A Texas college student who wasn’t indicted last year for his role in the hazing death of a fraternity pledge tearfully told police two days after the incident that he was responsible for the death, according to an audio tape obtained by The Associated Press.
“I killed him. It’s my fault,” Prairie View A&M University student Marvin Jackson said as he sobbed uncontrollably during an interview with police investigating the death of Phi Beta Sigma pledge Donnie Wade II.
The previously unreleased tape raises fresh questions about a Waller County grand jury’s decision not to indict Jackson, the fraternity’s membership chairman, and adds fuel to a growing sentiment among anti-hazing advocates that criminal authorities are sloughing off such cases.
Wade’s father says he was unaware of Jackson’s statements and called them surprising. He says he has long felt that criminal charges should have been filed.
“I just feel like they could have charged (the fraternity) with something, even if it was just failure to stop and render aid,” Donnie Wade Sr. says.
Wade collapsed and died on Oct. 20, 2009, after he and other pledges engaged in a series of pre-dawn exercises on the Hempstead High School track. Instead of calling for an ambulance, a group of pledges drove Wade to a hospital 30 miles away, where he was pronounced dead.
An autopsy found that the 20-year-old student from Dallas suffered from acute exertional rhabdomyolysis, a rare condition known to be aggravated by intense physical exercise.
