Coach accused of taping mouths of Galena Park volleyball players

GALENA PARK, TX (KTRK) -- A Galena Park ISD volleyball coach is on administrative leave after parents say she taped up students' faces during practice.

"No one has the right to touch my daughter, because she's a child," said one parent. "Very humiliating, very disrespectful. And my daughter is scared."

Her daughter came home crying last week, saying her coach, Alicia Sanford, had put tape around the mouths and faces of the girls on the team.

Coach Sanford supposedly told students the tape was part of a lesson, a way to get the players to communicate without using words. But many students felt violated, and now parents are worried.

"Never in my whole life has something like this happened," said the parent.

The Galena Park School District has now put the coach on paid administrative leave while investigating whether any district policies were broken.

Eyewitness News' attempts to reach coach Sanford were unsuccessful.