CPS Report Confirms Carmel High School Players Subjected Victim To Criminal Deviate Sexual Conduct

A newly-released investigative report from Child Protective Services concerning allegations that several Carmel High School basketball players sexually assaulted a freshman teammate confirms the veracity of the allegations made by a 14-year old victim, and it ignites new concerns that Hamilton Co. Prosecutor Sonia Leerkamp went out of her way to protect the accused from more serious sex charges during a grand jury proceeding that recommended only non-felony, non-sexual charges against the four players accused of sexually assaulting the 14-year old. The CPS report concluded that the victim's allegations of criminal sexual deviate conduct were substantiated by the investigation.

Robert Turner, an attorney representing the victim in a lawsuit against the school district, released the CPS report containing graphic descriptions of multiple sexual assaults of the victim by the accused, with the consent of the victim's parents; otherwise, the reports aren't generally released to the public. The CPS investigation began after the victim was taken by his parents to Clarian North Hospital's emergency room on February 17, 2010 for treatment of injuries he received when he was held down and anally penetrated on a school bus returning from a basketball game in Terre Haute by senior members of the basketball team, including Scott Laskowski, Brandon Hoge and Robert Kitzinger. The victim claims he was lured to the back of the bus that night by the accused where Laskowski grabbed his legs, Kitzinger sat on his head and together they pulled down his pants while Brandon Hoge anally penetrated him with his finger through his shorts. He said he yelled for help but the coaches sitting at the front of the bus apparently did not hear his calls for help. The report confirms that a video recorder on the bus captured the assault, including a claim by a police detective investigating the case that the video showed Hoge sexually assaulting the victim. That is contrary to a claim by Leerkamp that the video tape was too dark and grainy to discern what had transpired.

According to the report, the harassment and sexual assaults of the victim began months earlier. At first, the three basketball players from the bus that night and another senior player, Oscar Falodun, began by exposing their genitals and butts to the victim. As the incidents escalated, the senior players began grabbing the victim's genitals.  Eventually, the four on various occasions "gooched" him, which the report describes as the act of anally penetrating the victim with a finger. On one occasion, the players carried the victim into the school's locker room shower and anally penetrated him through his shorts. During each assault, the victim says he was penetrated by a finger through his shorts. The victim didn't report the earlier incidents because the senior players threatened to "beat his ass" if he told on them. A witness told investigators that he witnessed the accused sexually assault the victim in the school's locker room on multiple occasions.

Investigators attempted to interview the accused through contacts with their attorneys, but only Falodun agreed to be interviewed. He told investigators the senior players began harassing the victim after he made a claim that he had a sexual encounter with a girl in the locker room and the senior players didn't believe him. He admitted they sometimes shoved him and threw his belongings into the shower, but he insists that neither he nor the other senior players gooched the victim. He said the senior players often gooched themselves but never engaged in inappropriate sexual conduct with the victim.

An attorney for one of the accused, James Voyles, is angry that Turner released the CPS report and expressed concern about the prejudice to his client in his upcoming trial on misdemeanor assault charges. Voyles may seek a gag order prohibiting Turner from releasing any further information concerning his client's case before he is tried. Leerkamp's office is not commenting on the CPS report yet.

Based on the information contained in the CPS report, its seems incomprehensible that a grand jury would have rejected more serious sex charges against the accused in this case. A grand jury only has to find probable cause for charging the accused with a crime, not the proof beyond a reasonable doubt standard applied during trial on the charges. There have been rumors that Leerkamp put on witnesses in the grand jury proceedings favorable to the accused who said the victim consented to being penetrated. If Leerkamp allowed persons to testify to the grand jury who she should have had strong reason to believe were perjuring themselves to protect the accused, that would constitute prosecutorial misconduct. The detective's claim that the bus' video showed the assault on the victim and the penetration of him by Hoge raises concern about whether Leerkamp allowed the grand jury to see the video and why she told the media the video was too dark and grainy to discern anything. Taken together, I have to agree with Turner that the entire transcript of the grand jury proceeding should be released to the public. If Leerkamp has cleans hands, then she should explain to the public why she reached conclusions that are so at odds with this CPS report.