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Hazing At College

Hazing At A College Fraternity Or Sorority – Penal Code 245.6C

There are a lot of instances where people are charged with hazing-related to activities with a fraternity or sorority at a university or college, and these are serious charges.

The definition of hazing is broad and murky. Still, the bottom line is if you're doing activities that are customarily defined as hazing – and that means that you're doing something that can result in some injury or death to one of the pledgers in the fraternity or sorority – you're going to be charged with hazing. If any injury or death results, you're going to be looking at a felony, prison time, and some real serious ramifications.

If no injury results during the hazing, it will probably be charged as a misdemeanor. You could still look at some County jail time or other punishments.

These hazing charges are so serious because if you get involved with them, not only will you be prosecuted by the criminal prosecutors, but you're also going to be looking at some punishment through the college where this hazing occurred.

A lot of times, they will expel you. The fraternity or sorority, those who deal with the greeting system and kick people off campus, putting them on probation relating to hazing activities, will be punished.

What Are Some Defenses?

One defense is that you're not involved. If you're not directly involved with the hazing, you shouldn't be charged or convicted of any hazing-related activities just because you're in a fraternity.

They are going to need witnesses and evidence. They will often just arrest somebody without getting the full story of what happened, so that's my job as a criminal defense attorney when you're charged with a hazing charge, and they're using this Penal Code §245.6C against you.

I have to make sure they can prove all the elements against you, and again, as I said, there are good defenses that can be utilized to either find you not guilty or mitigate things down – get you some diversion or infraction – something that does not stay on your permanent criminal record.

I've also been involved in helping people regarding their school—either helping them prepare for the hearing that will eventually come up or being involved with the hearing, depending on the particular school's rules regarding hazing and punishment as it relates to the students at the college.

So, if you have a hazing case, your best bet is to sit down with an attorney who has handled these cases before, knows what they're doing, knows what type of defenses are available to you, and can get your side of the story across.

What Factors Will Help You Defend A Hazing Case?

One big factor is your involvement, what you did, and whether any serious injury resulted from the hazing. Also, if you're a good student and never had any other disciplinary actions, that would obviously be important.

We would get character letters from friends, family, and teachers. If you're an athlete, we would also get something from your coach – anybody who knows you.

So, these fraternity and sorority hazing-related incidents are very serious, and you want to get ahead of them very quickly and meet with your attorney. I have the clients come in, give me all the information, and give me a fair, detailed account.

Make it accurate; don't put a spin on things; this way, I can help you figure out what defenses might be available and what strategy we want moving forward.

The key in these hazing cases is getting your version of events across. We do that by putting our strategy together so that our story makes sense and we can start taking action. Sometimes, I can do it even before a case is filed.

So, get in here, let's sit down and go over everything so we can figure out what we can do to defend you in this hazing-related case and hopefully show that you're not involved and set things up so we can protect your record now and into the future and get you out of the criminal justice system as quickly as possible and get this hazing-related offense away from and try to avoid a Penal Code §245.6C conviction – get some lesser conviction or get a dismissal or some diversionary program.

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