belinda Hill if she liked peanut butter, officials said.

He then chucked his feces at Hill in an apparent attempt to feign incompetency. The fecal matter spattered the bench and plopped onto Hill’s phone, according to photos of the aftermath. She managed to dodge the flung dung, Bell disclosed in court. “We’re doing the plea in there in case there’s a surprise,” Bell said. The guilty plea resulted in a 20-year prison sentence with credit for time served. The previous courtroom stunt prompted Hill, who was overseeing the emergency relief docket, to recuse herself from Nwigwe’s pending cases, two of which stemmed from his July 2018 arrest on charges of aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon and evading arrest. Additional charges related to clashes with fellow Harris County Jail inmates and detention officers — some of which also involved his feces — have since been stacked on, according to court documents.