SPOKANE COUNTY, Wash. — It was an emotional day in court as the second victim took the witness stand in the civil trial against the Mead School District.
The district is facing a lawsuit over its handling of a hazing incident at a football camp in 2023. The jury will determine how much money the district owes the victims for damages.
The victim said he was tackled to the ground in a dorm room by a group of teammates who took a massage gun and applied it to his genital area.
The victim remembers other boys in the room filming, while he screamed in the hopes someone would hear him.
In the months that followed, he says he was suffering, and everyone knew because videos of the incident had spread around school. This ended up forcing him to transfer schools.
When asked if he told his parents, he said “there were multiple times where I wanted to tell them, but I physically couldn’t get it out because I didn’t want them to think of me as anything other than their son.”
On Tuesday, the court also heard witness testimony from family and friends, including both of the victims’ mothers who spoke about how their sons’ personalities have changed since the incident.
The mother of the victim who spoke today, said “I watched it absolutely destroy my son. He went from being this class clown, happy, fun kid to being so distraught about what happened.”
The other victim’s mother told jurors she found out eight months later.
“I just remember feeling so hurt to hear what happened to him and that he had been dealing with this for this long on his own,” she said. “And just very angry that nobody had told me.”
During the cross-examination, the defense asked the victim about his relationship with one of the alleged assailants prior to and after the hazing incident. He says he was friends with one of them. That boy apologized and the victim forgave him.
The trial will continue on Wednesday, when the defense is expected to call its first witness.
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