Pledges shot with air guns, forced to drink bong water in Coastal Carolina fraternity’s hazing, report finds
CONWAY, S.C. (WBTW) — Shooting pledges with air guns, making them eat butter with dirt on it and making them drink bong water led to a Coastal Carolina University fraternity’s five-year suspension, according to an investigative report obtained by News13.
The fraternity, Alpha Chi Rho, was suspended in January through 2028 after an October 2022 hazing incident.
The hazing violations were reported to the university on March 29, 2023. It was reported that in the evening hours of Oct. 10, 2022, into the early morning hours of Oct. 11, a first-year student pledging the fraternity was injured after being shot multiple times with an air gun as part of the group’s initiation process.
According to a report News13 obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, about six pledges went to a fraternity house off campus on Oct. 10 to prepare for an exam about the fraternity’s history.
Later in the evening, the pledges were lined up and each were asked questions about the upcoming exam, according to the report. Initially, if one of them answered incorrectly, they were told to lay in the dirt or do pushups.
Eventually, the punishments escalated to the fraternity members shooting the pledges with air guns, including a first-year pledge who was shot twice in the head, twice in the stomach and multiple times in the back, the report said. That student sought medical attention in the following days for headaches and hearing difficulty.
Shortly after, he received texts from some of the fraternity members, including one who allegedly told him to “keep the frat’s name out of your mouth,” according to the report. The pledge withdrew from the university on Jan. 9, 2023, for medical reasons.
The university last April asked the Cozen O’Connor law firm to investigate the hazing allegations, the report said. Between May 31 and Oct. 6, investigators interviewed 23 people, including current and former students, the university’s Fall 2022 director of Greek life, a Department of Public Safety officer, Fall 2022 employees of the Dean of Students Office and the director of communication and development of the Fraternity National Chapter.
An interview with one of the witnesses, a former pledge who was at the fraternity house that night, said he wasn’t shot, but that the pledge who was shot was laughing every time he answered a question incorrectly, which made the fraternity brothers “more and more angry,” according to the report.
“It seemed more like them taking their anger out versus trying to teach someone something,” he said in the interview.
The student during his interview with investigators also shed light on other alleged hazing activities in the fraternity, including having to eat a stick of butter rolled in dirt and drinking bong water.
The student told investigators that one pledge was messing up the answers “pretty badly” and that the punishments initially started as just pushups. A fraternity member then gave the pledge bong water and told him to drink it.
The student recalled the pledge going over to the side of the house and it “sounded like he threw up,” according to the interview. The student said the pledge came back looking pale and “visibly disgusted.”
School leaders slapped the fraternity with an interim suspension two days after the investigation began March 29. Those findings were submitted to CCU on Oct. 24 and confirmed that hazing took place. Alpha Chi Rho appealed the decision on Nov. 17, and it was later denied on Jan. 3.
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Caleb is a digital producer at News13. Caleb joined the team in January 2023 after graduating from Liberty University. He is from Northern Virginia. Follow Caleb on X, formerly Twitter, and read more of his work here.
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