By Sara Coello
The Dallas Morning News
ARLINGTON, Texas — An Arlington paramedic was accused of groping a teenage patient in 2017, but he returned to work and wasn’t charged until after another teen came forward with allegations of inappropriate behavior months later, according to court documents.
Aaron Tyler English, 33, was indicted Tuesday on two counts of official oppression.
A 17-year-old girl told police that a paramedic transporting her after an April 2017 suicide attempt had commented on her breasts while listening to her heartbeat, then asked to see them and pinched her, according to an arrest-warrant affidavit. He also asked for her phone number and social-media accounts, she said.
English was identified as a suspect and suspended from work at American Medical Response, but later returned to work, according to the affidavit. It is unclear why the case wasn’t prosecuted at the time.
In January 2018, a 16-year-old girl who’d attempted suicide and rode in an ambulance with English reported that he asked her about her sex life and told her he’d visit her at the mental-health clinic where she was being taken, police wrote in the affidavit.
After she turned 17 a short time later, she began receiving text messages asking whether she remembered the ambulance ride and requesting nude pictures, according to the affidavit. Investigators said the messages came from a phone number registered to English.
Arlington police arrested English on Dec. 20 on a charge of official oppression, saying he’d used his position as a medical professional to subject patients to unwanted sexual advances.
English admitted the text messages he sent were “inappropriate” but denied any unprofessional behavior toward the first teenager, according to the affidavit.
Police issued another official-oppression warrant, for the first allegation, on Jan. 30.
It’s not clear under what circumstances English was allowed to return to AMR, which contracts with the city of Arlington, after the first report.
Mark Kessler, regional director of AMR, said English no longer works for the company. Kessler would not comment further on the case.
Copyright 2019 The Dallas Morning News