Author: Hank Nuwer
Journalist Hank Nuwer tracks hazing deaths in fraternities and schools. Nuwer is the Alaska author of Hazing: Destroying Young Lives; Broken Pledges: The Deadly Rite of Hazing, High School Hazing, Wrongs of Passage and The Hazing Reader. In April of 2024 and April 2025 , the Alaska Press Club awarded him first place in the Best Columnist division.
He has written articles or columns on hazing for the Sunday Times of India, Toronto Globe & Mail, Harper's Magazine, Orlando Sentinel, The Chronicle of Higher Education and the New York Times Sunday Magazine. His current book is Hazing: Destroying Young Lives from Indiana University Press. He is married to Malgorzata Wroblewska Nuwer of Fairbanks, Alaska. Nuwer is a former columnist for the Greenville (Ohio)Early Bird and former managing editor of the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner in Alaska.
Nuwer was named the Ohio Society of Professional Journalists columnist of the year in 2021 for his “After Darke” column in the Early Bird. He also won third place for the column in 2022 from the Indiana chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. He and his wife Gosia, recently of Union City, Ind., have owned 20 acres in Alaska for many years. “The move is a sort-of coming home for us,” said Nuwer. As a journalist, he’s written about the Alaskan Iditarod sled-dog race and other Alaska topics. Read his musings in his blog at Real Alaska Daily--http://realalaskadaily.com
Excerpt from article
When Marquise pledged the Phi Sigma Kappa house in 2013, according to a civil lawsuit, the brothers pointed a gun at a pledge’s head, forced pledges to drink alcohol excessively until filling trash cans with vomit and deprived them of sleep for up to 89 hours. Marquise and other pledges also allegedly were forced to fight each other, choose between snorting a line of cocaine or being sodomized while being videotaped; and kill, gut and skin animals.
Here is the link to the editorial in the Tufts student newspaper
Moderator: Great job by the Tufts staff and well done, Tufts administration
Yesterday, the Tufts administration finally released a substantial update on the status of Greek life on campus. Following a series of controversies in the fall of 2016 and 10 months of investigations and sanctions, the changes mentioned will, if carried out, represent a major turning point in the relationship between Greek life and the university.
For many, the focus of this announcement will be the changes to how sororities and fraternities on campus operate. For example, Tufts joined the Hazing Prevention Consortium, in efforts to clamp down on hazing among Greek organizations. Another major change announced is that only students in their second year or above will be allowed to rush, contrary to the previous policy allowing first-years in their spring semester to join fraternities and sororities.
In addition to these new policies, a particularly important change is the administration’s efforts to become more transparent with the student body, at least on the issue of Greek life.
Since the suspension of most Greek life activity on campus, the administration had failed to meet the student body’s expectations of transparency. Students were largely unaware of the status of the investigations and Greek life itself, except for the few members of organizations involved in negotiations and investigations. The administration has finally seemed to realize and attempted to correct its previous lack of transparency.
The announcement itself is a demonstration of the school’s desire to be more straightforward with students and faculty. While announcements regarding this issue were released in early November, December and February, those were much less detailed than the most recent one. Furthermore, after February the administration stopped issuing announcements about the status of fraternities and sororities, allowing the majority of the spring semester to go by without students receiving any updates on the situation regarding Greek life.
The announcement made on Wednesday, however, emphasizes that more information will come in the following weeks with the release of the Student Life Review Committee report, which was promised by University President Anthony Monaco at the“beginning of the coming academic year.” If the school follows up on its promise to release this report shortly, then the ambiguity of last spring will be avoided.
Additionally, the message from the administration reported the creation of the Organization Status page on the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life website. This website offers constant updates on the status of each Greek life organization on campus, including whether or not groups are allowed to recruit new members. It also offers a glossary on the terms used for the status of each organization.
This website is a positive step because it allows students to access the information by themselves, without having to wait for the administration to release an announcement. Moreover, the website prioritizes student access to information over the privacy of Greek organizations by showing the names of each sorority and fraternity, a move away from their emphasis on privacy in previous announcements.
It seems that the administration has finally taken a step in the right direction by striving to be more sincere and transparent. There is no doubt that the issue of Greek life will continue to be polarizing, and while many may be either opposed to or in favor of the changes in Greek life’s operations, this movement away from vagueness and ambiguity should be warmly welcomed by all.
