Man Beats Up Wife’s Students, Authorities Say

CHARLESTON, W.Va. —  The husband of a middle school teacher was sick of his wife’s complaints about her class, so he barged into her classroom and attacked three 14-year-olds, police said.

Edward Hilts, 52, told students that he was “tired of his wife taking out her school- and student-related problems . . . on him,” police said.

While inside the classroom Wednesday at DuPont Junior High School in Belle, where his wife, Kathryn Hilts, was a substitute teacher, Hilts slammed the heads of students Caleb Bays and Justin Larch together and grabbed Gabriel Gonzalez around the chest and shoulders, police said.

Bays suffered a split lip and a cut over his right eye.

Police said Hilts then placed a $20 bill on a table and challenged a fourth student, 14-year-old Josh Pennington, to a fight, saying the only way out of the room was through him or the second-story window.

“He just started going crazy on everybody,” Pennington told WOWK-TV of Charleston-Huntington. “He started cussing at them and choking them.

“Then he grabbed two other kids in headlocks,” Pennington said.

The 6-foot-2-inch, 270-pound Hilts, who was charged Friday with misdemeanor assault, battery and trespassing, denied the allegations.