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at Snaps the Podcast. When I was eighteen years old, I became an
Alpha FI sister at the University of Maryland. Three years after disaffiliating from the
chapter and three days before graduating college, I released the first season of Snapped,
a tell all podcast series about my sorority experience. Since the release of
season one, I've interviewed forty current or former Greek Life members, including some
Greek Life adjacent individuals. These are their stories. I I'm Lucy Taylor,
your host and favorite excommunicated sister. This is Snapped. Snapped. In two
thousand and five, a real estate investor named Donald Abbey visited his old frat
house at Penn State Beta Theta Pie. Don Abbey is a billionaire, you
know, and he goes on and he saw that Beta Theta Pi had been
a vehicle to his success. But what he saw was that it had become
something of like Inma House, not what he had wanted. It just preturning
he has to become. According to a grand jury report, Abbey ended up
spending a total of eight point five million dollars towards renovations of the Beta Fa
to Pie House. However, throughout the renovation process, mister Abbey became concerned
with the Beta brothers drinking habits. Workers on the renovation were navigating puddles of
vomit and replacing patio doors because brothers who forgot their keys would kick the doors
in, you know, frat house stuff. Basically to Pie, Penn State
went through the most expensive attorney house renovation in America's history. It was inspired
by the White House, the chairs in the dining room, the gold on
the kitchen ceiling. With so much money on the line and frat boys in
the house, mister Abbey needed a contingency plan, and a wealthy alumni had
refurbished it and then tried to basically ensure his investment because the members at that
time were destroying the work that had been done, so he was the one
who put the camera system in there to basically ensure the safety of the building.
As part of his multimillion dollar renovation, Don Abbey installed cameras throughout the
Beta Theta Pie House. These cameras are the only reason we know exactly what
happened on the night of February second, when nineteen year old Tim Piazza showed
up to accept his bid and start pledging his first night in a fraternity would
be the last night of his life. A national fraternity at Penn State University
is suspended after the death of a student. Police saying nineteen year old Timothy
Piazza, and engineering student, was found unconscious inside the Beta Theta Pie fraternity
house Friday morning. The coroner ruled his death accidental. Jareka Duncan reports investigators
are now looking for video evidence from inside the fraternity house. Jika, good
morning, Good morning. Timothy Piazza just recently joined the ranks of the Men
of Principle at Beta Theta Pi fraternity. Frat members told police and paramedics on
Friday morning, the team plunged down the basement stairs the previous night, and
that their call for help came about twelve hours after his fall. This is
Evelyn Piazza, Tim's mom. But Tim had mentioned to us that he was
thinking about rushing one more time. We really didn't think it was a good
idea. He was an engineering major and mechanical engineering major really tough course load,
and I didn't want anything to take away from what he wanted to accomplish
in the long run. But I never wanted to be the parent that told
him what to do, so I would point out good and bad and tried
to lead him into the right decision, and yet he still wanted to give
it a shot. So he had told me the one fraternity that he was
really interested in, which was Beta Theta Pie, and I had looked it
up online and saw that it was a non hazing, non alcohol fraternity,
and I thought he made a good choice. Around the same time that Tim
had told his mom that he was interested in Beta Theta Pie, Cordell Davis
was a Beta pledge. I got initiated in December twenty sixteen ish. Tim's
plush costs came in February, so when I joined the fraternity, Beta Theta
Pie It was alcohol free. It was supposed to be. That was actually
one of the things that drew me to it, because I had thought,
Okay, if it's alcohol free, they can't have this crazy hazing process.
The Beta Theta Pie House was supposed to be alcohol free after the chapter was
shut down the first time for hazing. That was a few years before Tim
and Cordell showed up. But of course the frat reopened under you know,
we're alcohol free now. And but when I interviewed Cordell, I saw the
scar on his forehead that he got on bit acceptance night during the same hazing
event that would lead to Tim's death one semester later. So you go from
rushing a fraternity, which is where you're just experimenting with everything and seeing which
one you like, to becoming a pledge, which is where you're getting hazed
insanely constantly, and then you're initiated, and then you're a newly initiated brother.
They called it a NIB, So as a NIB until there's another pledge
class, you're basically still a pledge. So January December I was even though
we were initiated, we were still basically the pledges right, so I still
never got any respect whatsoever from anybody. Cordell and I met in Philadelphia last
October to do an interview in person. He was featured in the last episode,
The h Word. He was the one who got a head injury from
a fall at the chapter how that was a result of hazing with alcohol,
the one who his brothers wanted him to lie to Urgent Care about how he
fell. It's also important to note that Cordell was his chapter's only black member.
