Fraternity in Alleged Rape Shows Few Scars

Wednesday night was Toga Night at Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity. Beer flowed, music played, and a steady stream of women clad in bed sheets wandered through the College Avenue house to meet the men of San Diego State University’s most famous fraternity.

Like Graffiti Night and Progressive Room Party Night before it, Toga Night was part of last week’s process of recruiting “little sisters.” After meeting the women at four nights of parties and deliberating together, the members of Pi Kappa Alpha will ask 93 of them Monday to join the auxiliary organization that supports their activities and, in return, is invited to attend their social events.

Despite the events of last Nov. 15--when former SDSU freshman Christine McMahon claims she was sexually assaulted by three men at the fraternity house--there has been no trouble recruiting little sisters. About 180 women showed up for the first night of the rush period, and a smaller number attended subsequent events, the fraternity’s president said.

To the frustration of some officials at SDSU, the fraternity they expelled from campus in February remains a thriving social institution that has signed up a new crop of male pledges and--more surprising to some--attracts scores of women to a house that is the focus of a nationally known incident.

“It’s very frustrating, and it’s very surprising,” said Sue Raney, spokeswoman for the university. “In the light of all the publicity surrounding this incident, it’s very surprising that the young women would want to join this fraternity.”

Fred Hornbeck, chairman of the Senate, which represents SDSU’s faculty, said, “I can’t believe that young adults are attracted to an organization which might have condoned or permitted or covered up the acts that were alleged.”

But attracted they are. Twenty-one men have pledged Pi Kappa Alpha this fall. That is the same number who signed up last September, before the incident that resulted in McMahon’s leveling the allegations that the men sexually assaulted her after she had passed out in a bedroom after drinking at a party.

Briton Reich, Pi Kappa Alpha president, contends that “The problem is that the whole fraternity has been stereotyped now. . . . The whole house wasn’t involved here. It was a few that were even involved.”

“The problem is that what the community is basing the judgment on is what’s coming out in the media, which . . . is not favorable to Pi Kappa Alpha,” he said. “Frankly, I think they see us as a bunch of rapists. I have people driving by my house late at night, when I’m trying to fall asleep, yelling ‘Rapist!’ ”

The fraternity, which was expelled from campus after a university investigation that also resulted in sanctions against 29 members, maintains that McMahon voluntarily had sex after drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana. The sanctions, which were not publicly detailed, included expulsions from the California State University system for those most directly involved.

The district attorney’s office declined to file charges, saying prosecutors would be unable to prove that a rape had occurred. SDSU, however, found the fraternity guilty of “physical abuse; lewd, indecent, and obscene behavior, and obstructing the university’s disciplinary process by intentionally destroying evidence.”

McMahon reopened the controversy last week by suing the state, SDSU, the fraternity and the Delta Gamma sorority, where she was a pledge at the time. The suit seeks unspecified damages.

Days before McMahon’s suit was filed the fraternity angered the university by distributing a promotional brochure that links Pi Kappa Alpha with SDSU, a move that was seen by university officials as a deliberate violation of its “outlaw” status. More bad publicity followed in local media before the fraternity stopped distributing the brochure and agreed to print a retraction.

But the beleaguered fraternity still drew about 70 men to each night during “rush week.”

Men and women say they are joining Pi Kappa Alpha because they like the people they met there, a sentiment that is not tempered by SDSU and police conclusions that some fraternity members took part in sexual abuse, some watched, one took pictures, and others conspired to cover up the incident.

“Truthfully, I feel like the guys that did it--if there was a rape--were expelled anyway,” said Chris Henry, one of the pledges. “These guys are nice. I don’t think they’re in that category.

“They’re not angels, but they’re not rapists. No way. I do not believe that they would cover up a thing like that.”

Several women interviewed Wednesday night held the same views.

“I want to be a little sister at Pike,” said Amy Curley, who sat outside her sorority clad in a toga after returning from the fraternity party. “It’s got to be at least half the girl’s fault, if it did happen. I’m not holding it against the Pikes at all. I went in there with an open mind. They were all really, really nice to me.”

Kelly Busia, a sophomore, joined Pi Kappa Alpha as a little sister in January, less than two months after McMahon’s complaint and before the university expelled the fraternity.

