In a lawsuit wending its way through the courts, a college student’s grieving parents are testing Title IX as it applies to hazing deaths on college campuses.
In 2017, Max Gruver entered Louisiana State University, declaring a communications major. The 18-year-old from Roswell, Georgia, wanted to be a sports journalist. He had published almost 400 sports articles while in high school.
Max decided to rush Phi Delta Theta. It was a small fraternity Max thought might give him the opportunity to move into a leadership role.
Alcohol-fueled night
On the night of September 13, 2017, Max participated in a hazing ritual called “Bible study.” In this ritual, pledges must chug 190-proof liquor for giving wrong answers to questions about the fraternity or incorrectly reciting the Greek alphabet. Max died the next morning from alcohol poisoning.
At the time of Max’s death, he had a 0.495 percent blood alcohol level. That’s more than six times the legal limit in Louisiana. He also had THC in his system, a chemical found in marijuana.
The Gruvers filed a lawsuit in 2018 against LSU, Phi Delta Theta and several members of the fraternity, seeking $25 million in damages.
Gender bias in reverse
Here’s where Title IX comes in. The suit claimed that LSU discriminates against men by policing sorority hazing more strictly than fraternity hazing. Specifically, the suit claimed that LSU imposed greater sanctions on sororities than those imposed on fraternities, even though the women’s rituals are non-life-threatening.
Max’s parents claim that fraternities’ practice of hazing is based on outdated stereotypes of men, exposing them to a greater risk of hazing death. They point out that the school distributes glossy brochures promoting the benefits of Greek life without mentioning any risks.
The fraternity and five fraternity members settled with the Gruvers. One fraternity member, Matthew Naquin, was convicted of negligent homicide and sentenced to five years in jail. Witnesses testified at Naquin’s trial that he didn’t like Max, wanted him cut from the fraternity and played a central role in the hazing. He went to jail in January 2020. But 2.5 years of his sentence were suspended, and due to good behavior, he was released in April 2020, after less than three months in jail.
Phi Delta Theta has been banned from LSU’s campus until at least 2033, but the university is a holdout. It pressed a countersuit up the legal chain, but an appeals court ruled that because the university accepts federal funding, it isn’t immune from hazing lawsuits. And in December 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected LSU’s request to hear arguments.
“This ruling means that a school can face liability for violating Title IX if it disregards or minimizes reports of Greek male hazing,” said Jon Fazzola, an attorney for the family. “In doing so, it creates a greater risk of danger for males compared to females in Greek life.”*
Stopping the rituals
A trial has not yet been scheduled. But in 2018, Louisiana’s governor signed into law the Max Gruver Act and other anti-hazing bills.
The Gruvers created a foundation in Max’s name and are working to stop murderous hazing rituals. Since 1838, they say, more than 200 American university students have died from hazing. Max was one of four young men to die from fraternity hazing in 2017 alone.
“We don’t want to live in what happened to Max at the end, but at the same time, we want to change things for other young kids,” his parents have said. We don’t want this happening to another family.”**
I hope the Gruver family is successful in its pursuit. I remember clearly the death of Timothy Piazza that same year, a Penn State student who died from alcohol-fueled fraternity hazing. Whether redress comes through Title IX or some other path, we all want to know that we can safely send our students to college.
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* Betsy Butler, “What This Title IX Case about Hazing Means for Women on Campus,” Ms. Magazine (August 19, 2019).
** Natalie Anderson, “The Hazing Edition: Remembering Max Gruver,” the LSU Reveille (September 11, 2018).