This is the first time, Lucy, that this is going to be
an accurate play by play, because I just had my deposition last month,
and it's just amazing how much I forgot. The deposition that Cordell is referring
to is his official witness statement from the night Tim fell down the stairs on
February second, twenty seventeen. I'll set the scene. It's bid acceptance night
night one. Beta Fata Pie has undergone reforms that have earned it a reputation
as a model fraternity. They've even won Penn States Chapter of the Year.
And the event that Tim is attending is supposed to be dry no alcohol.
To tell the story of that night, I'm using reporting from the Grand Jury
and an article by Caitlin Flanagan for the Atlantic title Death at a Penn State
Fraternity. Flanagan's coverage of Tim's death, Beta Theta Pie and the Inner workings
of Fraternity World is the most comprehensive assessment of Greek life that I found throughout
my research. The full article is linked in the episode description, and you
should read it when you're done with this episode. I'm sure you'll have questions
that her article can answer. We're also going to hear from Tim's mom,
Evelyn, and Cordell, who played his own unique role in Tim's story.
Before we get into any details, I want to warn you that some of
this is really hard to hear. The negligence and blatant disregard for human life
is hard to wrap your head around, so please listen with caution. Tim
arrives to the Beta Theta Pie house at nine oh seven pm on February second.
Inside, fourteen pledges have lined up, each with their right hand on
the right shoulder of the person in front of them. Cordell Davis is there,
too, ready to welcome the new pledge class. First on the agenda
is a series of songs and skits for the new pledges to enjoy. After
the ceremony, the gauntlet begins. This is the first act of hazing.
Pledges will endure an alcohol fueled obstacle course around their new chapter house, their
dry chapter house. Station one, chug from a handle of vodka. Station
two, shotgun and natty light while your brothers cheer you on Station three.
Slap a wine bag, gulping at least a mouthful. Station four, play
beer pong in the basement, chugging a full cup of beer if you miss
a shot. Station five. The full pledge class chugs a beer together before
heading off to their first social, where alcohol continues to flow. So after
the ritual on the gauntlet, then came the party and again this social,
the social. Yes, the social. I saw on the camera footage in
the basement. I had gone into tim piazza and it had kind of like
given him a handshake, slash a hug. And was this the first time
you met him? No, I hadn't met him before at another event,
which was a rush event. It had a good conversation and he had a
lot to say about his family. You know, he's very family oriented.
And he walked away, and I thought to myself, he needs to walk
right out of this house. He's too good for this place. I still
remember thinking that, you know, the beta Beta Pie social was in full
swing. Security footage shows that at ten forty pm, Tim Staggering hunched over
and plops down on the couch, struggling to get up. Eventually, Tim
heads to the front door. Tim's mom, Evelyn, says Tim tried to
let himself out of the house and couldn't figure out how to open the door
because I think it was a keypad, and we think that's why he was
heading for the basement, because there was another exit in the basement, so
he was trying to save himself. After an unsuccessful attempt to exit out the
front, Tim staggers towards another door. Caitlin Flanagin reports that perhaps he is
hoping that this door will be easier to open. Perhaps he is hoping that
it also leads out of the frat house. But it is the door to
the basement, and when he opens it, perhaps expecting his foot to land
on level ground, he takes a catastrophic fall down the flight of stairs.
Another brother here the fall seized him and shoots a text to the frat group
chat, Tim Piazza might actually be a problem. He fell fifteen feet down
a flight of steps, hair first, going to need help, Four of
the brothers carried him up the stairs. By now he has somehow lost his
jacket and tie, and his white shirt has ridden up, revealing a strange,
dark bruise on his Torso this is something that I didn't see with my
own eyes, but I watched on the video camera footage. There's twenty to
forty people who saw Tim being carried up the stairs. He's on the couch
and they just surround him. Some of them are laughing, some of their
pointing, and nobody thinks anything of it. And this is during the social
Flanagan says that while Tim is on the couch, one brother performs a Sternham
rub, which is a test for unconsciousness used by EMTs, but Tim does
not respond. Another brother throws beer in his face. Someone lifts Tim's arm
and it falls back dead weight to his chest. A brother rolls to him
on his side, but has to catch him because he almost rolls onto the
floor. Another brother straps a backpack full of books to him to keep him
from rolling over, and choking on his vomit. Two brothers sit on Tim's
legs to keep him from moving. This is when Cordell walks into the video
frame. At one point there's twenty forty people surrounding him, and then when
I got in there there was a lot less, but sitting on him,
sitting on his legs was the person who had driven me from the clinic back
to the returning the house when I had my fault my head, and I
knew right away there was a huge problem. So he's laying on the couch,
lying on the couch and conscious. Being a former football player, I
mean, we were very trained in high school. Concussions were no joke.
