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Sorority Sisters Charged With Assault, Hazing
By: Sean Yoes, Special to BlackAmericaWeb.com
Seven former and current members of the Zeta Phi Beta Sorority were formally charged with assault and hazing last week after allegedly beating and severely bruising a former pledge at the University of Maryland.
According to court documents, Lavisha McClarin said she was choked, shoved into a wall and hit on her buttocks with an oak paddle by the sorority members on more than one occasion.
She says the assaults took place at two different locations - an apartment complex in Adelphi, Maryland and at a home in Bladensberg, Maryland owned by one of the accused sorority members, Kandyce Jackson, 32.
Both alleged attacks occurred in October 2010, and after the second hazing incident, McClarin reported the attacks to the University of Maryland and withdrew from the historically black sorority. The university suspended Zeta Phi Beta indefinitely in November 2010.
The other members charged are Amber Bijou, 22; Bridget Blount, 24; Montressa Hammond, 24; Tymesha Pendleton, 26; Zakiya Shivers, 26, and Monika Young, 23.
Pendleton's attorney Jim Papermeister says he doesn't know how his client's name was included on the list of the accused.
"She is devastated now because everything she has been working hard for, for many years ... her undergraduate degree, at which she did very well; her Master's degree, which is forthcoming in a couple of months, and she has been accepted into a Ph.D program," Papermeister said.
"The idea of hazing is abhorrent to her," he added.
However, according to court documents, Pendleton is identified as one of the sorority members who wielded the oak paddle against McClarin and choked her.
"Hazing of any kind is strictly prohibited, and is inconsistent with the principles of the sorority," according to a statement by Zeta Phi Beta spokeswoman Stacye Montez.
The sorority, which, according to their website, was founded Jan. 16, 1920, is only one of a long list of sororities and fraternities that have been accused of violent hazing of pledges. In fact, violence has been a part of the initiation process for many of these organizations for decades.
In a 2007 article in "Diverse: Issues in Higher Education," writer Paul Ruffins explored hazing-related violence at black fraternities.
According to the article, Marcus Polk, who was a sophomore at the University of Maryland-Eastern Shore, <span style="font-weight: bold">required major surgery on his buttocks because he had so many ruptured blood vessels as a result of repeated violent paddling, he developed gangrene.</span> According to police, he was one of five UMES students hospitalized after a Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity paddling ritual that went on for eight weeks.
Two weeks after the UMES incident was reported, 23-year old Ernest Harris, another Kappa and a recent graduate of Kansas State University, was hospitalized after a fraternity-related beating.
According to HazingPrevention.org, 44 states have anti-hazing laws. Since 1970, there has been at least one hazing-related death on a college campus each year, and 82 percent of deaths from hazing involve alcohol.
The first recorded incident of hazing involving sexual abuse occurred in 1983, and those incidents have been increasing in their frequency since 1995.
Elizabeth Allan and Mary Madden of the University of Maine-Orono compiled a 2008 report, "National Study of Student Hazing," which indicates 68 percent of women in Greek life have experienced hazing in order to become a member of the various groups.
In February 2010, ABC News reported a pledge for one of those sororities, Sigma Gamma Rho at Rutgers University, was hospitalized in January 2010 because of injuries she allegedly sustained during a violent paddling incident. The night the pledge was hospitalized, Rutgers arrested six sorority members.
"When we hear about hazing issues, we move aggressively to stop them," said Gregory Blimlling, the university's vice president of student affairs. "Rutgers has a no-tolerance policy."
But, despite the anti-hazing efforts of Rutgers, other universities and assorted organizations across the country, many believe hazing will always be a part of sorority and fraternity initiations.
"Hazing is something that everyone knows is going on here on campus," said a 21-year-old senior at Rutgers who said she is friends with the sorority members who allegedly paddled the injured pledge.
"All the fraternities and sororities use paddles here," she said. "It is really nothing new at all."
By: Sean Yoes, Special to BlackAmericaWeb.com
Seven former and current members of the Zeta Phi Beta Sorority were formally charged with assault and hazing last week after allegedly beating and severely bruising a former pledge at the University of Maryland.
According to court documents, Lavisha McClarin said she was choked, shoved into a wall and hit on her buttocks with an oak paddle by the sorority members on more than one occasion.
She says the assaults took place at two different locations - an apartment complex in Adelphi, Maryland and at a home in Bladensberg, Maryland owned by one of the accused sorority members, Kandyce Jackson, 32.
Both alleged attacks occurred in October 2010, and after the second hazing incident, McClarin reported the attacks to the University of Maryland and withdrew from the historically black sorority. The university suspended Zeta Phi Beta indefinitely in November 2010.
The other members charged are Amber Bijou, 22; Bridget Blount, 24; Montressa Hammond, 24; Tymesha Pendleton, 26; Zakiya Shivers, 26, and Monika Young, 23.
Pendleton's attorney Jim Papermeister says he doesn't know how his client's name was included on the list of the accused.
"She is devastated now because everything she has been working hard for, for many years ... her undergraduate degree, at which she did very well; her Master's degree, which is forthcoming in a couple of months, and she has been accepted into a Ph.D program," Papermeister said.
"The idea of hazing is abhorrent to her," he added.
However, according to court documents, Pendleton is identified as one of the sorority members who wielded the oak paddle against McClarin and choked her.
"Hazing of any kind is strictly prohibited, and is inconsistent with the principles of the sorority," according to a statement by Zeta Phi Beta spokeswoman Stacye Montez.
The sorority, which, according to their website, was founded Jan. 16, 1920, is only one of a long list of sororities and fraternities that have been accused of violent hazing of pledges. In fact, violence has been a part of the initiation process for many of these organizations for decades.
In a 2007 article in "Diverse: Issues in Higher Education," writer Paul Ruffins explored hazing-related violence at black fraternities.
According to the article, Marcus Polk, who was a sophomore at the University of Maryland-Eastern Shore, <span style="font-weight: bold">required major surgery on his buttocks because he had so many ruptured blood vessels as a result of repeated violent paddling, he developed gangrene.</span> According to police, he was one of five UMES students hospitalized after a Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity paddling ritual that went on for eight weeks.
Two weeks after the UMES incident was reported, 23-year old Ernest Harris, another Kappa and a recent graduate of Kansas State University, was hospitalized after a fraternity-related beating.
According to HazingPrevention.org, 44 states have anti-hazing laws. Since 1970, there has been at least one hazing-related death on a college campus each year, and 82 percent of deaths from hazing involve alcohol.
The first recorded incident of hazing involving sexual abuse occurred in 1983, and those incidents have been increasing in their frequency since 1995.
Elizabeth Allan and Mary Madden of the University of Maine-Orono compiled a 2008 report, "National Study of Student Hazing," which indicates 68 percent of women in Greek life have experienced hazing in order to become a member of the various groups.
In February 2010, ABC News reported a pledge for one of those sororities, Sigma Gamma Rho at Rutgers University, was hospitalized in January 2010 because of injuries she allegedly sustained during a violent paddling incident. The night the pledge was hospitalized, Rutgers arrested six sorority members.
"When we hear about hazing issues, we move aggressively to stop them," said Gregory Blimlling, the university's vice president of student affairs. "Rutgers has a no-tolerance policy."
But, despite the anti-hazing efforts of Rutgers, other universities and assorted organizations across the country, many believe hazing will always be a part of sorority and fraternity initiations.
"Hazing is something that everyone knows is going on here on campus," said a 21-year-old senior at Rutgers who said she is friends with the sorority members who allegedly paddled the injured pledge.
"All the fraternities and sororities use paddles here," she said. "It is really nothing new at all."
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