Robert Clifford speaks to FOX news on Tuesday, May 16, 2006, about the legal issues surrounding the hazing incident with the Northwestern University girls' lacrosse team. Below is a column he wrote for the Chicago Lawyer on the liability of colleges and universities regarding students' hazing activities.

Chicago Lawyer, 09/01/1996

"Thank you, sir, may I have another?"

Moviegovers laughed at actor Kevin Bacon in "Animal House", pleading on all fours while his underwear-clad bottom was paddled during a fictionalized hazing at the Omega House.

But for William Quinn, an 18-year-old freshman at the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana campus, a real-life initiation ritual was not funny.

It was "Pledge Dad Night" at Beta Theta Pi fraternity in the fall of 1986. As a freshman pledge, Quinn was directed to drink alcohol to the point where he suffered neurological damage causing partial permanent disability to his arms and hands.

Quinn brought suit against the fraternity on the grounds of negligence. The circuit court dismissed his complaint, but the appellate court found a duty existed. Quinn v. Sigma Rho Chapter of Beta Theta Pi Fraternity, 155 Ill.App.3d 231, 507 N.E.2d 1193 (4th Dist.1987).

The court distinguished cases brought under the Dramshop Act in that the fraternity required the plaintiff to drink to intoxication. That, combined with the "much valued" status of fraternity membership, blinded plaintiff to any dangers he may have faced.

"We cannot close our eyes to the fact that the abuse illustrated in the present case could have resulted in the termination of life and that plaintiff was coerced into being his own executioner," the court wrote.

Hazing is generally construed to mean any act at an educational institution in which the purpose is to hold up the individual to ridicule for the pastime of others.

Many colleges and universities prohibit such practices. An Illinois statute that had been on the books since 1901 was amended effective this year to include stiffer penalties, making such conduct a Class A instead of a Class B misdemeanor. 720 ILCS 120/10 (1996). Hazing that results in death or great bodily harm is now a Class 4 felony.

The Illinois Supreme Court recently upheld the constitutionality of this hazing statute in the case against 12 lacrosse club members at Western Illinois University who were part of the club's "rookie day" initiation rites. People v. Anderson, 148 Ill.2d 15, 591 N.E.2d 461 (1992). An 18-year-old freshman died in 1990 after drinking large quantities of alcohol to get into this club. Apparently some students like to carry on such nonsense - even to extremes.

But, should the institutions that house and educate these teenagers and young adults ultimately be responsible for the student's negligent actions? Until the 1960s, courts generally found the college stood in loco parentis - literally "in the place of the parent." As the guardian of the students' health, welfare, safety and morals, colleges were held liable.

But, in the wake of the 1960s student revolutions against the Vietnam War and racial inequality, a new student independence emerged. And with it, much of America changed its attitude toward college students, viewing them more as adults than children. The passage of the 26th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution lowering the voting age to 18 added to this feeling of student responsibility. But, perhaps Illinois courts have taken this attitude to extremes.

Take, for instance, the case of Leonardi v. Bradley University, 232 Ill.App.3d 685, 625 N.E.2d 431 (3d Dist.1993). A female student was raped at a fraternity house on the university campus. She alleged that the university had a duty to take reasonable precautions to protect her from sexual assault.

But the court found that no special relationship existed giving rise to such a duty. The court relied on Rabel v. Illinois Wesleyan University, 161 Ill.App.3d 348, 514 N.E.2d 552 (Dist.1987), where a female student at that school received a telephone call from a male fraternity member who asked her to meet him in the lobby of her dormitory. When she met him, he picked her up, threw her over his shoulder and ran out of the dorm through a gauntlet of other fraternity brothers who struck him with bones. The student fell while carrying plaintiff and she sustained severe head injuries.

Again, the court found no special relationship existed between the university and its students; and, therefore, no duty existed to protect her from third parties. These cases represent a very harsh approach for a group of people who generally are away from home for the first time and are led to believe - after being enticed there - that the university's primary concern is their general welfare.

Certainly, the traditional in loco parentis doctrine no longer applies. But Illinois courts need to recognize another metamorphosis taking place.

More and more students are looking to higher educational institution for help with other "parental" aspects of their lives - tuition assistance, job hunting and establishing their careers. Students are demanding protection against sexual attack, criminal assailants, even athletic-related injuries, often bringing suit against colleges for negligence.

Rather than skew legal doctrines to avoid liability, courts need to recognize that a university has, at the very least, a duty to enforce its rules and regulations designed to protect its students from the risks of sexual assault, hazing and other dangerous activities peculiar to the college environment.

If that means greater supervision of the students, perhaps we've just come full circle.