Spring Hill man gets 11 years in teen overdose ice bath tragedy
A Spring Hill man will serve 11 years after a 17-year-old was found unresponsive and put in an ice-filled tub instead of getting help. A co-defendant still faces trial.
At 3:39 a.m. in September 2023, a Hernando County emergency call sent deputies to a Spring Hill home where a 17-year-old girl later died of an overdose; James Richard Briski is now headed to the Florida Department of Corrections after pleading guilty in Hernando County Circuit Court to his role in the case.
Judge Stephen Toner Jr. sentenced James Richard Briski, 27, to 11 years after Briski accepted a plea deal on June 10. He pleaded to manslaughter and possession of cocaine with intent to sell within 1,000 feet of a church.
The teen had ingested cocaine and was overheating when Joshua Prentiss Ware, 21, brought her to Briski. Instead of calling for help right away, the men put her in a bathtub filled with cold water, ice and frozen food products, then left her unattended for more than two hours while they did more drugs. Hernando County Fire Rescue later took her from the residence to a local hospital, where she died.
The original arrest reports charged Briski with aggravated manslaughter of a child and possession of cocaine, with bond set at $30,000. Ware was charged with aggravated manslaughter of a child, two counts of possession of a controlled substance and trafficking in fentanyl, with bond set at $170,000.
Ware remains set for trial on manslaughter of a child and fentanyl-trafficking charges.
This article was produced by Prism’s automated news system from verified source data, official records, and press releases, then run through automated quality and moderation checks before publishing. The system is built and supervised by the people who set the standards it runs under. Read our full AI policy.
Did this article answer your question?
