The First Day That Should Never Have Happened: Hazing, Sickle Cell Trait, and a Death That Was Preventable
Your son walked onto a college campus for his first day of football practice. He never walked off. Now a prosecutor has confirmed what you already knew in your bones: his death was not an accident. It was preventable, and someone who knew the danger pushed him through it anyway.
If you are reading this at 2 a.m. because your family is living through something like what happened at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania — or because you are the family of Calvin “CJ” Dickey Jr. and you are trying to understand what the criminal charges filed on July 6, 2026, mean for your civil case — this page is for you. We are Attorney911, a trial firm that takes Pennsylvania hazing and wrongful death cases, working with local counsel where required. We are not your lawyers yet. But we are going to tell you everything we know about how these cases are built, what the law allows, what the evidence shows, and what the university and its insurers are already doing to protect themselves — so that when you do call a lawyer, you call one who knows exactly what to do on day one.
Here is the first thing you need to hear: your son’s death was not his fault. An 18-year-old freshman on his first day of collegiate practice cannot be expected to defy a conditioning coach’s direct orders. Sickle Cell trait is a known medical vulnerability that the institution had a legal duty to accommodate — not to punish with 100 up-downs and prolonged plank drills. The NCAA wrote specific protocols to prevent exactly this death. Bucknell University trained its coaches on those protocols. And the strength coach who ordered those drills had been told, in writing, that your son carried the trait. He knew. He was trained. He did it anyway.
What Happened at Bucknell: A Freshman’s First Day
On Wednesday, July 10, 2024, an 18-year-old freshman football recruit from Florida arrived on Bucknell University’s Lewisburg campus for his first day of practice. He carried a medical condition that the university knew about, that the strength coach had been specifically trained to manage, and that the NCAA had written detailed protocols to protect against. By Friday, July 12, 2024, he was dead.
The strength and conditioning coach ordered the freshman and other players to complete 100 “up-downs” — a punishing calisthenic drill where players drop to the ground and spring back up repeatedly — along with multiple full-body plank holds. Investigators later determined these exercises were unnecessary calisthenics that contradicted the training and guidance Bucknell University itself provided to its coaches about safe conditioning practices. They were not football drills. They were not skill work. They were a test of will disguised as conditioning — the kind of punishing first-day ritual that hazing laws were written to stop.
The freshman was visibly struggling during the workout. He was pushed to continue. The coach did not call for medical assistance until after the player lost consciousness. The young man was taken to a nearby hospital, where he died two days later. An autopsy determined his death resulted from the combination of intense exercises, his Sickle Cell trait, his body weight, and exertional rhabdomyolysis — a catastrophic medical cascade that the NCAA’s own protocols are designed to prevent.
On July 6, 2026, Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday announced felony aggravated hazing and misdemeanor involuntary manslaughter, reckless endangerment, and hazing charges against the strength coach. The coach surrendered to authorities and was released on $10,000 unsecured bail.
“The facts show this was an intentional, deliberate hazing perpetrated by a coach who knew C.J.’s health condition made him vulnerable to extreme workouts.”
That is the Attorney General’s own words, spoken at a public press conference — not a lawyer’s argument, not a family’s accusation, but the conclusion of a state investigation led by the chief law enforcement officer of Pennsylvania. Those words matter to your civil case because they establish, in the government’s own voice, the recklessness that punitive damages are built to punish.
Pennsylvania’s Wrongful Death and Survival Actions: Two Separate Cases
Pennsylvania law treats one death as two separate legal cases — and a defense lawyer is happy to let a grieving family walk through only one door. Here is what each captures and why both matter.
Wrongful death is the claim brought by the personal representative on behalf of the surviving family members. It compensates the family for what they lost: the financial support their son would have provided, the guidance he would have given, the companionship that was taken from them. For an 18-year-old, this means a full lifetime of lost earning capacity, lost household services, and the incalculable loss of a son whose adult life was just beginning.
Survival action is the separate claim brought by the estate for what the decedent himself endured. It captures the conscious pain and suffering CJ Dickey experienced during the approximately 48 hours between his collapse and his death — the acute kidney injury, the electrolyte derangement, the organ failure, the knowledge that his body was shutting down. It also captures the medical expenses of those two hospital days and the funeral costs.
