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Police investigate allegations of sex abuse in team hazing
From Maria Hinojosa and Phil Hirschkorn
NEW YORK (CNN) -- Pennsylvania police and prosecutors are investigating a reported hazing incident in their state involving alleged sexual abuse by members of a Long Island, New York, high school varsity football team against younger, junior varsity players. Two officers from the Pennsylvania State Police spent Thursday and Friday at the Mepham High School in Bellmore, New York, investigating the incident, which was reported to the police last weekend, though it allegedly occurred last month.
The incident allegedly included sodomy with a broomstick, sources close to the case said. It allegedly occurred at Camp Wayne, a preseason summer camp in Preston Township, Pennsylvania, in the rural northeastern corner of the state, about 35 miles from Scranton. Three teenage suspects -- all of them juveniles -- have been suspended from the football team, but are still attending school, officials said. No arrests have been made. Two of the suspects are 16 years old, and one is 17, according to a source close to the case, who said three of the victims are about 14 years of age. Pennsylvania State Police Trooper William Satkowski said Long Island investigators interviewed the suspects, alleged victims and school personnel and would probably report their findings to prosecutors next week. Satkowski would only say the case involved "inappropriate sexual contact between the varsity and junior varsity members of the football team" during the team's stay at the camp August 22-27. "School officials are investigating allegations of a very serious nature involving several members of the Mepham High School football team," said Bellmore-Merrick Central High School District superintendent Thomas Caramore in a written statement. "Upon the completion of the investigation, we will take appropriate action," Caramore said. Saul Lerner, director of physical education for the Bellmore-Merrick district, said that three members of Mepham's varsity football team were suspended from the team "pending an investigation." "Until we know [the facts], we don't want to put out half truths that we will have to retract," Lerner told CNN in a telephone interview. "There have been no reports of hazing in my eight years here," he said. Wayne County, Pennsylvania, District Attorney Mark Zimmer said the incident had been described to him as "a hazing incident gone bad," meaning it got to the point where crimes may have been committed, allegedly including "physical and sexual abuse." "We are in the process of investigating it, and we're going to do that as thoroughly as we possibly can and as quickly as we possibly can," Zimmer said. Bellmore is about 30 miles from Manhattan on Long Island's south shore. Parents of the boys who were allegedly victimized first told their story to the school principal last Friday, September 5, a school official said. The families later contacted the local police, who contacted Pennsylvania authorities, the official said.
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