It is our duty, as students of Tufts, to ensure that this is not just a single moment in transparency. It must be clear that obscurity is not acceptable and that we view sunlight as the best disinfectant.
THE ISSUE
A Centre County district judge threw out involuntary manslaughter and aggravated assault charges against members of a Penn State fraternity in the alcohol-related hazing death of a pledge, The Associated Press reported Friday. District Judge Allen Sinclair ordered 14 of the young men and former fraternity brothers of Beta Theta Pi to stand trial on less serious counts relating to the February death of Timothy Piazza, 19, of Lebanon, New Jersey. Authorities say Piazza, pledging at the now-shuttered fraternity, was made to run a gauntlet of drinking stations and guzzle different types of alcohol. He fell down repeatedly in the hours afterward. His fraternity brothers didn’t call 911 until the next morning.
There were incriminating text messages. And security camera footage.
And most of all, a young man’s life lost.
That life was treated as if it were as disposable as used party cups, a problem to be cleaned up when the morning came. The dangerously drunk and sickened Piazza was not viewed by some of his so-called “brothers” as a brother at all, but as a problem that needed to be handled — in a way, it seemed to us, that wouldn’t constrict their ability to hold future parties.
So they allegedly directed Piazza’s fellow pledges to clear the fraternity house of evidence of alcohol. They angrily dismissed suggestions that Piazza needed medical help.
Frat members slapped Piazza to rouse him. Doused him with liquid. Placed a heavy backpack on his back to keep him from rolling over and choking on his vomit.
So they knew he was ill. And yet, when he was found on the floor of the fraternity house basement the morning after the party, the decision was to dress him and clean him up a bit. You know — to make him look more presentable.
Some 12 hours after Piazza’s ordeal began, fraternity members finally summoned emergency help.
It was too late. Piazza died a day later of a fractured skull, ruptured spleen and collapsed lung.
The eight former frat brothers who had the most serious charges dismissed last week were ages 19 to 21. They were old enough to know that when someone is so drunk he is falling down the stairs that you should get him help. They were old enough to understand that nothing is more important than making sure he’s OK.
The Philadelphia Inquirer called the judge’s decision to throw out the involuntary manslaughter and felony aggravated assault charges in Piazza’s death “stunning.”
It was stunning. And outrageous.
We are left with so many questions. Why did the district judge not explain his decision? How do Timothy Piazza’s parents reckon with a decision that seems to diminish the enormity of their loss and the responsibility of those who might have prevented it?
Fourteen young men still will stand trial on at least one offense. But as the Inquirer noted, the “dismissal of the felony charge in particular greatly reduces the possibility of jail time if any of the students are convicted.”
Centre County District Attorney Stacy Parks Miller has pledged to refile some of the dismissed charges. And we think she should.
Not because we think vengeance is demanded here. And not because we were galled by the insensitivity of the lawyer for defendant Joseph Ems, who had been charged with reckless endangerment — though we were. (“He’s happy to move on with his life, which has been on hold for about a year,” Ems’ lawyer, William Brennan, said.)
This was an egregious case. We would have liked to have seen a full airing of the charges in the Court of Common Pleas before a jury. That might have yielded some answers — and some lessons about a collegiate culture that encourages excessive drinking but discourages accountability. Who is responsible when a pledge dies after alleged hazing? How severe is the punishment if culpability is determined? When is a tragedy more than just a tragedy, but a crime that could have been prevented?
We were hoping also to hear more from Tim Bream, a Penn State athletic trainer and the adult adviser who resided in the frat house. He hasn’t been accused of any crime. On the stand, Bream said he wasn’t in charge of discipline at the fraternity; his job mostly had to do with overseeing house maintenance and offering advice on the fraternity’s finances.
It seems to us that an adult adviser of a university fraternity should be handling more important matters — like safety. This is a question for Penn State officials to consider, and we hope they do. Because the presence of such an adviser was likely a comfort to fraternity members’ parents — but bitterly cold comfort to Piazza’s in the end.
Timothy Piazza died a horrible death because he wanted to make some friends at Penn State. It was an understandable aim that ended in an incomprehensible way. And someone ought to be held accountable.