Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities

Trial in 2017 strangling continued to next month

CLOVIS — Trial this week for a man accused of strangling his son on New Year’s Day 2017 was continued to next month. The delay is attributed to the sudden unavailability of a lead investigator.

David Plyler, 61, of Lubbock, was initially indicted on a charge of involuntary manslaughter. That case was dismissed due to issue with the medical investigator office in Lubbock and Plyler was re-indicted on the third-degree felony charge of aggravated battery (great bodily harm), according to Chief Deputy District Attorney Brian Stover.

Court records show Plyler and his son, Matthew Jordan Plyler, visited Clovis for the New Year 2017 holiday and ended up in an altercation. Plyler’s girlfriend called police for the domestic altercation and Plyler “had the son in a choke hold waiting for Officers to arrive,” records show.

Officers located a faint pulse and transported the younger Plyler to Plains Regional Medical Center and ultimately to Lubbock’s University Medical Center, where he died Jan. 19.

Trial was scheduled to start Monday with jury selection but was continued due to a family emergency by a lead investigator and witness on the case, Stover said.

Plyler’s attorney Dan Lindsey told The News “the state should not be prosecuting” his client and that Plyler was defending himself from his son, who had “a long history of violence” and at the time of the incident was “highly intoxicated.”

A new trial is scheduled to start with jury selection Nov. 12 and last through Nov. 14.