WAY TOO FAR

Brutal High School Football Hazing Left Teen With Traumatic Brain Injury, Lawsuit Says

The victim was allegedly beaten in a ritualist locker-room game called “Bodies.”

A white teenager was beaten and called the n-word in a high school football hazing ritual that left him with brain damage, a lawsuit alleges. The unnamed teen was a player for Mater Dei High School and the lawsuit claims that, in February, he played a ritualistic game called “Bodies” in which two students punch each another until one of them surrenders. The plaintiff took multiple blows to the face and head and now has a “traumatic brain injury” which causes “pain, slurred speech and cognitive dysfunction,” the complaint alleges. It also claims team coach Bruce Rollinson told the victim’s father after the alleged incident: “If I had a hundred dollars for every time these kids played ‘Bodies’ or ‘Slappies,’ I’d be a millionaire.” In a letter Wednesday, Father Walter Jenkins, the president of Mater Dei, told students: “Please know that we take the matter seriously and commit to you that all aspects will be handled consistently and in accordance with the core values of our institution.”