DA gives 11 high schoolers involved in extreme hazing of lacrosse players 48 hours to surrender or face kidnapping charges

At least 11 high school students in Syracuse, New York, have 48 hours to turn themselves in or face felony charges of kidnapping for their alleged involvement in victimizing at least five younger lacrosse players in an incident the district attorney says, “goes way beyond hazing.”

At least 11 high school students in Syracuse, New York, have 48 hours to turn themselves in or face felony charges of kidnapping for their alleged involvement in victimizing at least five younger lacrosse players in an incident the district attorney says, “goes way beyond hazing.” The incident took place last Thursday evening, when a group of Westhill High School students, who are not being named due to their age, decided “they were going to haze or play some sort of prank” on younger members of the school’s lacrosse team, Onondaga County District Attorney William Fitzpatrick said during a Tuesday news conference. Among the five victims identified by the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office, one student was taken to a remote area in the county when people appeared from the woods, dressed in black and armed with what appeared to be at least one handgun and at least one knife, Fitzpatrick said. That group put a pillowcase over that student’s head, then tied him up and threw him in the trunk of a car before he was left in a wooded area in the southern part of the county, the district attorney said. “He was eventually returned home. There was a period of time where he thought he was going to be abandoned in the middle of nowhere,” Fitzpatrick said. “You can hear that some of the individuals found it amusing,” he said, referencing a videotape of the incident recovered during the investigation. The decision on whether to press charges has been removed from the young people victimized in the case and their parents, the district attorney said. “This case will be prosecuted and handled in a normal course of business,” he said.