If you face your college or university’s hazing charges relating to your alleged misconduct on or off campus, then you could suffer severe school discipline up to suspension and expulsion. Hazing charges place everything on the line, including not only your North Dakota college or university education and degree but also your ability to transfer to another school, pursue graduate education, get a professional license or vocational certification, or even get your preferred employment. You need our skilled and experienced attorney representation. Retain the LLF National Law Firm’s premier Student Defense Team by calling 888.535.3686 or using our contact form now.
What Is Hazing at a North Dakota College or University
Nearly all U.S. states have anti-hazing laws. North Dakota is among those states making hazing illegal on a North Dakota college or university campus or related to its educational activities. In general, hazing involves requiring a student candidate for membership in a fraternity, sorority, or other college or university organization to act in a way that creates a substantial risk of injury. North Dakota State University gives the following specific examples of hazing:
- forcing activities to prove the student’s worth;
- forcing consumption of spicy or nauseating foods;
- forcing alcohol consumption;
- depriving a student of sleep;
- requiring unduly stressful physical labor or menial tasks;
- requiring demeaning or taxing acts not required of members;
- requiring illegal acts such as theft, trespass, or vandalism;
- blindfolding, spanking, or other humiliating and embarrassing acts;
- forced kissing, petting, or other intimate or sexual acts;
- requiring a student to miss classes;
- distracting that reduces a student’s academic performance;
- disruptive acts causing a student social or emotional withdrawal;
- prohibiting a student from showering or other personal care;
- requiring a student to wear unusual clothing;
- requiring a student to wear identical clothing as others;
- unduly lengthy weekend commitments and
- withdrawal of usual eating, sleeping, cell phone or other privileges.
Why Student Organizations Haze Candidates
Decades ago, hazing was a common custom on college and university campuses, especially for initiation into a fraternity or sorority. Candidates ostensibly proved their fitness for membership by enduring hazing. Some form of rite of passage can make sense. Rituals unite members and candidates while committing candidates to the organization’s mission and aligning them to the organization’s culture. Because hazing, or some lesser form of initiation, was customary in many fraternities and sororities, some fraternities and sororities or other similar organizations persist with hazing or other initiation. They tend to do so secretly, however, because of the prominent anti-hazing measures that state legislatures, North Dakota included, and colleges and universities have put in place. Don’t get drawn into hazing. If you already face hazing charges, let us help you defend and defeat the charges.
The Seriousness of North Dakota Hazing Accusations
North Dakota college and university disciplinary officials treat hazing allegations seriously and punish students found to have committed hazing because of the substantial risks of harm from hazing. To put it plainly, students have suffered severe, permanent injuries and have even died from hazing. Schools and their officials have also paid enormous civil liability judgments into the millions of dollars over hazing injuries and deaths when deliberately turning a blind eye to the practice of hazing on their college and university campuses. Your North Dakota college or university officials will not ignore hazing allegations against you. They may pursue hazing charges very aggressively, meaning you need our highly qualified defense.
North Dakota Laws Against Hazing
North Dakota, like about forty-four other states, has adopted an anti-hazing law codified in North Dakota Century Code Section 12.1-17-10. (South Dakota is one of the few states without an anti-hazing law.) North Dakota defines hazing as willful conduct creating a substantial risk of injury in the course of another’s initiation into an organization. While “substantial risk of injury” may sound like a high bar, North Dakota’s statute defines it as “any treatment or forced physical activity” “likely to affect” “physical health or safety adversely,” or that subjects another “to extreme mental stress….” The statute then gives examples including sleep deprivation, beating, forced calisthenics, overexposure, or forced food or liquid consumption. The North Dakota law criminalizes hazing. However, whether you face criminal charges or not, your North Dakota college or university may aggressively pursue school discipline against you based on the state’s anti-hazing statute and your school’s own policies.
North Dakota College & University Hazing Policies
North Dakota’s colleges and universities accordingly adopt and enforce anti-hazing policies to ensure reasonable peace and order on their campuses, protect students from harm, and avoid substantial civil liability and even regulatory fines and harm to the school’s reputation. While your school’s anti-hazing policy may differ in small respects, it is likely to be similar to one of the following policies:
- North Dakota State University declares a zero-tolerance policy for hazing, detailed in Section 3.46 of the North Dakota State University Code of Student Conduct;
- the University of North Dakota likewise prohibits hazing while expressly incorporating the North Dakota anti-hazing statute in Section II.C. of its Code of Student Life;
- Minot State University also prohibits hazing while incorporating the state’s anti-hazing statute in Section II.2.f. of its Student Conduct Policy and
- Maryville State University also prohibits hazing in Section IV.A.4. of its Student Code of Conduct.
If you face disciplinary charges under a policy like any of the above, then promptly retain our skilled and experienced attorneys for your best defense. Do not leave the charges unanswered. Do not minimize the charges. And do not rely on unqualified assistance. Get our highly qualified help.