So I knew right away as somebody who is on the couch and unconscious,
there's something really wrong like past, Like oh, maybe let's put him,
give him much. He can't take a test. No, this is like
immediate nine one one hospital urgent now. And nobody thought that I was correct.
Caitlin Flanagan reports that two hours into the security footage, Cordell walks into
the frame and approaches the couch where Tim is lying, still unconscious. The
presentment notes that Cordell leans over Timothy's head. He then turns to the Beata
brothers near Timothy and becomes very animated, again, pointing at his head and
then at Tim and I know the thought was there that he could die.
I don't. I don't remember if I said it. I know I wanted
to. I wanted to. I know I said the words I'm going to
grab my phone and call name on myself, and that's when I was thrown
against the wall. The presentment states that when the brothers told Davis that tim
had fallen down the basement stairs, he became even more concerned now for Timothy's
life. He's as to them that tim needed to go to the hospital since
he could have a concussion. He screamed at them to get help. In
response, one of the Beta brothers rose from the couch and shoved Cordel into
the opposite wall. He instructed Cordell to leave and that they had it under
control. Several people had pushed me. I didn't know that until the deposition,
Like my brain had taken so much out. They were telling me,
think about Beta, you're overreacting. I was called crazy, I was called
insane. I was called chaotic and drunk. I was told that they have
these kinesiology career paths and biology career paths, so they knew they knew how
to handle this. And all of this just gone in my head and I
doubted myself. I didn't think it was appropriate for me to be that person.
I thought it would have to be a person in power. That's why
I was basically trying to lobby everybody in the house to get on that page.
But even after all of this, I'm talking with the social chairs now
and I'm trying to get them on board with calling nine on one. I
couldn't get the vice president, I couldn't get the assistant plugemaster, I couldn't
get the executive board. So now I'd tried the social chairs, and in
this moment, I didn't know it then, but I knew it when I
got like the next morning. In this moment, as I'm come playing the
social chair and trying to get him to help to him, he's putting in
the group chat, nobody listened to Cordel. He's insane and he always gets
like this, and the message I got twenty eight likes. I was told
by a couple of people that I was just trying to leave and the bus
was coming in like five minutes or so, so I had left, just
gone on the bus with them, and I was told, don't worry,
it's all gonna be okay. And I was just I was very worried.
I was I was my worries. We're not going away anytimes. Flanagin reports
that after Cordel leaves, the pledge master comes into the room, looks at
Tim and slaps him in the face three times. Tim does not respond.
Then another brother with an open hand strikes Tim on the abdomen, where the
bruise has bloomed. This hit maybe one of the reasons the forensic pathologists will
find that Tim spleen was not just lacerated but shattered. Still, Tim does
not wake up. Forty five minutes later, Tim rolls onto the floor.
The heavy backpack is still strapped to him. He attempts to stand up and
manages to free himself from the backpack, which falls to the floor, but
the effort is too much and he falls backwards, banging his head on the
hardwood floor. A frat member shakes him, gets no response, and walks
away. It's early in the morning of February third. Now the social has
ended. At three forty six in the morning, Tim is on the floor,
curled up in the fetal position at home in New Jersey. His parents
are sleeping across campus. His older brother Mike, has no idea that Tim
is not safely in his bed. At three forty nine, Tim wakes up
and struggles to his knees, cradling his head in his hands. He falls
again to the hardwood floor. An hour later, he manages to stand up
and staggers towards the front door, but within seconds he falls head first into
an iron railing and then onto the floor. He stands once again and tries
to get to the door. His only hope is to get out of this
house, but he falls head first once again. At five oh eight,
Tim is on his knees, his wounded head buried in his hands. Around
campus, people are beginning to wake up. The cafeteria workers are brewing coffee,
Athletes are rising for early practices. It's cold and still dark, but
the day is beginning. Tim is dying inside the Beta house. Some fraternity
members head off to class, and in the fullness of time they return.
At about ten am, A brother arrives to the house and asks the pledge.
