WACO, Texas (KWTX) – While former Waco attorney Adam Hoffman approaches the end of his 60-day jail term for sexually abusing his son’s best friend, outrage over his plea bargain with the Texas Attorney General’s Office continues to ripple throughout the state.
Hoffman, 49, who has since moved to Nebraska, pleaded guilty April 16 to indecent assault and displaying harmful materials to a minor, both Class A misdemeanors punishable by up to a year in jail.
His trial on first-degree felony continuous sexual abuse of a young child charges ended in a mistrial in June 2025 after jurors deadlocked 7-5 in favor of finding him guilty. He was facing life without parole until the Attorney General’s Office reduced the charges in exchange for his guilty pleas.
Former Waco attorney Adam Hoffman was sentenced to 60 days in jail for sexually abusing a young boy after a visiting judge, who said he was troubled by the plea agreement, doubled Hoffman’s 30-day plea deal.(KWTX GRAPHIC)
On Friday, State Rep. Pat Curry, R-Waco, State Rep. Jeff Leach, R-McKinney, and two friends advocating for Hoffman’s victim and his mother expressed their outrage over Hoffman’s plea deal during a press conference at the McLennan County Courthouse.
Leach, chairman of the House Committee on Judiciary and Civil Jurisprudence, said he has invited Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to appear before his committee to explain the disposition of Hoffman’s case by his office but so far Paxton has not responded to his request.
Leach said he has endorsed U.S. Sen. John Cornyn in his runoff against Paxton and Curry said he plans to endorse Cornyn.
Both lawmakers have met with state and local officials, including McLennan County District Attorney Josh Tetens, and say they will pursue legislative action in an effort to prevent cases like Hoffman’s from ending so badly.
“This is a travesty that cannot continue to happen,” Curry said. “This is a travesty that we as lawmakers and we as protectors of Texans have to stand up and fight for and make sure that these types of corrupt situations don’t happen again. Unfortunately, we have to put more and more guardrails in to keep these things from happening again.”
Melissa Dieterich and Sheri Hykel, who identified themselves and friends and spokespersons for the boy and his mother, went a step farther, calling for Paxton’s resignation from office.
“Adam Hoffman didn’t just harm an innocent child. He stole his life, and the so-called consequences that Paxton’s office offered weren’t merely insufficient, they were a slap in the face to every survivor who has ever trusted the justice system to protect them,” Dieterich said. “You don’t recover from that type of trauma.”
The boy’s mother initially gave Visiting Judge Roy Sparkman her assurance that she was comfortable with the plea bargain offered Hoffman, which originally called for the first-degree felony to be reduced to a misdemeanor and time served. Hoffman’s law license was to have stayed intact and he would not have to register as a sex offender.
Sparkman balked at the plea offer, and prosecutors from Paxton’s office met with the victim and her mother and attorneys for Sparkman and came back with a 30-day jail recommendation. Sparkman eventually insisted that Hoffman surrender his law license for five years and sentenced him to 60 days in jail on the two reduced misdemeanor charges.
Most inmates in the McLennan County Jail are given two days’ credit for each day served, meaning Hoffman is set to be released on May 25, 29 days after his April 27 sentencing date.
LETTER BY ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERALS BRENDA CANTU AND DORIAN COTLAR:
Letter from Paxton’s office written by assistant attorney generals Brenda Cantu and Dorian Cotlar(KWTX)
At his sentencing a week after Hoffman’s plea, the boy’s mother told Judge Sparkman that she was not happy with the 30-day term, saying that was not near enough for the three years of abuse her boy suffered and his continuing struggles.
Hykel read a statement from the boy’s mother, saying the AG’s office knew her son didn’t want to testify again and charging that the police, Child Protective Services, the AG’s office and the judge “all bent the system to protect” Hoffman instead of her son.
“Knowing my son didn’t want to testify again, they pushed the deal through with or without approval,” she said in her statement. “That is not justice. That is manipulation. That is betrayal.”Curry and Leach said a possible solution to the situation might be the creation of a state prosecutors’ unit, as proposed last week by Gov. Greg Abbott, instead of counties relying on the AG’s office to prosecute cases in which elected DA’s around the state have conflicts.