Sanctions North Dakota Colleges Impose for Hazing
School suspension or even expulsion is a common sanction for hazing incidents, especially if they threatened or caused harm to any student. North Dakota colleges and universities routinely grant their disciplinary officials broad discretion to choose the sanction. The University of North Dakota’s Code of Student Life is an example, providing for sanctions up to and including school suspension and dismissal for hazing. The North Dakota State University Policy Manual provides another example, authorizing a range of sanctions up to and including suspension or expulsion. The Policy Manual grants North Dakota State University disciplinary officials broad discretion to choose the sanction on factors that include the severity of the offense, whether the injury resulted, whether it was a first or subsequent offense, and the accused student’s willingness to accept responsibility. Let us help you make your best case in the mitigation of any sanction, even if you were involved in hazing. Our attorneys know how to present your best case for remedial measures, such as anti-hazing education and school service, in lieu of crippling school discipline.
Procedural Protection for North Dakota Hazing Charges
Public colleges and universities generally have the obligation to provide students with due process of law before depriving them of their property and liberty interest in their education. Private schools may have similar contractual obligations. Your school should thus be providing you with fair notice of the hazing charges and an opportunity to present your case before an impartial decision-maker holding a fair hearing. Minot State University’s Student Conduct Policy is an example, expressly committing its disciplinary officials to providing the accused student with due process. The Student Conduct Policy further defines elaborate procedures school officials should follow, including not only notice and a hearing but also an appeal. We can help you strategically invoke and deploy similar protective procedures at your North Dakota college or university.
How North Dakota Schools Shortchange Due Process
You must recognize, though, that your school’s promise of due process doesn’t mean that your school’s officials will necessarily live up to that promise. Protective procedures are generally not self-executing. Instead, the accused student must generally invoke those procedures. If, for example, you do not answer the charges timely and in the right form, raising the right defenses backed by the right evidence, you may effectively suffer default sanctions right up to suspension and expulsion. For your North Dakota school officials to provide you with due process takes their time, effort, and expense, when they’d likely rather that you admit to their charges, whether or not you committed the alleged offense. Don’t get railroaded. Even if you feel that you bear some responsibility for the allegations, let us help you make your best case for mitigating any sanctions. North Dakota colleges and universities recognize their educational mission. Minot State University’s Student Conduct Policy, for instance, promises that even in a disciplinary matter, “the guiding disciplinary philosophy shall be educational in nature.”
Beware Unqualified Defense Counsel
You may already recognize your need for skilled and experienced attorney representation. Your temptation may be to retain local criminal defense counsel or a local civil litigator. Beware of unqualified local counsel. Criminal defense attorneys and trial lawyers know the court rules well. However, academic administrative proceedings are not court proceedings. The laws, rules, customs, expectations, outcomes, and procedures all differ. Our academic and administrative attorneys know the differences. They know the evidence that your school’s officials expect to see, the way in which they expect us to present it, and the outcomes we can best advocate and negotiate for the early voluntary resolution of your disciplinary case. Unqualified attorney representation can, in the worst case, do more harm than good. Get our qualified representation.
Why You Need Our North Dakota Hazing Defense
Our attorneys can help you get your North Dakota school officials’ specification of the charges and disclosure of the evidence on which they rely to support the charges. We can then help you evaluate that information to gather your own exonerating and mitigating evidence. We can then help you present that evidence at early informal resolution conferences, advocating for voluntary dismissal. If school officials proceed with formal charges, then we can invoke your right to a hearing, present your evidence at that hearing, and cross-examine adverse witnesses as your school’s rules permit it. If you have already lost your hearing, then we can take available appeals to higher officials advocating for a reversal of any sanction. If you have already lost your appeal, let us see if we can negotiate alternative special relief through your school’s general counsel’s office or outside retained counsel. Court review may also be available.
What You Have at Stake in a Hazing Case
Do not underestimate your stakes in a North Dakota college or university hazing case. Your goal should be to avoid any disciplinary sanction. Discipline on a school record can cost you honors, awards, class standing, scholarships, graduate school admission, professional licenses, and vocational certifications. Discipline, depending on the cause and severity, can also cost you jobs and careers. If the school suspends and expels you, you could also lose your college or university housing, health care, transportation, recreational opportunities, and other rights, benefits, and privileges. Our goal would be to help you avoid all discipline so that you can continue your education and pursue your vocation, profession, and career with a clean record and without disadvantage or harm.
We Are Available for Your North Dakota Defense
Our premier attorneys are available for your defense across North Dakota, whether you attend the University of North Dakota, North Dakota State University, North Dakota State College of Science, Minot State University, Maryville State University, Medcenter One College of Nursing, University of Jamestown, Dickinson State University, Dakota College at Bottineau, Bismarck State College, Valley City University, Williston State College, the University of Mary, United Tribes Technical College, Turtle Mountain Community College, Trinity Bible College, Sitting Bull College, Rasmussen College, Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish College, or Cankdeska Cikana Community College. Retain the LLF National Law Firm’s Student Defense Team now by calling 888.535.3686 or using our contact form. Don’t delay. Get the highly qualified help you need now. We have helped hundreds of students in North Dakota and across the country preserve their education.