[There was a video here]

Here's William Adams, the Texas court-at-law judge who was filmed beating his 16-year-old daughter with a belt, giving an interview to Corpus Christi's KZTV. Think he could come off any less sympathetic after the abuse video? Think again.

This is the full interview that was partially quoted earlier today, in which Adams describes the beating as "not as bad as it looks on tape." He claims that his daughter Hillary—who filmed the video in 2004, and uploaded it earlier this week—is "mad because I've ordered her to bring the car back, in a nutshell. Her mother was there, she wasn't hurt.. it was a long time ago.. I really don't want to get into this right now because as you can see my life's been made very difficult over this child."

One imagines that Hillary's life has been made very difficult, too. Her mother, who appears in the video, but has divorced from her father, also responded, on Facebook:

"I am praying for my daughters and me and my family to heal in all ways from emotional and physical abuse, for the current and continuing abuse of my children and me that has been ongoing to end - starting now — for my daughters to both finally be able to go to counseling both individually and as a family group with their Dad's approval, encouragement, involvement and support, for him to finally make amends to all of us, talk openly with us, and take the first steps to letting our broken family heal."

Hillary Adams would seem to agree: "we do need to try to move on past the anger and just concentrate on getting counseling and help."

[KZTV]