A question to both of them seems like a casual one. Whatever happened
to that pledge who fell down the stairs of the party. They come across
Tim's shoes and realize that Tim must still be somewhere in the house, so
they look for him. The search reveals him collapse behind one of the bars
in the basement. He is lying on his back with his arms tight at
his sides and his hands gripped in fists. His face is bloody and his
breathing is labored. His eyes are half open, his skin is cold to
the touch. He is unnaturally pale. The chapter president would later describe Tim
and a text mean message, stating he appeared fucking dead. Three men carried
him upstairs and put him on the couch. Now is when the cover up
begins. President Brendan Young sends a text to Pledge Master Daniel Casey make sure
the Pledges clean the basement and get rid of any evidence of alcohol. In
the security footage, Flanagan reports that brothers with garbage bags suddenly appear in the
footage, cleaning up the party and destroying all the evidence. Brothers try to
prop him up on the couch and dress him but his limbs are too stiff
and they can't do it. Someone wipes the blood off of his face,
and someone else tries, without luck, to pry open his clenched fingers,
but they do not use their many cell phones to call nine one one.
Instead, one brother uses his phone to do a series of Internet searches for
terms such as cold extremities in drunk person and binge drinking alcohol, bruising or
discoloration, cold feet, and cold hands. Finally, at ten forty eight
am, the brothers agree to call nine one one, twelve hours after Tim
fell. The grand jury report includes a deleted text message from the same pledge
that found Tim lying behind the bar. If need be, just tell them
what I told you. Guys found Piazza behind in away bar the next morning
around ten am and he was freezing cold, but we decided to call nine
one one instantly because the kid's health was paramount. While Tim is on the
way to the hospital, his brother Mike is still on Penn State's campus,
presumably getting ready for a full day of class. So our older son,
Mike was also going to Penn State, and he was a year older than
Tim, so he was a junior and one of Tim's roommates called Mike and
said Tim didn't come home last night. That's not like him. So Mike
had the presence of mind to think, let me call the hospital. And
he called the hospital and they said there was an accident. You need to
come right away. So Mike went to the hospital and saw his brother on
life support by that point, and he had to call me. It wasn't
until Mike called the emergency room. Doctor called, I called my husband.
We met at home, packed bags and we were on our drive by the
time. There were the CEO of Beta Theta Pie reached out. They called
while we were driving to the hospital where Tim was having surgery, and I
did not answer because I didn't want anything I said to be held against me.
We didn't know what the situation was, so I thought it was best
not to talk to them at all. And then they called and they or
messaged and said that they were going to fly in the next day to meet
with us. But by that point Tim was declared brain dead and then he
passed away, and we said we're not waiting around. We're going home.
There's nothing for us here. Tim Piazza arrived at the hospital with a traumatic
brain injury, as well as bruising, internal bleeding, and a ruptured spleen.
Multiple doctors told the grand jury that these injuries didn't have to be fatal
if he received medical attention sooner. The brothers of Beta Theta Pie failed Tim
Piazza and they knew it too. So February second is the bags and this
night, February fourth is the day that he finally passes away. And in
between these two intervals, so the fraternity house ends up having a lot of
meetings. I wasn't at any of them. And then immediately nationals fly in
and they started saying, don't talk to the media. Bill Cassidy's one of
the big dogs of Beta. He comes in personally, and there's a lot
of people that there's a lot of lawyers, there's a lot of suits there,
and they're all on the line of don't talk to the Piazza family and
don't talk to the media. Don't talk to They said, don't even talk
to the pledges. Don't talk to Tim Piaza's pledge class. That was a
big thing. Immediately cut off all communications immediately, it was like, do
not talk to them whatsoever. There was a vigil with Tim's family there at
the vigil. They said, don't wear your letters. Whatever you do,
go to the vigil, but do not wear Beta clothes. They didn't want
the parents to know and remember faces of who they were. I mean,
there were a couple of slogans, think about Beta so weren't a secrecy and
keep your head down. Those words, all of them were very commonly spoken
and thrown around in the house in the days prior to him dying and after
him dying. After Tim died, somebody rounded up all of the fraternity members
and told them if anybody asks, Tim Piazza showed up drunk, and you
know, you can't talk to the Piazzas. You can't go to the funeral
because you'll get put in jail. We know this because a friend of ours
worked with a mom indirectly of one of the members who was not there that
night. So I was told by Tim's mom that the aternity was told to
not go to the funeral. Yes, I can say, positively speaking,
none of them went, and me and myself I wanted to go, but
I didn't have a car, so there's nothing I could do. I know
that I know the chapter president, he said don't go. He was the
one that had a private meetings with the Nationals, and a lot of the
stuff that came from him was really you know, came through him from nationals.
Remember that in fraternity world, accepting a bid doesn't make you a brother.
You're still just a pledge. Only after weeks of hazing do you become
a real brother in a separate initiation ceremony. You know, there's there's a
lot of ancient stories out there where if you weren't strong enough to get into
the organization, there were you just an outcast. So it was like Tim
Piosa didn't make it to the organization, he died trying to get in.
