CNN
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All 11 Westhill High School lacrosse players suspected of being involved in hazing a teammate have turned themselves in, Onondaga County First Chief Assistant District Attorney Joseph Coolican said Wednesday.
The non-juvenile students will be arraigned, while the juveniles will go “straight to family court,” Coolican said. They face misdemeanor charges of unlawful imprisonment, District Attorney William Fitzpatrick said.
“The crime – I don’t want to call it hazing, I use the definition that the DA used,” Coolican added.
The Westhill High School student athletes – who are not being identified due to their age – are accused of victimizing five younger players in an incident that goes “way beyond hazing,” Fitzpatrick said Tuesday.
Here’s what we know about the case that has stunned the community:
Some of the suspects tricked the younger players into believing they were going to McDonald’s after a lacrosse game last Thursday, Fitzpatrick said.
The driver of the vehicle then claimed he was lost in a remote part of the county. There, “accomplices jumped out of the woods, pretending to be kidnappers,” the district attorney said.
The accomplices were dressed in black, wielding what appeared to be at least one handgun and at least one knife, the DA said.
“Some of the (victims) were able to escape,” Fitzpatrick said. But one of the students couldn’t flee.
The group put a pillowcase over that student’s head, tied him up and threw him in the trunk of a car before ditching him in another wooded part of the county, Fitzpatrick said.
The younger player was eventually returned home. But “there was a period of time where he thought he was going to be abandoned in the middle of nowhere,” the DA said.
“I’ve seen the videotape of what happened to this young man,” Fitzpatrick said. “It is not a rite of passage. It is not a trivial matter. I don’t know how long this young man will be affected by what happened to him.”
The video also captured reactions from some of the suspects, Fitzpatrick said. “You can hear that some of the individuals found it amusing.”
Who are the suspects, and what charges could they face?
The number of suspects is “believed to be 11, but could be more,” Coolican told CNN Wednesday.
“Most of them are minors … but there’s at least one who’s over the age of 18.”
Before they turned themselves in, Fitzpatrick made a public offer to the suspects on Tuesday: Turn yourself in to the sheriff’s department within 48 hours, and you can face a less serious misdemeanor charge of unlawful imprisonment.
“If you don’t — if you’re tougher than me, you’re a gambler and you’re going to play the odds, you don’t think you’re going to get caught — trust me, the men and women of the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Department are going to identify you,” the district attorney said.
“You’ll be arrested, you’ll be prosecuted as an adult, and you’ll be charged with the very, very serious felony of kidnapping, perhaps in the second degree.”
Coolican declined to speculate on possible punishments the suspects might face if convicted of kidnapping, as it is unclear what degree of charges they might face.
But if a suspect under 18 surrenders and is charged with misdemeanor unlawful imprisonment, his case would go to family court and would not be subject to penal law, Coolican said.
“If they’re 18, they would be eligible for something called Youthful Offender status, which would seal the record in New York state,” the assistant district attorney said.
“If they turn themselves in and (are) charged with the misdemeanor, they would not have any permanent record.”
As for the apparent gun used in the incident, Fitzpatrick did not say whether it was real or fake. But “we’re not going to charge anybody with possession of a weapon,” he said.
The rest of the varsity boys’ lacrosse season has been canceled, Westhill Central School District Superintendent Stephen Dunham said Tuesday.
While most of the team was not involved in the incident or knew about the plans in advance, “We must address the culture of the program, and the most appropriate way to do that is with a reset,” the superintendent said.
The school district has launched its own investigation, though it “cannot comment or share specific details about student discipline,” Dunham said.
But he noted Westhill Central School District’s policy “strictly prohibits” hazing “in all forms.”
“Hazing is an indefensible act,” the superintendent said. “ It can be humiliating and degrading, potentially causing physical and emotional harm.”
This is a developing story and will be updated.
