Getting your fat ass paddled is no way to go through life son.
Posted on 01/30/2007 5:43:52 AM PST by ShadowDancer
Hazing Leads To Prison For Fraternity Brothers
POSTED: 2:25 am EST January 30, 2007
UPDATED: 2:32 am EST January 30, 2007
TALLAHASSEE -- A Florida judge said she wanted to send a message with the state's first prosecution under a new felony hazing law.
Circuit Judge Kathleen Dekker gave two Florida A&M fraternity brothers two-year prison terms for paddling a pledge with wooden canes.
Dekker said one year terms might have been sufficient to punish the two Kappa Alpha Psi members but she added the second year to make sure their sentences served as a deterrent.
One of them was accused of paddling the pledge while the other urged the pledge to take the paddling and revived him when he passed out.
Last month, a jury convicted the two under a new law that makes it a felony to take part in hazing that results in serious bodily injury.
Let the punishment fit the crime judge.
An all seeing, all knowing judge is deterring crime?
Yes but they usually get kicked off campus for doing it.
I have a modern art painting that looks like that.
I think it's Omega Psi Phi that brands their pledges at initiation with an Omega on their arm.
Thank you sir, may I have another!
Kappa Alpha Psi was kicked off campus for this.
CANES - not a paddle. Big difference. Caning is used as legal punishment in some Asian countries because it is like WHIPPING. The pledge in this case passed out from the pain. Just how hard do you think the caning was inflicted by these hazers?
And the hazing was done by a CANE - not a paddle. Paddles spread out the impact to a flat surface. Caning is like WHIPPING.
....unless they're democrats....
Getting your fat ass paddled is no way to go through life son.
Frat brothers get 2 years for hazing
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Two fraternity brothers both received two-year prison terms Monday from a judge who said she wanted to send a message with the state's first prosecution under a felony hazing law.
Florida A&M University students Michael Morton, 23, of Fort Lauderdale, and Jason Harris, 25, of Jacksonville, were led from the courtroom in handcuffs, as was Harris' lawyer, Richard Keith Alan II, who was charged with indirect criminal contempt.
Morton, former president of the university's Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity, was found guilty of striking prospective member Marcus Jones, 20, of Decatur, Ga., with a wooden cane so severely during four nights of initiation rites that he underwent surgery for bruising to his buttocks.
Harris was convicted of participating by encouraging Jones to bear up under the beatings and reviving him with water after he passed out so he could go back for more punishment.
Circuit Judge Kathleen Dekker did not explain her decision to charge Alan with contempt of court, but he often argued with her rulings, even after the decisions were made.
She said she imposed a two-year sentence on the fraternity members to deter others.
"I want to save the victims who will quietly go along because they want to belong," Dekker said. "I want schools to be furious and mad and upset that they can lose talent to this and come down hard on hazing."
They could have received 12 months to five years under sentencing guidelines for their December conviction. The 2005 law made it a felony to participate in hazing that results in serious bodily injury.
It was the second trial for Morton, Harris and three other Kappa Alpha Psi members. The first jury was unable to reach a verdict for any of the five defendants after raising questions about serious bodily injury, which is not defined in the law. The second jury also was unable to reach a verdict for the other three defendants, and they are to be tried a third time in March.
Clergy members, university professors and former Florida A&M University President Fred Gainous testified that Morton and Harris were upstanding, and they urged leniency.
They also asked the judge to withhold adjudication of guilt, which she refused to do. That decision means Harris, a pharmacy major, and Morton, who was two weeks from graduating with an engineering degree, probably will be unable to get state licenses in those professions.
Morton told the judge that he grew up without a father in his home and asked to be released so he could be a father to his unborn child. His fiancee, Lena Gallego, tearfully told the judge that she was more than four months pregnant and that Morton would never again appear in court unless it was to marry her.
Jones, who also suffered a broken ear drum that has since healed, was not in court. He told the judge in a statement that he still has pain and suffers from stress, depression and flashbacks.
His father, Army Master Sgt. Mark Jones, addressed Dekker in person, saying the defendants have not shown remorse.
More from another source...
Five in Fla. fraternity charged with hazing
Tallahassee, Fla. - Marcus Jones said he had a ruptured ear drum and injuries to his buttocks that required 25 stitches after his initiation into the Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity at Florida A&M University.
He told his parents that for four days he was blindfolded, paddled with wooden canes and punched with boxing gloves.
Jones, a sophomore, wanted to keep the February incident quiet, but his father called police. They charged five fraternity brothers under a new Florida law that makes hazing a felony if it results in serious bodily injury or death. Possible penalties range from probation to five years in prison.
The case is the first major test of one of the nation's toughest anti-hazing laws. Opening statements in the trial start Wednesday, which is the middle of National Hazing Prevention Week, an event organized by the Association of Fraternity Advisors.
Forty-four states have anti- hazing laws, but Florida is one of the few that has made it a serious criminal offense, said retired Pennsylvania Judge Mitch Crane, an anti-hazing advocate who has been following the case.
"If these young men are found guilty and if they are sent to jail then it will have national implications," Crane said Monday before beginning a Hazing Prevention Week speaking tour.
Jones, 19, of Decatur, Ga., has not returned to school. His attorney did not respond to requests for comments to The Associated Press.
"My son went off to school healthy and happy. He returned busted up and bruised," his father, Army Master Sgt. Mark Jones, recently told The Miami Herald. "He looked like a soldier you see on 'M*A*S*H."'
The defendants, Brian Bowman, 23; Cory Gray, 22; Jason Harris, 25; Marcus Hughes, 21; and Michael Morton, 23, have been suspended pending the outcome of the case. The university also has suspended the fraternity chapter until 2013.
"Black fraternities are notorious for beating their pledges with paddles until they bleed, suffer broken bones, etc."
And what's with the big, deep scars of their frat carved in their arms? Looks like somebody stuck them with a branding iron or something.
My fraternity 'big brother' was a linebacker on the football team. The tradition in our fraternity was that the pledge got first shot (at his big bro). Though I had little reason to do so, I nailed him a good shot. He could have massively retaliated, but he chose not to.
The unspoken rule was 1 shot apiece. That is not to say that the brother couldn't change the rules if he wanted to (and he had the backing of the pledgemaster & phi/president).
The fraternity was "suspended" until 2013. That's not the same as being permanently kicked off campus.
Many of them do brand. You see it on some of the football players out there. I've never seen a traditional fraternity that does it. It seems to be limited to the predominately black fraternities.
Come across our border illegally...no problem!
Molest a child...probation!
Sedition...we look theother way!
Haze a fraternity pledge...You're going to jail, son!
Come across our border illegally...no problem!
Molest a child...probation!
Sedition...we look the other way!
Haze a fraternity pledge...You're going to jail, son!
Any serious hazing in white fraternities was stopped over thirty years ago. The black fraternities have been "hands off" and have continued hazing as much as they liked.
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