UPDATE Mt. Carmel football coach reports alleged hazing to ChildLine, documents say

Dec. 13—Mount Carmel Area High School football coach John Darrah made the decision to call ChildLine after speaking to victims of an alleged hazing incident that allegedly took place at two football watch parties in Kulpmont in September 2020.

A special agent from the state attorney general's office said there were nine victims in the 2020 hazing incident that involved members of the Mount Carmel High School football team, according to court documents.

Special Agent David Scicchitano said in a criminal complaint that there were nine victims who were burned with a "punk stick" or sparkler during a football watch party at the home of the parents of one of the players.

The agent said seven of the victims sustained scarring as a result of the incident, according to a criminal complaint filed Monday at Milton District Judge Mike Diehl's office.

The court documents were with the charges were released to Diehl Monday afternoon after Mount Carmel District Judge Bill Cole recused himself from the case.

Darrah spoke to three victims and was provided a list of other victims, before he made the decision to report the incidents to ChildLine, according to court documents.

Two incidents

In total, nine former Mount Carmel football players were charged with hazing by the state attorney general's office last week, more than two years after an incident shut down the Red Tornadoes' season. The charges emerged following two separate incidents that occurred during the 2020 season, Attorney General Josh Shapiro said Thursday in a press release.

The attorney general's office began an investigation into the incident after the case was referred to them by the Northumberland County district attorney's office.

According to the documents, two separate incidents occurred when football players were invited to a teammate's house to watch game footage. During the watch party, captains Reed Witkoski, Damon Dowkus and another captain who was a juvenile at the time, and other members of the team burned the new starting players with lit burning sticks and sparklers as part of an informal initiation.

Witkoski, Dowkus, and the unnamed juvenile, have been charged with misdemeanor charges of hazing, simple assault, and intimidation of a victim. Other members of the team including, Tyler Owens, Michael Balichik, and four others who were juveniles at the time of the incident, have been charged with hazing and criminal conspiracy to commit hazing, according to officials.

This case is being prosecuted by Senior Deputy Attorney General Joseph Sembrot.

Children and Youth referral

The incident began on Oct. 6, 2020, when Mount Carmel Township Police were assigned a complaint from the Northumberland County Children and Youth Services, according to the complaint.

Mount Carmel Township Police officer Brian Carnuccio, who also serves as the Mount Carmel Area School District resource officer, took over the investigation, the complaint said.

Carnuccio said he learned the incident occurred on Sept. 30 during a football watch party at Witkoski's house in Kulpmont.

Carnuccio saw photographs of one of the victims with burn marks and he began to interview parents of additional victims, according to court documents.

Carnuccio said he received "little to no amount of cooperation in his investigation from the parents or other victims," according to court documents. Carnuccio said he reached out to 20 parents.

On Oct. 23, 2020, Carnuccio obtained search warrants for cellphones of the alleged defendants and on Oct. 30, 2020, the phones were taken to a state police computer crimes unit for analysis, court documents said.

Both football watch parties were held at Witkoski's house with the first on Sep. 23, 2020, and the second on Sept. 30, 2020, according to court documents.

Through Carnuccio's investigation he was able to discover team captains Witkoski, Dowkus and a juvenile along with Owens, Balichik and two other juvenile defendants were also present.

'Don't say anything'

Investigators alleged during both parties, new players were told to go to the back of the house and drop their pants and expose their backsides while the victims told investigators that's where they got burned, according to investigators.

The victims said Witkoski told them that "what happens here, stays here. Don't say anything," according to court documents.

The cellphones came back from the computer crime lab in February 2021 and investigators began to review the content, according to police.

One of the juvenile defendants allegedly had messages on his phone from himself and his parents where the child's mother asked, "why is officer Carnuccio trying to reach her and if it was about the hazing thing," according to court documents.

Carnuccio spoke with Mount Carmel football coach John Darrah and Athletic Director Greg Sacavage before the decision was made to cancel practice and an upcoming game, according to police.

The school board was notified of the incident and canceled the rest of the season.

Parents showed up at the meeting, and those who spoke said that nothing happened that warranted an investigation.

Not one person who addressed the board supported the move to cancel the season.

One of the defendants' parents spoke at the meeting and said "There is no victim and no crime," and that he met with police and thought the incident was over. He said at the time he was surprised the season was shut down.

Coach's investigation

Darrah then began to speak to alleged victims and said he found out one of them was blindfolded, asked to pull his pants down, and then burned.

Darrah then made the report to ChildLine, investigators said.

Each of the defendants will now appear before Diehl on the charges.

"Our school district became aware of the conclusion to a hazing investigation conducted by the Pennsylvania State Attorney General's Office involving our varsity football team that occurred off school grounds and came to light to our school district in the fall of 2020," Mount Carmel Area School District Superintendent Pete Cheddar said in a statement to the media.

The school district's internal response was immediately put into place as a result of the information that came to the district's attention over two years ago, Cheddar said.

Cheddar said the school board and administration reviewed hazing board policy (Policy 247) and made necessary updates.

The district updated the athletic policy and athletic parent and student handbook to include expectations for all students related to anti-hazing, Cheddar said.

All student-athletes involved in extracurriculars must complete a National Federation of High School Sports Anti-Hazing Course once per academic year before participating in any sport at Mount Carmel Area School District. Students must hand in a course completion certificate to their respective head coach, he said.

All coaches, teachers, and staff of extracurricular activities must complete a Hazing Informational Course, once per school year, via the Vector Solutions Safe Schools Platform. Course completion is tracked through the athletic and district office, Cheddar said.