From Roanoke.com:
RADFORD — Six of the seven Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity members charged in the hazing death of a Radford University student last year avoided jail time in a plea deal Friday.
Radford Circuit Court Judge Joey Showalter found five of the men guilty of purchasing alcohol for a minor and for hazing in the death of Samuel Harris Mason, 20, of Chesterfield County. Mason was a Radford University student who was pledging the TKE fraternity.
Charges against a sixth student were continued for 12 months with no finding.
“This case vividly illustrates the hazards and risks of binge drinking,” Radford Commonwealth’s Attorney Chris Rehak wrote in a statement released after the plea. “Those who commit crimes of hazing in Radford can expect to be identified, prosecuted and convicted.”
The defendants who pleaded guilty Friday were Chadwick Evancho, 23; Christopher Michael Pizzi, 22; William Taylor Burke, 21; Christopher Scott Cothren, 22; and Louis Hoskins Trible, 22.
Showalter found them guilty of misdemeanor charges of purchasing alcohol for a minor and of hazing. They were each sentenced to 24 months in jail, suspended, and $1,000 in fines.
“The plea agreements were negotiated around the fact the commonwealth was prepared to pursue manslaughter charges in the alternative,” Rehak said.
At one point during the hearing, Showalter asked Rehak if Mason’s family agreed with the terms of the plea deals.
“Very much so, your honor,” Rehak answered.
A sixth defendant, Ryan Lawson, 22, did not plead Friday. At the request of defense attorney Jimmy Turk and Rehak, the judge continued Lawson’s case for 12 months, to be dismissed in one year. No finding was made in that case.
Rehak said Lawson was “the most truthful TKE witness we had testify under oath,” Rehak said. “At trial, the government would have relied heavily on his account of what transpired that night.”
A seventh defendant, Dustin Lee Moore, 21, was sentenced last week on charges of hazing and providing alcohol to a total of two years in the New River Regional Jail. All but two months was suspended, and Moore was ordered to pay $1,000 in fines.
Rehak has accused the Radford TKE chapter of orchestrating a “code of silence, which hindered the investigation. Details concerning how Sam died were uncovered only through the use of the special grand jury and compelled sworn testimony.”
Mason was given a ritual bottle of liquor and, according to Rehak, drank it in an hour. He vomited, passed out and later died at his Fairfax Street home the morning of Oct. 15, 2010.
An autopsy report said Mason’s blood-alcohol content at the time of his death was .48, six times the legal limit for driving.
The international TKE organization based in Indiana suspended the Radford chapter pending an investigation into Mason’s death. No new information about the fraternity’s status was available Friday.
The chapter had earlier in 2010 been sanctioned by the university for “serving alcohol to students under 21, not checking [identification], and not confirming that persons served alcohol were of legal drinking age,” a Radford spokesman said at the time.
The sanctions, which included a ban on recruiting new members, had been lifted a matter of weeks before Mason died.
According to Radford University spokeswoman Christy Jackson, Evancho, Pizzi, Burke and Lawson graduated this year. Moore and Trible were students, but are not currently enrolled. Cothren is currently enrolled as a student.
Lots of guilty pleas but very little jail time. It looks like one student will spend 2 months in jail and the others will get some wrist slapping. Aren’t most people pledging a fraternity 18, 19 or 20? Samuel Mason was 20. Here we have 22 year old men putting some kid (yes, you are still a kid at 18, 19, 20) through some sort of stupid, dangerous silliness to pledge a fraternity? Who gives anyone a 5th of liquor to guzzle in an hour? These people are supposed to be the best and the brightest. They aren’t.
We want to do something horrible to Carlos Martinelly for driving drunk and ultimately killing a nun. At least he was legally drunk and could be expected not to be in possession of all his faculties. What about these college clowns? I didn’t see drunkenness in any of their defense. They know it is dangerous to consume that much alcohol. They are in college. They are supposed to be smart. Should we have higher expectations for them than we do Carlos? Do we even know Carlos finished high school? He probably didn’t. I am not excusing him but for goodness sakes, where is equivalent outrage?
I am outraged that these little pampered snots get a slap on the wrist over a boy’s death. Samuel Mason died because of stupidity. Virginia needs to get tough on hazing. There is too much of it and it can be lethal. If Universities can’t control what is going on in fraternity houses, shut them down. Its a fairly simple concept.
I think this is part of the problem:
“Here we have 22 year old men putting some kid (yes, you are still a kid at 18, 19, 20) through some sort of stupid, dangerous silliness to pledge a fraternity?”
If we continue to think this way we’ll never look at prosecuting people of that age group the same way we punish someone in their 30s or 40s.
They’re either an adult or they’re not. They won’t act like adults if we don’t treat them as adults and that means both the pleasures and punishments that come along with the age of majority.
I want them punished as an adult. I indicated that the pledge was a kid…meaning doing something stupid and dangerous to get into some dumb ass fraternity. I don’t want anyone that age treated like a kid by the court system. I am not very sure I even believe in the juvenile justice system. It should be used rarely. If you commit a crime, you should be treated like a criminal.
I think people that age group should be punished like everyone else. I think the issue lies with exceptions being made for class rather than anything else.
I also don’t think the age of majority should be 18, ever, not for reducing consequences for committing crimes.
Everyone knows who TKE is and what they do and how they operate. OX is the same way. Both are the worst of the worst. That’s been common knowledge for decades. I can’t for the life of me understand how anyone is bewildered when TKEs or OXs kill someone hazing. But then again, I never got the whole “pay for friends” thing.
Actually I remember at Shippensburg, TKE was steeped in tradition. Specifically, it was a beginning-of-the-school-year tradition to have a wasted freshman girl gang-raped at the TKE house during one of the first parties of the year.
@pokie,
I would be all in favor of shutting a house down for 20 years who pulled that kind of crap. There is too much wink wink nudge nudge in this arena, regardless of the school.