Female Columbus Firefighter Talks About Hazing

All Allison Meade wanted her entire life was to be a firefighter.

But as a member of the Columbus Fire Division, she said, many of the men at her station made her feel that she wasn't one of them.

Meade said they urinated on the floor and filled toilets with feces that she had to clean up.

Despite a division-wide order that men weren't allowed to use women's restrooms inside fire stations, the supervisors at her station allowed men in.

They left their clothes on the floor for her to pick up. Socks were draped across toilet paper rolls, according to details contained in an internal investigation by the Fire Division.

When she complained, some joked that they had masturbated into the socks and left them in the bathroom for her, Meade told investigators during recorded conversations that were transcribed and provided to The Dispatch through a records request.

Her supervisors also brought all of her coworkers together in one room, with Meade, and told them that "Alli was complaining" about what they were doing, Meade said.

"I felt humiliated," she added.

Hazing is not confined to college fraternity or sorority houses.

It is happening in firehouses, in the Air Force and on sports teams. Earlier this year an Ohio youth wrestling coach was accused of hazing young boys.

The Dispatch spent much of the past year investigating the brutal effects of hazing on its victims, and how little has been done by those in positions of authority to address the harmful acts.

Listen to the Dispatch's investigative podcast Broken Pledge

The investigation has shown that hazing charges rarely are filed by prosecutors. The reports have led to calls by Republican Gov. Mike DeWine to have Ohio's hazing law upgraded from a fourth-degree misdemeanor to a felony.

In October, authorities in Oxford, Ohio, charged 18 Miami University students or former students after the newspaper highlighted a case there. Some of those charges included hazing.

And in November, an Athens County grand jury indicted nine people in connection with the death of Collin Wiant, an Ohio University student who died after being hazed. His hazing and death was the subject of a six-part podcast series by The Dispatch called Broken Pledge.

Firefighter Meade is one of about 40 female firefighters in the Columbus Fire Division. The city has about 1,600 firefighters.

Earlier this year, Meade left during a shift crying after she entered the bathroom and again saw a toilet full of human waste.

Before she left, she said her supervising lieutenant called her boyfriend, who is also a lieutenant in the fire department. Meade's supervisor wanted the boyfriend to talk Meade out of leaving and to calm her down.

Leslie Blevins, the city's equal employment resources manager, was brought into the investigation to determine whether bullying or hazing was involved, according to documents provided to The Dispatch.

During the transcribed interviews with Meade, Blevins told Meade, "Don't be emotional. We're gonna resolve all of this. So don't be emotional."

Dan Carver, a firefighter who represented Meade in the interviews on behalf of the fire union, said during those interviews that the actions of the male firefighters represent a systemic problem.

"It's a cultural issue," he said. "It's not a Firefighter Meade issue. ... There's never any repercussions."

Despite the statements from Meade and Carver, Blevins wrote that she found no evidence of bullying. Blevins said there was no proof that firefighters were specifically targeting Meade.

In response to the incident and investigation, Meade was moved to a different station and later to the division's training facility. Some of those involved, including her supervisors, moved to different stations and were ordered to go through retraining.

"The Division of Fire does not tolerate any behaviors that conflict with our core values," Chief Kevin O'Connor said.

O'Connor added that those core values are "preservation of life and property, safety, personal integrity, professionalism and respect for others."

And despite a supervisor ignoring her request to put locks on the women's restrooms, that's exactly what the city did later to deter men from the women's bathroom.

"I am still dealing with a lot of this," Meade said. "The looks and the comments. There are others that this is happening to. They are just too scared to come forward."

O'Connor said the division holds Meade in high regard and she continues to be in leadership roles.

"We are proud of her as well as all of our female firefighter/EMTs and paramedics who do a great job in this difficult line of work." he said.

Hazing on spring break

Even when hazing allegations are reported, it's very difficult for administrative investigators to determine the facts due to secrecy, pressure from parents or other authorities and the differing views of what constitutes hazing.

That was the case for a high school baseball team in Clark County in the spring of 2017.

The hazing rumors began percolating soon after the Shawnee High team returned from its spring-break trip near Nashville.

Posts on social media alleged that some players had assaulted and humiliated younger players at the team hotel. Parents were calling the Clark-Shawnee Local school district demanding answers. The Clark County sheriff's office was looking into the hazing allegations.

The school district suspended the baseball season while Brian Kuhn, then the compliance officer for the district, investigated whether the Clark-Shawnee Local school board's policy had been violated.

