UPDATE: Evergreen officials Wednesday said the number of players disciplined is six, not eight, as originally reported.
Evergreen school district officials have disciplined the students involved in last week’s hazing incident.
Six Heritage High School varsity baseball players were removed from the team and suspended from school until the end of spring break, which is April 6.
The district did not identify the players involved, citing student privacy laws.
At about 9 p.m. last Friday, seven returning players of the team took four new team members to the playground at York Elementary School on Northeast 152nd Avenue, said district spokeswoman Carol Fenstermacher.
They went there to subject the new players to an initiation ritual of some kind. But when the group arrived, one of the four new members of the team joined the five veteran players in hazing the other newbies.
The six players bound the three students’ wrists and ankles with duct tape, Fenstermacher said. They mocked them verbally, made them jump around with their feet bound and doused them with baby powder.
One boy was taped to a structure on the playground, Fenstermacher said.
Reports that had surfaced of more severe treatment of the three students appeared to be unfounded, Fenstermacher said.
After one boy told his parents about the incident Friday night, they called the police.
The school’s resource officer on Monday interviewed all eleven students involved. In his report he recommended that no criminal charges be filed by prosecutors and that all discipline be left up to the district.
The district on Tuesday decided to take the six perpetrators off the baseball team and suspend them for nearly three weeks.
You can read the previous story here.
Jacques Von Lunen: 360-735-4515; jacques.vonlunen@columbian.com; http://twitter.com/col_schools
