A Christian college gave five football players accused of beating and sexually assaulting a freshman in a brutal hazing ritual the gentle punishment of having them write about it afterwards in an essay and perform community service.
Wheaton College gave the punishment in March 2016 before James Cooksey, Kyler Kregel, Benjamin Pettway, Samuel TeBos and Noah Spielman, five of its senior-year athletes, were charged with aggravated battery, mob action and unlawful restraint.
After their arrests, they were all suspended but the university in Illinois thought a more lenient approach was the way to go at first.
The punishment was for the boys’ alleged treatment of an unnamed freshman who claims he was kidnapped, beaten and sexually assaulted by his teammates in March 2016.
Samuel TeBos, 23 and Kyler Kregel, 22, are the others. They all denied battery, mob action and unlawful restraint
The student said he was taken from his dorm and put in the back of a vehicle where the boys put a pillowcase over his head.
He says the boys referred to him as a ‘goat’ and spoke in Middle Eastern accents. The alleged victim’s heritage is not known.
The boys then tried to put an object up his backside, he said.
When he refused, he claims they beat him and then dumped him, half-naked, in a football field.
He was eventually given a ride home by other students and took himself to hospital where concerned doctors notified police.
The boy and his family contacted Wheaton to tell them what had happened and he switched schools to Indiana but the others were allowed to remain there until they were arrested not long afterwards.
The school was unapologetic about its choice of punishment at the time and boasted that it had been carried out after their own ‘investigation’.
Wheaton College, the school which they all attended in Illinois, gave them the light punishment before they were arrested or charged. They were later suspended
‘The conduct we discovered as a result of our investigation into this incident was entirely unacceptable and inconsistent with the values we share as human beings and as members of an academic community that espouses to live according to our Community Covenant,’ campus spokeswoman LaTonya Taylor said in a statement.
‘We are profoundly saddened that any member of our community could be mistreated in any way.’
All of the students were charged with battery. They all denied it.
In November last year, 22-year-old James Cooksey of Jacksonville, Florida, was the last of the boys to appear before a judge in November 2017.
All five athletes were suspended from the school team in Illinois after they were charged with nine counts ranging from aggravated battery, mob action and unlawful restraint.
They face Every count of battery could see them locked up for five years each, while each count of unlawful restraint and mob actions carries a maximum sentence of three years and a $25,000 fine.
All five are accused of duct-taping their teammate, then dumping him half-naked in a park in March 2016.
The Chicago Tribune reported that the victim told police he was in his dormitory room in March 2016 when they duct-taped his hands and feet, put a pillowcase on his head, threw him in a car, attempted to sodomize him with an object and dumped him half-naked in an off-campus park.
The boys were all players on the college’s football team when the March 2016 assault happened
Noah Spielman is pictured arriving in court in October. All of the boys deny the charge
The student, who has not been identified, left the Christian school and now attends college in Indiana.
‘This has had a devastating effect on my life,’ he said in a statement to the Tribune.
‘What was done to me should never occur in connection with a football program or any other activity. … I am confident that the criminal prosecution will provide a fair and just punishment to the men who attacked me.’
Wheaton College said in a statement that other players and coaching staff alerted college officials to an ‘incident.’
The college added in the statement that it was ‘deeply troubled’ by the allegations and noted it has a strict no hazing policy for its students.
So far, the school has disciplined the student-athletes by requiring them to perform 50 hours of community service and write an eight-page essay reflecting on their behavior, the Tribune reported citing several sources familiar with the case.
The school is ranked fourth among all Division 3 football programs in the country.