So just his entire family was just became an outcast. Yeah, he wasn't
a brother. He wasn't a brother he so it was just good bar get
out of our face. So how did you find out that he died?
The chapter of Prison put in the group chat that Tim Piazza had died,
and then a member says, wait, so are we canceling the social this
weekend? Six weeks after Tim died, Penn State banned Beta Theta Pie from
ever returning as a chapter at Penn State. They wanted to have this party,
Lucy that was called Beta Theta Bi. So the fraternity house was called
Beta. They to pie, That's what the name of the social was.
They'd never had it, but they were planning. They really wanted to have
this social called Beta Theta bi as like they were. They were the victims
because Penn State was kicking them off campus after Tim died, they wanted to
have a social. So what about those security cameras that we talked about in
the beginning of this episode, you know, the ones that Don Abbey installed
to protect his investment from the brothers of Beta Theta Pi. As reported by
Penn State's student newspaper, The Daily Collegian, Beta initially claims that some of
their cameras were out of order the night that Tim fell. That was until
July twenty seventeen, five months after Tim died, when a State College police
investigator was reviewing the house as camera footage for completely separate case. This is
how he came across camera angles he hadn't noticed in the piazza case, even
though he himself had spent hours examining videos from February second and third. Upon
further inspection, the investigator noticed a data clearance message dated February sixth, two
days after Piazza was pronounced dead. This prompted him to check another recording device,
which had footage dating all the way back to January thirty first, twenty
seventeen, meaning that all of the cameras we're working the ninth Tim fell.
The deleted footage was eventually recovered by the FBI, and it's the only reason
we know exactly what happened to Tim on that night. Without it, it'd
be the Beta brother's words against Cordels. And at this point, when you
start speaking about it publicly, are you still in contact with any of the
brothers Before that happened, they had cut contact off with That's what made it
so easier to take a stand. I I wanted to go back to writing
Petsylvania right away. I didn't feel safe at Penn State. I mean,
I really thought that I would probably get killed prior to their being statements under
oath in a courthouse, you know, take care of me before for it
gets there, to put their lives away. The easiest thing would just get
rid of me. And I remember my new apartment in State College. I
remember looking at the window as on the second floor, and there's in this
community called the Retreat, and I looked out the window. I said,
wow, so much open space. How easy it would be for a sniper
to shoot me right through the window. These things went through my head.
I mean, I had death threats on death threats. I was nineteen years
old when this all happened. And there's gonna be haters who say that I
should have called myself, But they're only saying that because I bring up the
topic of well, it's yes, someone should have called. Yes, someone
should have called. I'll be the boxing bag for all that if that's what
it takes to get and make change here. At that point, I moved
to New Jersey with my father and stepmother, and from that day on,
I never felt safe in Pennsylvania. It's like to this day, like right
now we're in Philadelphia. You know, I would not come to city alone.
Wouldn't do it because the power structure in this city is one of which
that most of the people in power like no me, and like feel that
I'm like somebody who hurt their friend or their feeling or something. Again,
this is a powerful fraternity house where their family members are people in power.
So I felt a lot safer in Jersey transferring to Rutgers, and they that
was the enemy. I was the enemy of the organization. Still to this
day, I'm like the enemy. I think everybody who joins a Greek letter
organization becomes spectimized, and many of them don't even realize that. You know,
the hazing process. You're being marginalized, You're being exploited. You're being
forced to go shopping for people and forced to do laundering, forced to clean
the house. This is involuntary servitude, this is this is it's like you
don't even realize what's going on. So, yes, they were victimized,
but then they become the perpetrators themselves. Luckily myself, I never hated,
you know, not something I ever wanted to. But I think if I
stayed in the house long enough, I think maybe I would have been just
as bad, because at that point I'd be like, screw it. Yeah,
I can't get my justice, so let's take out my anger on the
pledges. Did they un follow you on INSTAGRAMM wondering they blocked you right away?
Yeah, but there. You know what's funny is their parents started following
me on Instagram to spy on me. Back to Evelyn Piazza, were you
ever in contact with anyone in the fraternity's parents? So one of the parents
reached out to my husband and said it was a terrible accident. My son
wasn't there that night, And when the FBI recovered the deleted video from the
basement DVR camera, guess whose son was involved. According to The New York
Times, the prosecution edited the twelve hours of surveillance video footage down to three
hours for the court. While the Piazzas left the room during the video footage,
the defendants stayed watching quietly. Apparently they laughed among themselves during a couple
of breaks. You would have thought it was a fraternity reunion, said Tom
Klein, a lawyer for the Piazzas. We did have one father come up
to us when we were in court. They were playing clips of the video
that they had put together, and we didn't want to see it, so
we left the courtroom and one father came out and walked over to us and
shoulder sagging, you know, look like he was crying, and he said
how sorry he was. And my husband said, well, then tell your
son to come forward. And tell the truth and do the right thing.
