In a damning report from Fox News, Professor Elizabeth Allan—who studies hazing abuse on campus—said that while many clubs or organizations practice hazing, fraternities by far have the highest number of fatal hazing cases. Fraternity hazing has rightfully been under the spotlight this year, largely due to the efforts of victims’ parents and our firm to bring awareness to this issue. Attorney David Bianchi, who represents the family of Daniel Santulli with Attorney Michael Levine, recently appeared on Dr. Phil to discuss the hazing problem. He was also featured in the Fox News report discussing hazing experts.
“The Santulli case is a slam dunk hazing case under Missouri law,” David said in an interview with Fox News, questioning why it’s taken so long for law enforcement to charge the men involved in Daniel Santulli’s savage treatment. The report also mentions Antonio Tsialas, another young man taken too soon by hazing. Our firm is representing the Tsialas family as well, as they still haven’t gotten answers about what happened to their son.
“In the minds of most people, September marks the start of a new school year. For me, it is the start of a new hazing season, so college students and their families need to be on high alert to avoid becoming a hazing victim,” David told the press.
As school begins across the country, parents and families are right to think twice about encouraging their sons to join campus fraternities. Some fraternities, like at USC, are breaking away from university authority entirely, abandoning the academic traditions they claim to uphold to follow their own rules and avoid hazing sanctions. It’s a troubling and dangerous trend, and our firm hopes that fraternities will fight harder to improve their reputations instead of attempting to avoid accountability.
Since the year 2000, 65 college freshmen have died in fraternity-related hazing incidents and enough is enough. It needs to end!