Two Cambridge High School students have been charged with felony child abuse for a June 30 incident that allegedly involved a freshman being forced to eat doughnuts off the older boys’ genitalia while others watched.
The Nebraska Attorney General’s Office filed juvenile petitions against the two Cambridge High seniors on Feb. 9 in Adams County Court.
The incident is alleged to have happened during a summer wrestling camp at Hastings College. The Nebraska State Patrol investigated after the incident came to the attention of authorities and school officials in late August.
Cambridge Public Schools Superintendent Robert Gregory said the district is aware that charges have been filed and continues its work to educate students on hazing issues.
“We will continue to support the entire student body and of course the victims of this alleged crime," he said in an emailed statement Monday.
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Adams County Attorney Donna Fegler Daiss declined to prosecute the incident as hazing, saying in October that Nebraska law says such incidents must involve post-secondary organizations, such as fraternities and sororities.
She said she wasn't charging them with sexual assault because it would be difficult to prove the teenagers performed the act for sexual gratification.
The incident prompted state Sen. Dan Hughes of Venango to introduce a bill (LB710) earlier this year that would broaden state hazing laws. Hughes has made the measure his priority bill, which means it likely will be debated this session.
Gregory said the students involved in the incident have been punished by the school district but would not elaborate.
One of the students who was criminally charged and his parents have filed a petition seeking to get his expulsion for this semester of school overturned and removed from his scholastic record. The appeal was filed on Dec. 29 in Furnas County District Court. Gregory declined to comment on the appeal.
A description of the incident included in the court documents says several members of the Cambridge wrestling team were in a dorm room at Hastings College on June 30. They had bought snacks earlier in the day, including doughnuts.
There was some discussion about “initiating,†and the atmosphere in the room led the freshmen to feel they had no choice, court documents say.
An attorney for one of the boys declined comment, as did the attorney general's office. An attorney for the other could not be reached.