And that's where that ended. I was told that I should just plead the
Fifth Amendment. The whole time somebody had done and you can't understand that first
some slight reason, maybe you want to help his family out. Like when
the hearing started with the court case started, my father was in a group
chain, a group email with the parents of the defendants. They're just trash
talking to Piazza families saying, why are they putting our kids through all this?
Our kids have college, our kids have class and exams, blah blah
blah. Yeah, you just had to laugh because it's so it's inhumane and
it's unnatural, it's uncivilized. After the basement footage was recovered, the grand
jury recommended one thousand and ninety eight criminal charges against eighteen fraternity members and against
the fraternity itself. The most serious of charges, like involuntary manslaughter, were
eventually dropped. Caitlin Flanagin reported that Evelyn and her husband Jim went to every
day of the pre trial hearings that determined which of the charges would go to
trial. So it was a series of preliminary hearings trying to determine which charges
would go to criminal court. And when we finally reached that point, most
of the individuals pleaded guilty to their charges, which might have been alcohol or
hazing. There are two individuals left who have yet to go to court.
They appealed the old Pennsylvania hazing law and said it was unconstitutional, and then
COVID hit. So we are still waiting to see about going to trial criminal
trial for two people. And how involved were the two people? They were
the president and the pledge master. Oh wow, wow, do you know
when that's going to be Nope? Wow? And so had they just been
living at their parents' house waiting or you don't know, I don't know.
But they were kicked out of school, all right. We were not told
who was kicked out or not. We were told that six people were expelled,
and you know, maybe some however, many seven left of their own
accord, and maybe some the charges were dropped against them because they did go
through the conduct process also, but there were many of them who just left
penn State and went to another school before the conduct process was finished. Nobody
has seen jail time in a horrible hazing death where there's video. There were
four people who if you were not a resident of Pennsylvania, you couldn't do
house arrest, so you were going to have to go to jail. But
they could come up with a Pennsylvania address and then do house arrest, so
they never had to see jail either. And some people got time served.
One had to go to an alcohol treatment center and that was time served,
and one had shoulder surgery and he was rehabbing, so that was time served.
So it's been a little frustrating to see that even with the sentencing,
it's still not it doesn't really have the gravity that it should. Yeah,
so it's like they just want to get away with murder. It's like it's
like the show How to get Away with Murder, Like they're living it in
reality, Like they're making tons of money right now. Who's making money.
They are the presidents, the chapter presidents. They're making money. They have
great jobs, huge Wall Street and all these things. So, yeah,
they got there. They got their college degrees, and they're making money and
they're buying houses and living lives. And I have PTSD. I am overwhelmed
easily. I don't get a lot accomplished. I try. I have good
intentions but I just am so scattered five years out and it is really freaking
hard, and it's just as painful now as it was then. There's always
that feeling in the center of my chest, like that heavy weight. I
physically feel it. I've had dreams where Tim has been in them, and
I know that he's not supposed to be there. It's so weird that even
in dreams you can't escape it. So it was alcohol free, but then
they brought in the Penn State had athletic football trainer, and he was on
board with having alcohol in the house. It's important to remember that Beta Theta
Pie was supposed to be one of Penn State's reformed fraternities. Beta took more
safety precautions than most chapters do. They even had a live in adult.
And we've learned that a member of the Penn State faculty actually lives in the
frat house. He's Tim Breen, University's assistant athletic director. The dead frat
boys parents say they hold Breen partially responsible. This individual's job was to be
an advisor and watch over these students. The boy's father said, you had
to know there was alcohol going on. He had to know there was hazing
going on. He literally lived in the house and he was the advisor,
and he sat in on every meeting and helps plan the parties and helps plan
how much alcohol was going to come. And he would all to talk about
his college experience and how he wanted it to be more like what he had
and before the gauntlet began. On the night that Tim fell, while the
brothers were still enjoying their songs and skits, Cordell saw Tim bream at the
Beta Theta Pie House. Our house had an interior loft area, so sort
of a balcony looking onto the main floor, which was I believe it was
called the Great Hole, the Great Hall's way. This ritual was and I
looked behind me and I looked into the loft and I saw the Pensley Football
head athletic trainer watching the ritual, and as I looked at him, he
looked at me. And after that, after it was over here, she
went to his room. So he was there the whole night on February second.
