Fraternity, UC Irvine sued over student's death

L.A. Times 4/25/07

By Roy Rivenburg

The family of a college student who died after an alleged fraternity hazing incident two years ago has filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against the fraternity and UC Irvine.

Kenny Luong, 19, suffered fatal head injuries during an August 2005 tackle football game held at a city park in Irvine to initiate pledges into Lambda Phi Epsilon, a nationwide Asian fraternity.

At a news conference Tuesday, attorney Richard Cohn and two of Luong's fellow pledges described the game as a brutal mismatch designed to inflict pain.

It pitted nine pledges, who were seeking to establish a fraternity chapter at Cal Poly Pomona, on the field at the same time against 40 Lambda Phi Epsilon members from UC Irvine.

After two hours, all but three pledges were sidelined from the effects of being repeatedly gang-tackled, Cohn said.

Luong, weighing 144 pounds and playing quarterback, took a snap and went down under a blitz, recalled pledge Lenny Nguyen. He never got up. Several players then dragged the unconscious pledge off the field and the game continued another five or 10 minutes, Nguyen said.

After someone realized the Rosemead resident was seriously hurt, a fraternity leader halted the game and told everyone to leave, Nguyen said.

The UCI fraternity brothers scattered, but the pledges from Cal Poly stayed, Cohn said. An ambulance took Luong to Western Medical Center-Santa Ana, where he died two days later.

The fraternity chapter was quickly suspended by UCI and will officially disband this week, school officials said.

UCI officials declined to comment on the suit. Attempts to reach Lambda Phi Epsilon's headquarters were unsuccessful.

No criminal charges were filed in the case.

Farrah Emami, a spokeswoman for the Orange County district attorney's office, said prosecutors found insufficient evidence to press charges but "will continue to work with the Irvine Police Department as they continue investigating the matter."

California law bans hazing rituals that are likely to cause serious physical injury but grants an exception for "customary athletic events."

Luong's pledge-mates described the 2005 football game as anything but customary.

In addition to being vastly outnumbered, the pledges were forced to play offense the entire game "so the [UCI students] could keep tackling us," said Steven Foster, another pledge. "Two or three people would tackle me every play — even if I didn't have the ball."

Under state law, the maximum penalty for a hazing activity that results in death is one year in jail.

Luong's father, Tony, an immigrant from Vietnam, said the family sued to achieve "some justice for my kid" and to send a message that hazing won't go unpunished.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in Orange County Superior Court, seeks unspecified damages from Lambda Phi Epsilon's national office, UCI and the UC regents. Although the football game took place off campus, the suit alleged that said the university failed to properly supervise the fraternity.

Lambda Phi Epsilon, which began in 1981 at UCLA, has earned mixed reviews in recent years. In 2003, 60 San Jose State University Lambdas took part in a midnight melee with a rival Asian fraternity that left one Lambda fatally stabbed and several other hospitalized.

Two years earlier, police seized LSD and ecstasy during a raid at the fraternity's UC Riverside house.

On other campuses, however, Lambda members have defied traditional Greek stereotypes. At Boston University, Lambda frat brothers have abstained from alcohol and cigarettes, according to news reports. And the chapter at Northwestern reportedly have catered to Asians raised with "Christian ideals."