Both actions are governed by separate Pennsylvania statutory provisions. Each captures distinct damage categories. Filing only one leaves money on the table. Filing both requires the appointment of a personal representative — the one person Pennsylvania law authorizes to bring the family’s case. We handle that appointment.
The statute of limitations for wrongful death in Pennsylvania generally runs two years from the date of death. CJ Dickey died on July 12, 2024. That means the critical filing deadline is approximately July 12, 2026 — and as you read this, that deadline may be days away. The criminal charges were announced on July 6, 2026 — six days before the potential expiration of the civil filing window. This timing is not a coincidence. It is a warning. If no civil action has been filed, the need to move immediately is not an exaggeration. Whether any tolling arguments apply given the pending criminal investigation is a question that must be answered by a Pennsylvania attorney now, not next week. We can help you find out. Call 1-888-ATTY-911. The consultation is free.
If you want to understand more about how wrongful death cases work in practice, our wrongful death practice area page walks through the full architecture of these claims.
Pennsylvania’s Damage Rules: No Caps, Punitive Damages Available, Modified Comparative Fault
Three rules of Pennsylvania damages law shape what a hazing wrongful death case is worth, and all three cut in the family’s favor.
Pennsylvania does not impose statutory caps on non-economic or punitive damages in non-medical-malpractice personal injury and wrongful death cases. This is the single most important damages fact in the case. Many states cap pain-and-suffering awards, limit punitive damages, or restrict what a jury can give a grieving family. Pennsylvania does not. A jury that hears what happened to CJ Dickey can award what the harm is actually worth — not what a statute says is the maximum. The absence of a cap is the absence of a ceiling on justice.
Punitive damages are available in Pennsylvania upon a showing of reckless or outrageous conduct. The reported facts clear that bar without effort. The strength coach knew about the Sickle Cell trait. He had completed university training on the condition’s dangers, NCAA safety standards, and Pennsylvania’s anti-hazing law. He nonetheless ordered contraindicated exercises while pushing a visibly struggling athlete to continue, then delayed medical care until after the athlete lost consciousness. The Attorney General characterized this as “intentional, deliberate hazing.” A jury that hears those facts can award punitive damages — money designed not to compensate but to punish — on top of every compensatory dollar.
Pennsylvania follows a modified comparative negligence rule with a 51% bar. This means a plaintiff’s recovery is reduced by their percentage of fault, and a plaintiff who is 51% or more at fault recovers nothing. The defense will try to pin percentage points on the athlete — “he should have stopped,” “he should have spoken up.” But comparative fault is unlikely to be a significant defense here, and here is why: the coach had actual knowledge of the SCT condition, the athlete was an 18-year-old freshman on his first day of collegiate practice, and the power dynamic between a conditioning coach and a first-day recruit makes the “he should have refused” argument morally repugnant and legally weak. An 18-year-old who has just arrived on campus, who is trying to make a team, who is facing a coach who outranks him in every dimension of authority, does not have the practical ability to stop a conditioning drill. The law knows this. The NCAA protocols are written on the assumption that the athlete cannot stop — which is why the duty falls on the coach.
The Timothy J. Piazza Anti-Hazing Law: How Criminal Charges Transform Your Civil Case
Pennsylvania’s Timothy J. Piazza Anti-Hazing Law was enacted in 2018 after another family lost a son — Tim Piazza, a Penn State student who died during a fraternity hazing ritual. The law criminalizes hazing and creates a separate, more serious offense called aggravated hazing when the conduct involves reckless disregard for human life or serious bodily injury.
The strength coach was charged with felony aggravated hazing under this law — the most serious hazing charge available — along with misdemeanor involuntary manslaughter, reckless endangerment, and hazing. These are not parking tickets. A felony aggravated hazing charge means the state’s chief law enforcement officer concluded that the conduct was not merely negligent but deliberate and dangerous.
Here is why criminal charges matter to your civil case: a conviction or guilty plea would establish facts that may be admissible in the civil proceeding through collateral estoppel principles. Collateral estoppel means that once a fact has been determined in one proceeding, it cannot be relitigated in another. If the strength coach is convicted of aggravated hazing, the civil case does not have to re-prove that the conduct was hazing, that it was reckless, or that it caused the death. Those facts are established. The civil case becomes about damages, not liability.
