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Hazing News

You decide. Justice? Or did Boone County Assistant Prosecutor Nick Komoroski drop the ball?

Columbia Daily Tribune

The dropping of charges in one final University of Missouri hazing case brings an end to at least two years of hearings, trial delays and pleas from the 11 criminally charged after the alcohol poisoning of Danny Santulli on Oct. 19, 2021, at the now closed Phi Gamma Delta fraternity on the MU campus.

Benjamin Karl was to have a hearing Monday, but felony hazing charges were dropped Thursday by Boone County Assistant Prosecutor Nick Komoroski. This follows charges dismissed against other hazing defendants Samuel Lane, John O’Neill and Benjamin Parres after Santulli’s “pledge dad” Ryan Delanty pleaded guilty to reduced misdemeanor charges last month.

Terms of Karl’s case dismissal were not known by time of publication.

Inquiries seeking to confirm dismissal were sent to both Karl’s defense attorney Ben Faber and the Boone County Prosecutor’s office. The Boone County circuit court provided confirmation of case dismissal.

Nearly two dozen civil lawsuits previously were settled. While four defendants had their cases dismissed, seven others, including Delanty, pleaded guilty to reduced misdemeanor charges where most had minimal jail time among other penalties.

 

By 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, the Alaska Press Club awarded him first place in the Best Columnist division and Best Humorist, second place.

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 Warsaw, Poland and 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 and in his weekly column "Far from Randolph" in the Winchester Star-Gazette of Randolph County, Indiana.

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