Four other former Northwestern University football players came forward Wednesday to claim they were also subjected to “extreme ritualized sexual hazing” at the prestigious Big Ten school.
They spoke a day after an anonymous person filed the first lawsuit. former Wildcats player whose civil complaint went into excruciating detail about hazing he claimed took place within the Northwestern football program.
“The university and the soccer program have let us down. That is why we are here today”, former player lloyd yachts he told reporters in Chicago, standing with other Wildcats football alumni. warren miles long, simba short and tom carnifax.
“We were thrown into a culture where physical, emotional and sexual abuse was normalized,” he said.
The players have not sued the school, but their lawyers said they are conducting further interviews with them and civil action is pending.
The players and lawyers described many of the same acts alleged in the John Doe lawsuit filed Tuesday in Chicago by attorneys Patrick Salvi and Parker Stinar, including rituals involving a naked human “car wash” and a punishment called “Shrek.” clap your hands”, in which seniors on the team would run around players who made mistakes in practice while clapping above the heads of teammates.
“The stories are eerily similar to each other, whether they were there in 2013 or 2019,” said Ben Crump, who represents the four named players.
Crump and his partner, Steve Levin, said they hope the scandal, which has rocked Northwestern, will have a bigger impact on college sports.
“No student-athlete should be enrolled in an athletic department [and be] conditioned [to accept] forced participation in highly ritualized sexual behavior,” Levin said. “That’s what happened here.”
Crump and Levin said they are representing 15 former Northwestern student-athletes, including former football, baseball and softball players.
“It was a toxic culture that was rampant in the athletic department at Northwestern University,” Crump said.
A Northwestern representative declined to comment Wednesday beyond an earlier statement that insisted the school is taking new action against hazing.
“These steps, while necessary and appropriate, are just the beginning and we will be increasing them in the coming weeks,” the school said.
Veteran football coach Pat Fitzgerald was fired last week amid allegations that he failed to prevent hazing.
Fitzgerald was head coach for 17 seasons, building the Wildcats into a consistently competitive program, a huge accomplishment in the academically prestigious schoolplaying in the hyper-competitive Big Ten.
Fitzgerald, a 48-year-old Northwestern alumnus, was 110-101 leading a program known for a 34 game losing streak from 1979 to 1982.
Northwestern initially suspended Fitzgerald for two weeks before he detailed school student newspaper the hazing accusations. He Northwest Daily Report led the administrators to consider a harsher sentence for Fitzgerald, which led to his removal.
