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Another hazing lawsuit....
Ex-SLU student sues sorority over initiation
BY ELIZABETHE HOLLAND
Of the Post-Dispatch
Thursday, Aug. 18 2005
A former St. Louis University student has sued one of the nation's oldest and
most prestigious African-American sororities, claiming a hazing ritual prompted
a car accident that resulted in permanent injuries to her.
The woman, Courtney Easter, filed the suit Wednesday in St. Louis Circuit
Court. Easter is claiming that the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority, its top officers
and several of its members had roles in a car accident on Oct. 31, 2003, in
which she was severely injured.
Easter was being initiated into the sorority along with several other area
college students. She was a passenger in a car driven by fellow initiate and
SLU student Tracey Randall, the suit says. James A. Fox, Easter's attorney,
said the two were among a group of women being hazed by sorority members.
That hazing, according to Fox, included sleep deprivation. Sorority members
made the initiates stay in the same apartment and then repeatedly called their
cell phones over five consecutive nights, forcing them to stay awake.
"They hadn't slept in days," Fox said.
When four of the women, all SLU students, got into a car to go to classes early
that Halloween, each fell asleep - including Randall, the driver, Fox said. The
car crashed into a traffic control box at or near Grand Avenue and Delmar
Boulevard, he said.
Easter, a senior at the time, nearly died, Fox said. She suffered head and
chest injuries, including brain damage, he said. She now lives with her parents
in the Chicago area and is enrolled in a community college, Fox said.
In addition to those believed to be directly involved in the accident and what
led up to it, Easter is suing the Chicago-based sorority, the sorority's
executive director, Betty N. James, and other officials.
The sorority's national officers "haven't chosen to accept responsibility," Fox
said. "They just said our investigation showed . . . that there was no improper
behavior.
The suit also names the sorority's St. Louis-based Beta Delta chapter, some of
its officials and several members, including Randall.
A call to James in the sorority's Chicago office was not returned Thursday.
Randall returned a phone call but said she could not comment on the case.
A SLU spokesman said the sorority is not considered a SLU organization, nor is
it associated with the university. A Washington University spokeswoman said the
university does recognize the sorority, along with three other citywide,
historically black sororities and five such fraternities.
Alpha Kappa Alpha, which claims Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison and Jada Pinkett
Smith among its alumnae, was the subject of a hazing-related lawsuit settled in
November.
The sorority was sued after the deaths Sept. 9, 2002, of two Cal State-Los
Angeles students who drowned in what their families claimed was a hazing ritual
at a beach. Kristin High and Kenitha Saafir drowned during what police
detectives and coroner's deputies concluded was a group exercise involving
sorority members, according to the Los Angeles Times. High's mother believed
that sorority members led her daughter and the other victim into dangerous
waters tied and blindfolded.
Angela Reddock, the attorney who represented High's family, said the sorority
had agreed to settle with the families for a confidential sum of money and with
the understanding that it would make anti-hazing and initiation-related
reforms.
The sorority's Web site details an "anti-hazing policy," which says anyone who
violates the policy risks suspension or permanent expulsion from the
organization. The Web site also lists suspended chapters; Beta Delta chapter is
not among them.
Reporter Elizabethe Holland
E-mail: eholland@post-dispatch.com
Phone: 314-340-8259
Posted by Rashid on August 25, 2005 7:59 AM