Man gets 19 years in plea

CLOVIS — A man charged in 2017 with battery and child abuse was sentenced Monday to 19 years in prison through a plea agreement.

Jackie Cubit Jr., 32, pleaded guilty to first-degree felony child abuse and admitted to prior felony convictions in Texas during a plea hearing in the court of Judge Matthew Chandler. He was charged in November 2017 with two counts of felony child abuse and one count of misdemeanor battery, for which he previously was scheduled to face a two-day trial this week in Curry County. The lesser child abuse and battery charges were dismissed, according to the agreement.

In a news release from 9th Judicial District Attorney Andrea Reeb, prosecutors said Cubit “threw a glass jar candle at his wife and missed, hitting their infant daughter in the head.” The infant “suffered a subdural hematoma and had to be airlifted to Lubbock ... for medical treatment.”

Reeb told The News that the girl’s mother said the baby is OK, “but won’t know for sure until (she) enters school.”

Cubit’s attorney, William Greig, told The News that his client “wanted everyone in the community to know that he never intended to harm the child.

“What happened to the minor child in this case was a horrible accident,” Greig said. “The state concedes that point, as they charged him through the legal theory of reckless behavior, but with that said my client still accepts full responsibility for his actions.”

Cubit’s sentence includes a one-year prior felony enhancement. With pre-sentence confinement credit of 476 days and “good time” eligibility at 50%, he could be released from prison in just under nine years.