Even without a conviction, the criminal charges dramatically increase settlement leverage. The university and its insurers know that a criminal conviction would make the civil case nearly unlosable on liability. That knowledge creates pressure to resolve the civil case before the criminal case concludes — which is exactly when a family has maximum negotiating power.
The Attorney General said this at his press conference:
“This law exists because it recognizes what hazing is: criminal conduct that, in the best possible scenario, humiliates and dehumanizes an individual — and at its worst, takes lives and leaves families and friends forever devastated.”
The violation of the Piazza Anti-Hazing Law can also serve as negligence per se in the civil action — meaning the jury can be told that the defendant violated a statute written to protect the exact class of person (students) from the exact type of harm (hazing death) that occurred. That is not our argument. That is the law.
NCAA Sickle Cell Trait Protocols: The Standard of Care Bucknell Was Required to Meet
The NCAA mandated Sickle Cell Trait screening for Division I student-athletes following a 2010 settlement agreement — a settlement that happened because other athletes had died the same way. The NCAA Sports Medicine Handbook then published specific guidelines for conditioning athletes with SCT. Those guidelines are not suggestions. They are the standard of care, and every NCAA member institution — including Bucknell University — is required to comply with them.
The protocols are specific and were directly contraindicated by what happened on July 10, 2024:
Gradual acclimatization. Athletes with SCT must be eased into conditioning over days and weeks, not thrown into maximal exertion on the first day. The strength coach ordered 100 up-downs and prolonged planks on the freshman’s first day of practice. There was no acclimatization. There was no easing. There was maximal exertion from the first repetition.
Adequate rest intervals. SCT athletes need structured rest between exertion periods to allow oxygen debt to clear and prevent sickling. One hundred consecutive up-downs do not include rest intervals. They are designed to break the athlete, not to build him.
Hydration monitoring. Dehydration thickens the blood and worsens sickling. SCT protocols require active hydration management. There is no indication that hydration was monitored during the July 10 drills.
Avoidance of all-out exertion without proper preparation. The NCAA’s own guidance says SCT athletes should never be pushed to all-out, maximal exertion without proper physical preparation. One hundred up-downs on Day 1 is the definition of all-out exertion without preparation.
The strength coach had received information about the freshman’s Sickle Cell trait before practice began. He had also completed university training covering the condition, NCAA safety standards, and Pennsylvania’s anti-hazing law. He knew the protocols. He was trained on the protocols. He ordered the exact drills the protocols exist to prevent. This is not a case where the standard of care is ambiguous. The standard was written down, the coach was taught it, and he violated it.
Who Is Liable: The Coach, the University, and the Chain of Command
A hazing wrongful death case is not one defendant. It is a chain of defendants, each with a different role and a different source of accountability. Naming only the coach leaves the deepest pocket untouched. Naming only the university leaves the individual recklessness unpunished. The case must reach all of them.
The strength coach is the direct actor. He ordered the contraindicated drills. He had actual knowledge of the SCT condition. He pushed a visibly struggling athlete to continue. He delayed medical intervention until after the athlete lost consciousness. He faces criminal charges — felony aggravated hazing and misdemeanor involuntary manslaughter, reckless endangerment, and hazing. His individual exposure is clear, but his personal assets and individual insurance are likely limited. The real money sits behind him.
Bucknell University is the institutional employer. Under the doctrine of respondeat superior, the university is liable for the acts of its employee committed within the scope of his employment as strength and conditioning coach directing university-sanctioned athletic practice. The coach was not a rogue actor operating outside the university’s knowledge — he was doing exactly what the university hired him to do, running exactly the practice the university sanctioned, on exactly the day the university scheduled. But the university’s liability does not stop at vicarious liability. The university is independently liable for negligent supervision — it failed to supervise its strength coach’s programming, allowing unnecessary and dangerous calisthenics that contradicted the university’s own training guidance. It is liable for negligent training and retention — although the university provided SCT training to the coach, it failed to ensure compliance with that training or to monitor whether his conditioning programs adhered to NCAA safety standards. And it is liable as an institution subject to Pennsylvania’s anti-hazing law obligations.