In Hoffman’s case, Tetens had conferred with Hoffman after his arrest before Tetens was elected DA.
Leach said he has lost sleep stewing over the Hoffman case, which Cornyn has featured prominently in his attack ads against Paxton.
“When it comes to protecting victims and survivors, when it comes to advocating on their behalf, this is black and white,” Leach said. “You are either with victims and survivors or you are against them. There is no reasonable ground when it comes to picking sides.
“And what the Attorney General’s Office did in their mishandling of this case, over the years, I have reviewed hundreds and hundreds of civil and criminal cases, and it is without question the most negligently, recklessly handled case that I have ever seen come out of the Attorney General’s Office.”
Leach called the resolution of the case “a slap on the wrist and a spit in the face to the victim and his family.”
“It is totally unacceptable for this outcome to have happened, and the people of Texas should be outraged,” Leach said. “The attorney general should own it. He should apologize to the family, to the victim and the people of Texas for what happened in that case, and he should promise to the people of Texas and the policy makers that he will do everything he can to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
FULL STATEMENT FROM ASSISTANT ATTORNEYS GENERAL BRENDA CANTU AND DORIAN COTLAR:
Representative Leach:
We were the prosecutors on the Adam Hoffman case. Ms. Cantu has 29 years of prosecution experience. Mr. Cotlar has 25 years of criminal law experience and is Board Certified in Criminal Law. Our combined background includes work on thousands of child sexual-assault cases.
Today, we are writing in response to your public letter to Attorney General Paxton. As you know, we often field questions from legislators with good-faith questions about the operations of this office. In this case, you chose to publicly issue a letter questioning decisions implicating the traumatic abuse endured by a child and a difficult decision made by that child. Despite this issue being raised repeatedly by third parties seeking to politicize this case, this office has sought to respect the child’s privacy regarding these sensitive matters. As prosecutors, we believe it is important to defend our work and set the facts straight.
As line prosecutors in the Attorney General’s Criminal Prosecutions Division, our job is not political. Our job is to ensure that justice is done. And here, we did everything that we could to accomplish that end. We will not engage in political gamesmanship, but we will inform you of the facts surrounding the ultimate resolution of this case.
In June 2025, our prosecution team tried a four-day jury trial against Adam Hoffman for Continuous Sexual Abuse of a Child. And, as the prosecutors in the courtroom, we can share that the child involved demonstrated incredible courage in facing down and testifying against the man that abused him. But, as with any child sexual assault trial, participation in this process took a massive emotional toll on every witness involved, especially the child. And, unfortunately, that jury could not reach a unanimous verdict, resulting in a hung jury by a vote of seven to five, with seven voting to convict.
Nonetheless, our office was prepared to re-try the case and seek a conviction. However, following his experience in the first trial, the child made clear that he would not voluntarily testify at a second trial. As you know, the Constitution guarantees defendants an opportunity to confront and cross-examine the witnesses against them, and here that witness was a child who had already spent his formative years enduring abuse and the traumatizing impact of having to face his accuser. In this case, the child emphasized that he preferred to move on with his life and prioritize his mental and emotional health over subjection to the unimaginably difficult position of once again testifying against the man who abused him.
In light of the child’s decision, there would have been only one path forward for a second prosecution: subpoenaing the child, forcing him to re-face his abuser, and subjecting him to a second grueling cross-examination. This process would have further traumatized the child and was against his wishes. As prosecutors, we must consider the extent to which a prosecution will compromise a child’s emotional and mental well-being by forcing him to testify against his will. Although our office had no pathway to prove the elements necessary to secure a felony conviction without the child’s testimony, we did secure jail time for his abuser and admission to a lesser offense.
We hope you can understand this difficult decision, which was made entirely in the best interest of the child involved. You are welcome to second-guess our decisions, but our hope is that you and others who have taken an interest in this case would respect the child’s privacy and his decision on how to move forward with his life.
Sincerely,
Brenda Cantu, Assistant Attorney GeneralDorian Cotlar, Assistant Attorney General
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