Residents deserve answers in hazing case

Daily Local News staff writer Adam Farence offers his commentary on the Tredyffrin/ Easttown hazing case.

Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan has left much information to be desired after bringing assault related charges against three Conestoga High School football players and then settling the case on a summary harassment offense — the equivalent of a traffic ticket — over nine months later.

Because of his civic duty as a public servant, Hogan needs to explain fully to the public the evolution of the hazing case, particularly to the Tredyffrin/Easttown community on which was cast a harsh national spotlight.

Because those involved are juveniles, court records are sealed. This means the public cannot examine all the information being used in the case as they would if the defendants were tried as adults.

This gives Hogan more power than normal in deciding what kind of information to make available. Unless the defendants or those close to them are willing to divulge their side of the story, the prosecution’s version of events dominates the public sphere unchallenged.

This is exactly what happened with the hazing case. Hogan shared at an explosive news conference his version of the story — a story which dominated local and national news and left the defendant’s version unknown and unheard.

It was not until almost a month later when Tom Batgos, one of the coaches released by the school district in the wake of the incident, spoke out and broke Hogan’s monopoly of information in the case.

A few months after that, news surfaced about a video of the alleged victim giving conflicting statements about the veracity of the sodomy claim and of the ongoing residency battle between the victim’s father and the school district.

The victim’s father had received a bill for about $13,000 tuition due to a non-residency issue; he brought the hazing claim before the school district about a week later.

At this point the entire picture started to become clearer, but parts were still missing. Then on Jan. 3, the prosecution and defense counsel released a joint statement announcing that the defendants had pleaded guilty to a summary harassment offense.

What the defendants pleaded guilty to is about as serious as a traffic ticket and something most journalists typically ignore when reviewing police reports.

In the span of nine months, almost a year, Hogan went from a sensational news conference announcing the charges, the alleged sodomy, and “NoGay Thursday,” to a minor offense that, in the words of Dorian Ross, a father of one of the defendants, “could’ve been settled in district court months ago.”

And most importantly of all, the alleged sodomy, the element of Hogan’s case that carried across the country, was changed to “briefly poked the victim with a broom stick in the leg.”

Like harassment, “briefly poked the victim with a broom stick in the leg,” does not register high on a journalist’s level of interest, even on the slowest news days.

And if the alleged victim was indeed poked in the leg, how could he have been sodomized with a broom stick? Why was there no mention of the alleged sodomy?

And along the way, the head coach resigned, the rest of the football coaching staff was let go, and legacy at Conestoga tarnished. And for what? To give Hogan a moment in the national spotlight? His reasoning is not quite clear.

So what happened? There is certainly more to this story, but Hogan, the person who could explain the entire evolution of this case from start to finish does not seem to be forthcoming with details.

Now, members of the Conestoga community largely believe they have been wronged and many have called for an investigation into the case. Some have even dedicated themselves to voting Hogan out of office when his term is up in 2019.

As a public servant, Hogan should be as transparent as possible and explain what happened, particularly to the community whose reputation he damaged at the original news conference, and to the three defendants whose reputations he dragged through the mud.

They deserve to know why he marched down the proverbial warpath but then did a 180 degree turn on the charges, releasing a joint statement that still makes it seem like the three defendants committed the crime of the century by harassing a freshman and briefly poking him in the leg with a broom stick.

Chester County residents, in particular those from the Tredyffrin/Easttown School District, deserve answers.

Adam Farence is a Daily Local News staff writer. He can be reached at afarence@21stcenturymedia.com and @ afarence on Twitter