The Bucknell University Athletic Department administration bears oversight responsibility for the strength and conditioning program design, coach hiring and supervision, and compliance with NCAA student-athlete safety standards including SCT protocols. The question is not just what the coach did on July 10 — it is what the athletic department did, or failed to do, in the months and years before that allowed this coach to program these drills without anyone checking.
The Bucknell University Head Football Coach — whose identity will be established in discovery — sits in the supervisory chain over practice activities and conditioning programs. The head coach has a duty to ensure that first-day freshman practices follow acclimatization protocols rather than punishing calisthenics. What did the head coach know about the strength coach’s programming? What did the head coach approve? What did the head coach do when a player collapsed on the practice field?
Bucknell University is a private liberal arts institution with a substantial endowment. Its insurance coverage likely includes substantial excess and umbrella layers typical of private universities of its financial profile. This is not a defendant that will be unable to pay a verdict. The question is whether the family’s lawyers identify every layer of the coverage tower and every defendant in the chain of command — because the university’s insurers are already working to limit which entities and which policies are exposed.
The Medicine: How Sickle Cell Trait and Exertional Rhabdomyolysis Kill
To understand what happened to CJ Dickey in the 48 hours between his collapse and his death, you need to understand the biology. This is not an abstract medical discussion. It is the foundation of the survival action — the claim for the conscious pain and suffering he experienced as his body shut down.
Sickle Cell Trait is a genetic condition in which a person carries one copy of the sickle cell gene. Under normal conditions, a person with SCT is asymptomatic and lives a normal life. But under extreme physical exertion — especially sustained, high-intensity exercise with heat stress and dehydration — red blood cells can change shape. They become rigid, sticky, and crescent-shaped (sickled). Sickled cells are not a metaphor. They are a physical change in the blood that blocks capillaries the way a crushed car blocks a lane.
When sickled cells block the microvasculature in muscles, they cut off oxygen delivery. The muscle, starved of blood, begins to die. This is called ischemia — the same process that kills heart muscle in a heart attack, but happening in the skeletal muscles of an athlete being pushed through 100 up-downs.
Exertional rhabdomyolysis is the catastrophic cascade that follows. When muscle cells die from ischemia, they rupture and dump their contents into the bloodstream. Three things pour into circulation:
Myoglobin — a muscle protein that the kidneys were never designed to filter in these quantities. Myoglobin clogs the kidney’s filtering tubules the way sand clogs a fuel filter. The kidneys, overwhelmed, begin to fail. This is acute kidney injury, and it is the primary mechanism by which exertional rhabdomyolysis kills.
Creatine kinase (CK) — an enzyme that indicates muscle destruction. In a normal person, CK levels are measured in the low hundreds. In exertional rhabdomyolysis, CK can exceed 100,000. The level tells doctors how much muscle has died.
Potassium — an electrolyte normally locked inside muscle cells. When cells rupture, potassium floods the bloodstream. High potassium — hyperkalemia — disrupts the heart’s electrical rhythm. In an operating room, potassium is the chemical used to stop a heart on purpose. Released by dying muscle, it can stop a heart by accident.
The cascade takes time. CK climbs for 24 to 72 hours after the injury. Kidney failure develops over hours. Electrolyte derangement worsens progressively. This is why CJ Dickey did not die on the practice field — he died two days later in a hospital, as the muscle destruction he suffered on July 10 progressed through his bloodstream and shut down his organs one system at a time.
During those 48 hours, he was conscious. He was experiencing the pain of acute kidney injury, the distress of organ failure, the knowledge that his body was failing. This is the survival action — the claim for what he went through between the collapse and the death. It is not speculative. It is documented in the hospital records, the lab values, the nursing notes, and the progressive decline that ended on July 12.
The NCAA wrote its SCT protocols because this cascade is a known, documented, and entirely preventable mechanism of death in athletes with the trait. The protocols exist because athletes have died this way before. The screening exists because you cannot protect an athlete from a condition you do not know about. The conditioning guidelines exist because the difference between a safe workout and a fatal one is not the athlete’s effort — it is the coach’s programming.