He knew everything that was going on, held the planet right, He
held planet everything. The grand jury presentment included a text between two Beta brothers
after Tim Piazza's death referring to Tim, one of the brothers suggested they should
delete a group me thread quote so people don't get screenshots or anything that could
leak to the media. Tim's idea as a precaution, he lied under earth.
He said he never planned anything. He never he didn't know about the
parties, and it's just all flambolliant lives. And he walked by Tim that
morning. Video footage shows that he walked directly past him on his way to
work. But I don't get how he could get away with that if it's
literally on camera footage. Well, because you know, I had I had
a lawsuit against Penn State and Bath in a Pie and the trainer and Penn
State called my lawyers and they said, we'll settle with Cordell, but you
got to remove the trainer from the case. You can't sue him anymore.
It was Yeah, so there was this weird protection with the trainer from Penn
State. Probably with the judges too. You know, again, this is
Penn State. All the judges are just they're connected with Penn State. Right,
It's like a judge and State College as a Penn State judge, just
like they're not for the people. A real yeah. It's like it's a
yeah, it's a puppet. Penn State continued to employ tim Bream after his
contract expired in the summer of twenty seventeen. According to news outlet Penn Live,
he had a salary of one hundred eighty eight thousand, nine hundred twenty
eight dollars. At the beginning of twenty eighteen, the university took away his
assistant Athletic director position and reduced his salary to one hundred thirty five thousand dollars.
He resigned the same day. Tim Bream was never charged for his involvement
in tim death at Beta Theta Pi In two thousand and nine, eight years
before Tim Piazza rushed at Penn State, eighteen year old Joseph Dato died from
head injuries after falling down the stairs on campus. The investigation into his death
found that two fraternities provided data with alcohol that night, Penn State's student run
into Fraternity Council aka the IFC aka the little frack government that we've been talking
about, sprung into action. They agreed to hire an outside security firm called
Saint Murets to perform unscheduled checks at the fraternity houses. They'd show up the
parties with a clipboard and note if any rules were being broken. This was
supposed to be a game changing reform. They'd never did anything. The only
rule that they had was you could hold one cup. The rule they had
it was that you were earned allowed to hold two cups of alcohol. You
had to have one cop That was the rule you had to follow. Sat
Maret's came to check on Beta Theta Pi's party the night that Tim fell down
the stairs. Surveillance footage shows that minutes before Tim fell, two Saint Mauret's
employees walked through the first floor of the house. And then they had a
somewhat farce of a security company that would go and check out parties, and
they were there that night. They came, they rang the doorbell, and
the procedure was they ring the doorbell, somebody answers the door and they have
to go get the president. So they closed the door and leave the people
outside go get the president. But that gives them time to clean up whatever
is going on inside. And then the president comes to the door. And
then they walked through the first floor and that's it, just the first floor,
and then they usher them out, and then that security company, if
they were to have seen something that was a violation, should write a report,
and then that report would go to the IFC, and the IFC could
determine whether that goes in the trash or whether they push it up the chain
at all. This next interview is with an anonymous frat brother from another school.
We'll call him Tyler. Tyler was very transparent about the effectiveness of fraternity
world so called reforms. Do you think that their inspections of the party are
helpful and that the worst thing that they do well? The issue is is
that students are doing this like they're random people from all Greek houses and so
like they basically come to your party, they of a list of things that
we can't be doing, and so they're supposed to look for them and report
them. The issue is these rules are never properly enforced. People in their
house do these things, but they charge other houses for them, and so
it's a massive double standard because it's basically the people who are on our IFC
board their houses are basically don't get in trouble, and the houses that aren't
usually end up taking the blame unless they're like Uh, I don't know how
to put it, but like there are also houses here that like can't really
get kicked off campus, Like they have like a layer of protection because of
who their alumni are. They're like a house got in trouble for underage drinking,
which while yes, it's against the law, Like if you are expecting
fraternity houses to throw parties under your rules, you know that people are going
to drink under twenty one. There's we were always we're always like I don't
want to say, on our toes, but it's the reality is situation,
and so like yeah, like it's just like we kind of I don't want
to say, have a contingency plan, but like we're always kind of on
our toes and like ready to butt. And usually it's just like I don't
want to say it's hopeless to fight back, but it really is. Because
like the j board that you go to for IFC is very much cankrew court
in a sense that there's no, it's not really illegal proceeding. You're you're
only involved with students. Remember, Fraternity World prefers to handle matters internally.
The main goal of these kangaroo courts is to provide the illusion of authority,
not any real consequences. So like usually the Office of Students, it's like
it's called os R R OFF I don't know, but basically they're like it's
some sort of student organization that deals with all student conduct, right, and
so they will go over and they basically gather evidence and then it goes to
IFC got it. And so that gathering of evidence is mostly done Like so
they're like interview people who are there that night. That is done by people
who are adults. So is the goal then to not get to OSRR?