“Regardless of what had happened, I knew how they were,” she said. “They were down to earth guys. . . . As far as depending on a friend, you’ve always got a friend here.”

Some officials find it difficult to believe that students could hold such attitudes. They speculate that students have either forgotten the events of 10 months ago, never learned of them or simply do not believe the university’s conclusions.

“Given the circumstances of the incident (the fraternity members) were involved in last year, one would think that women would be reluctant to become little sisters of the fraternity,” one official said.

Some women may choose not to believe McMahon’s charges as a way of convincing themselves that the same thing could not happen to them, said Julie Ehrhart, who last year conducted a study on campus gang rapes for the Assn. of American Colleges.

“Young women at that age certainly have a protective or defensive mechanism that says that something like that could never happen to me,” she said. “That’s part of the reason that we found a very prevalent ‘blame-the-victim’ attitude. People are willing to believe that it was her fault because they would never be in that position.”

Male pledges certainly know about the incident. After the dispute over the brochure, Pi Kappa Alpha agreed to require all of them to sign affidavits stating that they are “fully aware of this fraternity’s off-campus status as well as the reason leading to this university decision.”

Fraternity members, pledges and little sisters agree that no effort is being made to hide last year’s problems, but it is difficult to know how the incident is being presented.

“My guess is that the story (the pledges) got from Pi Kappa Alpha was a little different from the story I would have given them,” said Doug Case, adviser to SDSU’s fraternities.

Some people apparently are rejecting Pi Kappa Alpha because of the bad publicity. Case said he “knows for a fact that there are a large number of people who did not look into Pi Kappa Alpha because of the incident last year.”

At least one woman attending little sister parties Wednesday night said she avoided the fraternity because of last year’s incident.

“I’m not allowed in that house,” freshman Laurie Safier said. “My boyfriend won’t allow it. He said, ‘Stay away from there.’ ”

According to Reich, the fraternity is turning its attention to the future, with the goal of being reinstated to the university. He noted that the fraternity, which is no longer under SDSU control because it is not recognized, observed the ban on alcohol during rush week for men and did not join other fraternities by hanging its banner at SDSU’s home opening football game.

(Alcohol is served by all fraternities during little sister rush week under Interfraternity Council rules. Spokeswoman Raney said SDSU is encouraging the fraternities to change those guidelines.)

“We could have been a pain in the butt,” Reich said. “We could have had beer going, and we could have brought everybody over to our house just to have beer.”

But members dealt themselves a tremendous setback--and aroused considerable anger in SDSU President Thomas Day, the only person who can reinstate them--by distributing the brochure during the first week of school.

The colorful pamphlet, titled Turnpike, identifies Pi Kappa Alpha as “one of SDSU’s largest fraternities,” uses the university name in several places and makes no mention of the fraternity’s off-campus status.

For Day--who was already angered by the national Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity’s refusal to withdraw the local chapter’s charter when SDSU found it guilty in February--the publication of Turnpike has added fuel to a smoldering fire.

“They have set their goal of reaffiliating with the university way, way back with this incident,” Day said.

In addition to misusing the university’s name, Pi Kappa Alpha leaders labeled the brochure as a mistake, which Day said he does not believe.

“The facts are that what they’re telling the public is wrong, the misappropriation of the university name is illegal and they have broken their good faith at the university level, at the alumni level and at the national level,” Day said.

Pi Kappa Alpha has stopped distributing the brochure and has agreed to print a retraction in the campus newspaper, the Daily Aztec. “The intention of Turnpike was not to mislead anyone,” Reich said.

But Day said university officials are investigating whether the fraternity house can remain open under city codes regarding boarding houses now that SDSU no longer recognizes it. They are also considering suspending and expelling students involved.

In the meantime, the national Pi Kappa Alpha organization is maintaining its stance that the local chapter was not guilty of wrongdoing and is refusing to pull its charter. In June, it sued SDSU, seeking the local’s reinstatement.

“If there was any wrongdoing, it was by individuals,” said Ray Orians, executive vice president. “The university has reported that they were sanctioned and are no longer part of the chapter.”

Day said that he, for one, is not concerned with his students’ continued attraction to Pi Kappa Alpha, which he called “just a boarding house with Greek letters on it.”

“I can’t really express a concern one way or the other,” he said. “American citizens have a right to free association. The question is what the association stands for.”