High School Basketball Players Accused Of Horrifying Hazing

Five former members of an Idaho high school basketball team are accused of imprisoning teammates and penetrating them with foreign objects as part of a horrible hazing ritual. Now they’re facing sex crime charges.

According to Reuters, the accused include three college football players, Anthony Clarke of Boise State, Nathan Walker of Idaho State, and Logan Chidester of Carroll College, as well as two other young men. They face charges of sexual crime, battery and false imprisonment for allegedly locking their then-teammates at a Blackfoot, Idaho high school in a locker room and a bus and “forcibly penetrating” them. Says the prosecutor on the case, “Hazing is an inadequate term since it wasn’t a once-and-done kind of thing but an over-and-over kind of thing, with one victim experiencing it multiple times.” But really, even “once-and-done” forcible penetration wouldn’t have been okay.

Four former teammates of the accused made the initial allegations last month, but now more are speaking out. Says Blackfoot Police Captain Kurt Asmus, “Now that everything is out, more victims are coming forward because they realize they are not alone and they don’t need to be afraid or embarrassed.” It’s sad that any of them had to feel that way in the first place, especially since, as Reuters points out, a quarter of high-school athletes have been victims of dangerous hazing. Hopefully by coming forward, the Blackfoot students have lessened some of the stigma these victims feel.