Inset: Mary Tracy Morrison (Second Judicial District Prosecutor). Background: The ENGAGE School and The Delta Institute for Developing the Brain in Jonesboro, Ark. (KAIT).
An Arkansas woman who founded a school for kids with autism led a “makeshift child fight club” where she forced a boy to sit while his classmates stood around him in a circle and beat him.
Mary Tracy Morrison, 41, pleaded guilty to one count of permitting child abuse and four counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. She was sentenced to five years” probation for the child abuse, plus a year’s probation for each of the delinquency counts, according to Sonia F. Hagood, prosecuting attorney for the Second Judicial District.
Morrison will also have to serve 30 days behind bars and will be on house arrest for about three months following her release. She is prohibited from working with children in a professional capacity.
The investigation began in April 2025 when the mother of a 13-year-old boy reported that her son had been physically and mentally abused at the ENGAGE School and The Delta Institute for Developing the Brain in Jonesboro, a probable cause arrest affidavit said.
Cops obtained a search warrant for surveillance video from inside the school. The video showed Morrison encouraging students to abuse the boy. She had the victim sit on the floor and 18 students stood in a circle around him and struck the boy with an unknown object.
“Dr. Morrison verbally berated the child the whole time as she watched many of the other students sitting around the circle punch, kick and choke the juvenile victim sitting inside the circle,” cops wrote. “After the first juvenile choked the juvenile victim, Dr. Morrison can be seen giving the juvenile a high five, displaying her pleasure with the student’s actions.”
The beating lasted for 30 minutes, cops said.
Hagood described the scene to ABC and NBC affiliate KAIT as a “makeshift child fight club.”
“This resolution ensures that the victims are not required to relive these events through the court process and secures conditions that protect the community going forward,” Chief Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Jessica Thomason said in a statement. “Morrison will no longer be permitted to work with children.”
