Cedar Bridge Military Academy Summer Camp in Toms River, N.J.–Reminder: camp season is fast approaching: a few bad camps have had major hazing problems.

This story today reminded me of the long list of camps with past hazing issues. I’m sure the good camps far outweigh the bad, but why not be diligent in selecting a camp?

Here are helpful tips.

And some from my old column.

Excerpt Pittsburgh Post Gazette

According to the suit, the Cedar Bridge Military Academy Summer Camp in Toms River, N.J., was advertised as a “private, faith-based” camp whose mission was to “foster a love of Corps, country and God by providing a vehicle for the application of leadership, strengthening character, teaching responsibility, improving self-discipline, developing an understanding of the role of our military in today’s society, and building informed and productive citizens.”

But the plaintiff, who is identified only as “M.S.,” claims that when he attended the camp in 2007 at age 12, he was subjected to relentless hazing that “exceeded all possible bounds of human decency.”

During his two-week stay at the camp, the suit says, M.S. was made to eat his own vomit, threatened with having to clean up human feces with his hands, was nicknamed “Puke Bucket” by staff and called that name by other campers and made to listen to sexually explicit stories told by camp employees and counselors.

Plaintiffs attorney Edward S. Shensky first sued Cedar Bridge and its owner, Steven Baryla, who was later indicted on charges of possessing child pornography and pleaded guilty in federal court in New Jersey. He is in prison awaiting sentencing and faces a mandatory minimum term of five years in prison, court records show.

News accounts said the criminal charges against Mr. Baryla led to the closing of the Cedar Bridge Military Academy camp.

In an amended suit, Mr. Shensky later added the Boy Scouts of America and its local chapter, the York-Adams Council, as defendants.