SDSU Expels Fraternity From Campus; Will Charge 30 Men

San Diego State University on Thursday expelled Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity for at least five years and said it will charge 30 fraternity members with a variety of offenses stemming from a party in November at which an 18-year-old sorority pledge claimed she was raped.

The university also asked the national Pi Kappa Alpha organization to shut down the 110-member chapter by revoking its charter after a five-member hearing panel found it guilty of numerous charges including “physical abuse; lewd, indecent, and obscene behavior, and obstructing the university’s disciplinary process by intentionally destroying evidence related to the incident,” spokeswoman Sue Raney announced.

A Pi Kappa Alpha leader said that the fraternity would appeal the decision up to SDSU President Thomas Day but held little hope of a reversal. He also said the fraternity will file suit if the decision is not reversed.

“We in no way will accept the university’s decision. We think it is unfair and unjust,” said Ken Smerz, San Diego director of chapter affairs for the fraternity. “The only rape that took place here is that the university raped Pi Kappa Alpha.”

The Delta Gamma sorority, which participated in the “exchange” party the night of Nov. 14, was found guilty of violating state alcohol laws and cleared of other charges.

The sorority was placed on disciplinary probation until the university determines that the sorority has improved its methods of assuring the safety of chapter members and complying with rules governing alcohol consumption by minors. No sorority members were charged.

The hearing panel of three administrators and two students made no attempt to determine whether the woman was raped after the Nov. 14 party.

But evidence presented at three days of hearings in January “compelled the board to reach the conclusion that an 18-year-old sorority pledge became intoxicated, and was thereafter physically abused and taken advantage of sexually by members of the fraternity,” Raney said.

“As an organization, Pi Kappa Alpha and its elected officers, some of whom were party to the incident under review, consistently failed either to recognize the compromised positions in which the victim was placed or, at any time over the period of several hours, to take affirmative steps to provide for the safety, well-being, or personal privacy of a woman in an obviously intoxicated state,” Raney said.

Raney said the dismissal of the fraternity was the first ever imposed by the university.

The decision came nearly three months after the unidentified sorority pledge told campus police she was raped in a private bedroom at the house between 2 and 4 a.m. Nov. 15, after drinking what she believed to be non-alcoholic punch. After an investigation, police said they believed three men had sexually assaulted the woman while other men watched through a win dow or from in the room.

But on Dec. 5, San Diego County Dist. Atty. Edwin Miller declined to file criminal charges, saying prosecutors could not “prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a rape occurred.” The woman’s family late last month asked the county grand jury to open its own investigation into the matter.

Raney said that hearings last month did not produce any new evidence to bring to Miller, who has said he would consider reopening the case if new information became available.

Reached by telephone, the sorority pledge’s father said that “we’re glad something has been done” and “we look forward to the district attorney doing the same thing.”

The family’s lawyer, James P. Collins of San Francisco, said that the measures taken Thursday by the university “show that (the woman’s) claims were valid, that the university believed her claims are valid and that the sexist statements of the fraternity yesterday were absurd.”

Collins referred to a letter sent Wednesday to Pi Kappa Alpha alumni claiming that the woman “voluntarily” had sex in a private bedroom at the fraternity house after knowingly drinking alcohol and beer and smoking marijuana.

Collins said he will file a complaint against the university next week, a legal maneuver that preserves the woman’s right to sue SDSU for damages. He said the family has not decided whether to sue the fraternity or any of its members.

The organizations representing the 16 remaining SDSU fraternities and the school’s 11 sororities released statements supporting the panel’s decision.

The SDSU Pi Kappa Alpha house, one of 175 chapters nationwide, can continue to operate as a fraternity without campus affiliation unless the national organization revokes its charter. But “in the eyes of San Diego State University, Pi Kappa Alpha no longer exists,” said Doug Case, adviser to the fraternities.

Ray Orians, national executive vice president of Pi Kappa Alpha, said the organization will not revoke the local chapter’s charter while Thursday’s decision is being appealed. If the appeal fails, the fate of the local chapter will be decided by the national fraternity’s seven-member governing board.

“The punishment, we feel, wasn’t correct or just as it relates to the charges and testimony that we have been provided to date,” Orians said.

Smerz said the national organization, headquartered in Memphis, Tenn., would back a lawsuit by the local chapter, but Orians said no decision has been made on that subject.

The 30 fraternity members who will be charged this week in connection with the incident face individual hearings before Carol Goerke, the university’s judicial procedures coordinator. Goerke has a choice of expelling them from the California State University system, suspending them or putting them on probation. The fraternity will not represent the individual members, who are entitled to appeal the decisions.

Raney said that it is “unlikely” that many fraternity members will be expelled. The men are charged with violations ranging from physical abuse and hazing to intentional destruction of evidence.

At a mid-afternoon news conference in the fraternity house, Smerz repeated the fraternity’s contention that the woman voluntarily had sex in a private bedroom, and that the actions of a few individuals should not jeopardize the entire fraternity.

But SDSU President Day said that “what this university stands for is helping students. You have an obligation as a host to make sure your guests are well-treated. They did not discharge their obligation as a house.”

The fraternity released its 34-page final statement to the hearing panel, which included new details about the incident taken from three days of closed-door hearings Jan. 21 to 23. Names were deleted from the report.

Smerz also said for the first time that photographs taken in the bedroom that evening were destroyed along with negatives by a fraternity member before the fraternity was aware police were investigating a rape.

Campus Police Chief John Carpenter has said that he believes that the photographs showed the woman.

V. Frank Asaro, the fraternity’s attorney, said Wednesday that the photos were of fraternity men “mooning” the camera and did not include her.