Kuhn, now the district's superintendent, interviewed players, coaches and staff members over a three-week period. He eventually concluded that players were not properly supervised, leading to three upperclassmen grabbing young players by their sides and lifting their legs.

Kuhn said the "three main aggressors" meant the behavior in a playful manner and didn't intend to hurt anyone. But 11 players reportedly received "unwanted physical contact." There was no evidence that the players' clothes were removed nor were any objects inserted into the players' bodies, refuting early rumors.

But there was evidence that players were pressured to align their stories so no one would get in trouble.

Kuhn determined that hazing and harassment had occurred, in violation of the student conduct policy. One volunteer coach was fired. Three players were removed from the team, and two of them were not allowed to participate in the school's graduation ceremony. The baseball team missed several games but was allowed to finish the season. Local authorities chose not to seek charges in the case.

Kuhn said many people involved in the case were unhappy with the outcome. Some wanted the district to ignore the allegations, believing they represented just childish "horseplay." Some thought the punishment was not enough. Others thought it too harsh.

Kuhn said he simply remained focused on doing the right thing and today advises other districts to take hazing allegations seriously.

"On a human level, this consumed my life. I didn't sleep much, and my wife would tell you I was crazy for three weeks," Kuhn said. "Schools need to be proactive and make sure they communicate with teams and all students that (hazing) is not acceptable. It must be reported, and you have to be trained in how to deal with it.

"We are comfortable in what we reported was accurate."

Wrestling with hazing

In April, longtime central Ohio youth wrestling figure Bart Freidenberg was charged with hazing and child endangering stemming from an incident at one of his wrestling camps in June 2018 in Franklin, in southwestern Ohio.

The father of a teen wrestler told The Dispatch at the time that his son was pinned down by other wrestlers who lifted his shirt, hit and clawed repeatedly at his chest and then rubbed Icy Hot pain-relief cream on him. It's a ritual the participants called "surgery," the father said.

The wrestler called his father from camp a few days before he and his teammates were scheduled to leave on an eight-week tour last summer as part of Freidenberg's Ohio All-Star Wrestling Team. When the father picked up his son before the tour began and asked the coach about the incident, he said Freidenberg "laughed it off like some locker room horseplay" and knew what the term "surgery" meant, the father said.

An initial investigation by police in the Warren County city of Franklin found that Freidenberg was aware of the hazing but failed to stop it.

But by mid-October, the case was dismissed from Franklin Municipal Court after police and the city attorney found it was difficult to get some potential witnesses to cooperate.

Detective David Hatfield with Franklin police said at least one witness was out of state, which made for logistical hurdles. Another was a parent who was concerned about ramifications for his son in youth wrestling if he spoke out, Hatfield said.

It is the first hazing case Franklin City Attorney Steven Runge can recall his office prosecuting in the more than 43 years he's been there.

He suspects some hazing might go on in his community, among student-athletes for example, but that "it's primarily done in a sense of fun," he said.

But the "surgery" tradition that allegedly occurred at Freidenberg's wrestling camp?

"That's going a little beyond the pale," Runge said.

Runge said he hasn't considered whether a stronger hazing law in Ohio might be beneficial, but he wants those in his community to come forward if they have experienced or witnessed hazing, whether it's physical harm or psychological, he said.

"They need to let the authorities know that that's going on so it can be looked into, because we don't need to have that kind of thing going on," he said. "There's no place in youth sports for there to be the kind of hazing that causes harm to any of the sports participants."

Airmen bound and taped

In March, the Air Force announced that it had discharged two squadron commanders from service after an investigation found the pair, attached to the 354th Fighter Wing based in Alaska, were hazing airmen.

The investigation specifically focused on a ritual called "rolling up," in which airmen are tackled and their feet and hands bound with duct tape.

The airmen are forced to struggle while being antagonized and carried around to various locations by others before they are freed, according to details released by the Air Force.

During the investigation, many in the squadron thought the ritual was supposed to create camaraderie and bonding.

Investigators determined, though, that those who were victims of the hazing felt like they were forced to do it because of peer pressure.

Col. Benjamin Bishop, commander of the 354th Fighter Wing, said the hazing ritual did not reflect the values of the Air Force.

"There are traditions that promote the health of the unit and link us to the long blue line of airmen that have preceded us," Bishop said. "When airmen, however, attempt to equate hazing actions as tradition, they do an absolute disservice to our Air Force culture and also undermine our mission effectiveness."

———

Visit The Columbus Dispatch (Columbus, Ohio) at www.dispatch.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.