Their goal is to like not have yeah, pretty much. Yeah, And
so like we there's like certain things that once they happen, you know what's
going straight to OSR. It's like we said, calling an ambulance straight to
OSSR OSSR, and like we know that they will be investigating for that.
Do you think that that might deter people from calling an ambulance when one might
be needed. So one of the issues is at the phrase that they say
is you will be safe if you call an ambulance for someone. But not
right now. Tyler's recording this interview in his frat house. That was his
frat brother knocking one of the phrases they say is you will be saved if
you call an ambulance. But what's not included in that is your organization will
not be safe. And so what will happen is that people will be afraid
to call an ambulance because although they won't get in any trouble personally, their
organization can get in trouble. I originally planned to dedicate a portion of this
episode depend State's reforms after Tim's death, but truthfully, I don't think they
matter because from what I've heard, they don't seem to be working anyway,
and I don't think you can reform away the problems we've illustrated in this series
so far. This next interview is with Lauren, who attended Penn State shortly
after Tim's death. I mean, I know people who were in fraternities and
when they were going through their new member period or pledging, whatever phrase they
want to call it, situations where people were brutally I mean they were brutalized.
There were guys who were being thrown down the stairs. There were guys
who were being forced to stay up all night, being forced to drink excessive
amounts of alcohol. But I mean it was sort of just like kind of
understood that when freshman or sophomore boys showed up to class with broken arms or
broken legs or something, you don't ask questions because it's hazing, and they
are held to such a high level of like secrecy, and it's just it's
insane to me that you can lose somebody, it can shake your campus to
its core, or which it should, and things can still continue on just
the way they were before, but just quieter and sneakier. That's why I
don't think it's worth it to talk about the reforms. Google them yourself if
you want, because this ship still happens on college campuses, and it's not
just Penn State. Twenty was the first time in sixty years that there wasn't
a hazing related death in the US, and that's only because students weren't on
campus. Frats weren't on campus. You can't reform this system. This is
Eric Barron, the president of Penn State, right after Tim Piazza's death,
And my question is is this a wake up call for Penn State University?
Are you willing to acknowledge so that whatever the university was doing to govern this
fraternity and all fraternities. It hasn't been enough. So I would say this
is very clearly a national problem. We've had tens of deaths across the nation.
We have university president, large, small, private, public trying to
deal with this problem. You know that if you have a society which is
secret, which from all outward appearances, is incredibly positive. These brothers signed
a pledge that if they were caught drinking they would be expelled. They had
faculty advisors, they had a beautiful house, they had cameras, there were
no external parties. We would have said this was a model fraternity. But
if behind closed doors a group of people are willing to band together, keep
something secret, not tell anyone, how is it that universities can manage to
deal with a situation like that. It's private property, it's a private house.
But I will tell you this, We're not going to give up until
we either solve the problem or shut down every house that's out there. It's
a problem, no question, and it's a difficult position for someone in your
role. However, I think there are a lot of people who are sitting
there and thinking, wait a minute, the university has just turned a blind
eye. They know what really goes on in these fraternities and they allow it.
Okay, So we have been working on this for more than a decade.
We begin with a lot of educational programs, then mandatory educational programs,
then response programs if we had an incident. Then we worked on team approaches
to get everybody involved, all the partners involved. Then we go to a
task force that looks at mechanisms where we can see something happening ahead of time.
But the only real tool we have in the toolbox is to take away
the recognition for house because you have to remember that it's private property. It's
a private house, it's privately managed, it has a national organization that is
involved there, it has alumni boards that are there. And the only tool
that Penn State has to be effective is to say you're no longer a student
organization. And what was that? Let me play that again. And the
only tool that Penn State has to be effective is to say you're no longer
a student organization. And he just said it himself. No university reform has
successfully prevented hazing in greek life. They've tried everything. The only tool the
university has that's effective is to say you're no longer a student organization, so
say it. This episode was written, recorded, produced, and edited by
myself, Lucy Taylor, scriptwriter and production supervisor, Megan Thompson, audio engineer
Niel Gottlia. Special thank you to Evelyn Piazza and Cordell Davis for participating in
this episode. To stay in the loop with Snapped, you can join our
email list at snaps the podcast dot com or follow us on Instagram or TikTok
at snaps the Podcast. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll see
you next Wednesday for the season finale of Snapped. To listen to the finale,
now, join us on Patreon dot com, slash Snapped and become a dismantler today