My son continually either loses his phone or somehow manages to damage
the charging ports on EVERY phone I've ever gotten him. This is why I
never buy him a new phone (at least not from Verizon) and get new, or
mostly new, from Ebay.

Anyone recommend a good, durable vzw phone that I can get him
(again...) that won't be too bad as far as any texting he does? He
has said that for some reason the phones that have charging ports with
internal contact pins are the ones he invariably ends up breaking and
hence cannot be reliably charged.

I'm initially thinking of the LG VX8300 as I know it has always been
one of LG's better, more reliable phones - more so than their follow-
on models of the phone.

Thanks,
Walt