BOWLING GREEN — Bowling Green State University on Friday said it has charged the fraternity involved in the suspected hazing-related death of sophomore Stone Foltz with six violations of the Code of Student Conduct.
The charges include Offenses Against Persons causing harm to others, hazing, and disrupting order or disregarding health and safety with alcohol.
VIEW BGSU LETTER FROM DEAN OF STUDENTS
The campus Pi Kappa Alpha chapter has been on interim suspension since March 5, the day after Mr. Foltz, 20, of Delaware, Ohio, was dropped off unconscious at his apartment following alleged hazing activity involving alcohol consumption at an off-campus event. He was pronounced dead on March 7 after his organs were removed for donation.
The university said it met Friday morning with local and national leaders of Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity to lay out the charges, but a letter addressed to the chapter’s unidentified student president said that person “failed to attend.”
The fraternity now faces a follow-up meeting Tuesday at 9:30 a.m. with Dean of Students Chris Bullins and Jeremy Zilmer, an associate dean, where the chapter president can either accept responsibility for the charges on the fraternity’s behalf and discuss sanctions, or request a formal hearing to be held April 13, the letter said.
The investigation into the conduct of individual students is ongoing.
“While these university charges don’t bring back student Stone Foltz, our goal is to hold those accountable who are responsible for this tragedy,” a BGSU spokesman said in an emailed statement.
The university said it also continues to work with local law enforcement officials who are conducting a public investigation of Mr. Foltz’s death.
Lt. Dan Mancuso, a Bowling Green Police Department spokesman, and Paul Dobson, Wood County prosecuting attorney, could not be reached with questions about their investigations Friday. Staff for each said they were out of the office.
A message left with Bowling Green Deputy Chief Maj. Justin White also was not returned.
Lawyers representing the Foltz family, Rex Elliott and Sean Alto, issued a statement calling the university’s charges “an easy decision that should lead to the fraternity’s expulsion” and stating the family expects the individuals who participated in the hazing ritual to be held accountable.
“However, our ultimate goal is to get all university presidents to institute a zero-tolerance policy for any hazing activities,” the lawyers wrote. “True zero tolerance means one hazing incident results in immediate fraternal expulsion. Proposed state and federal legislation are steps in the right direction but university presidents must make serious and significant changes to eliminate hazing from the culture.”
Mr. Zilmer’s letter to the chapter president spells out previously undisclosed details of the fraternity party held March 4 at 318 N. Main St. in Bowling Green.
It says that members of the organization provided individual bottles of alcohol to new members and encouraged the new members to consume the entire contents of the bottle.
“One new member died following this event, and other new members were severely intoxicated to the point of vomiting,” the letter states.
The student conduct charge of “offenses against persons — harm to others” prohibits behaviors such as “endangering, threatening, intimidating, or attempting to cause physical harm to another person, causing reasonable apprehension of such harm, or engaging in conduct or communications that a reasonable person would interpret as a serious expression of intent to cause harm.”
The hazing specifications prohibit causing, coercing, or forcing an individual to consume any food, liquid, drug, or other substance, or to do “any activity which has the potential to be frightening, degrading, or unduly deceptive, including deception designed to convince the individual of impending pain, injury, or non-initiation including, but not limited to, promoting servitude, berating or verbally harassing individuals, throwing items at or on individuals, forcing individuals to carry items, forcing individuals to yell when entering or departing a physical structure or in the presence of designated individuals, forcing individuals to use designated entrances or exits, requiring individuals to run personal errands, intentionally creating labor or clean-up work, and requiring individuals to wear scant clothing or to be nude.”
The charge is based on information that new members were made to wear blindfolds and were then led into a basement area while being yelled at and pushed, in an effort to disorient them. The investigation also determined new members were instructed multiple times before the March 4 event that they would need to inform faculty members of their likely absence from classes March 5.
The offense against disregarding health and safety said that alcohol was provided to new members of the organization, and only one new member was of legal age to possess or consume alcohol.
The investigation was conducted by special counsel David DeVillers, a former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, at Attorney General Dave Yost’s appointment.
Responding to the charges, BGSU President Rodney Rogers said in a statement emailed Friday to students that he remains committed to working with Dyad Strategies, a consultant specializing in universities’ management of fraternities and sororities, to “conduct a broader review of fraternity and sorority life and other student organizations and activities.”
He also appointed Mr. Bullins and Maureen Wilson, associate dean and professor in the College of Education and Human Development, to co-chair a presidential working group to focus on building a framework for the university’s anti-hazing efforts and to implement recommendations from Dyad.
All new-member intake processes and on-campus and off-campus social events of chapters in all four Greek councils, including the Interfraternity Council, Multicultural Greek Council, National Pan-Hellenic Council and College Panhellenic Conference have been suspended.
The Interfraternity Council also unanimously decided Wednesday to cease new-member processes of its 17 member chapters for the remainder of the current semester, with deferral until fall.
“Our goal is clear. We must be a leader in our anti-hazing efforts,” Mr. Rogers said in his letter. “We need each administrator, student, faculty and staff member to continue to step up to shape this culture. We will focus on the health and safety of our community, and, together, we will move forward.”
Mr. Foltz’s death prompted an angry student-organized protest demanding that BGSU expel the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity, that the administration take responsibility for the incident and others, and that Mr. Rogers resign.
It also has given renewed impetus to Senate Bill 126, known as “Collin’s Law,” which would increase penalties for hazing and create the new crime of aggravated hazing, a second-degree felony.
The bill is sponsored by state Sens. Stephanie Kunze (R., Hilliard) and Theresa Gavarone (R., Bowling Green). Its nickname refers to Collin Wiant, an Ohio University freshman who died during an alleged fraternity hazing incident in 2018.
First Published April 2, 2021, 12:42 p.m.