One hundred up-downs and prolonged planks on Day 1, for an athlete known to carry the trait, by a coach trained on the protocols, is not a training error. It is the exact scenario the NCAA’s entire SCT safety framework was built to prevent.
The Evidence Clock: What Records Exist and How Fast They Disappear
Every record that proves this case exists right now. But records do not keep themselves. Universities purge files on retention schedules. Employees leave and take devices with them. Email archives cycle out. Camera footage overwrites itself. The evidence that proves what happened at Bucknell on July 10, 2024, is on a clock — and the clock is already running.
University SCT training records for the strength coach. These records prove the coach had actual knowledge of Sickle Cell Trait dangers, NCAA safety standards, and Pennsylvania anti-hazing law requirements. They establish the recklessness element for punitive damages. But personnel and training records can be purged or reorganized following an employee’s departure. If the coach has already left the university, his training file may be in the process of being archived, reorganized, or destroyed. A litigation hold letter freezes this record. Without it, the file can legally disappear.
SCT screening and communication chain documentation. These records prove who knew about the athlete’s condition, when they knew it, and how that information was communicated to coaching staff. Medical screening records are subject to institutional retention schedules, and electronic health record access logs can be overwritten. The question is not just whether the coach knew — it is who else in the athletic department knew, and whether the information was properly communicated down the chain.
Internal communications between athletic staff. Emails, texts, and messages between coaches, athletic trainers, and administrators regarding the athlete’s SCT status and conditioning practices. These may reveal institutional knowledge, prior concerns about the coach’s programming, or warnings that were ignored. Email retention policies vary by institution, and personal device data may be lost if devices are replaced. A preservation letter must go out immediately to lock these down.
Practice and conditioning footage. If any camera systems were operational in the athletic facility, they may have captured the intensity and duration of the drills, the athlete’s visible struggle, and the timeline of collapse and delayed medical response. But athletic facility camera systems typically have short overwrite cycles — 30 to 90 days. The footage from July 2024 may already be overwritten unless someone preserved it. This is the fastest-dying evidence in the case.
Witness statements from other freshman players. Other players present at the July 10 practice can corroborate the visible struggle, the coaching pressure to continue, and the delayed medical response. But player memories fade, players transfer or leave the program, and witnesses may be influenced by institutional pressure or pending criminal proceedings. The sooner statements are taken, the more reliable they are.
Hospital medical records and autopsy report. These prove causation — exertional rhabdomyolysis, SCT contribution, mechanism of death — and document the athlete’s condition and treatment during the 48-hour survival period. Hospital records are generally retained per Pennsylvania law but should be obtained immediately to ensure completeness.
EMS and ambulance response records. These establish the timeline of when medical assistance was finally called relative to the collapse — critical for proving the delay in care element of recklessness. Dispatch records and EMS run reports have retention limitations. The gap between collapse and the 911 call is one of the most powerful pieces of evidence in the case.
Bucknell athletic department policies, conditioning program documentation, and NCAA compliance records. These establish the standard of care the university set for itself and whether the coach’s programming violated institutional policies and NCAA guidelines. Institutional policy revisions may obscure prior versions — the policies in effect as of July 2024 must be documented before any updates replace them.
Weather conditions data for July 10, 2024, in Lewisburg, PA. Heat and humidity data is relevant to exertional risk assessment for SCT athletes. Historical weather data is durable through NOAA and National Weather Service archives but should be formally documented for trial use.
The strength coach’s personnel file. Including prior complaints, training history, and performance evaluations. This may reveal prior incidents, warnings, or a pattern of unsafe conditioning practices that supports negligent retention and punitive damages. Employment records may be sealed, destroyed, or reorganized following termination. Discovery with a protective order may be needed.
The preservation letter that freezes all of this evidence goes out the day you call. Not the week after. Not after the funeral. Not after the criminal case resolves. The day you call. Because every day that passes is another day on the overwrite cycle, another day on the retention schedule, another day closer to the evidence being legally gone.
What a Hazing Wrongful Death Case Is Worth in Pennsylvania
Every case is different, and past results depend on the facts of each case and do not guarantee future outcomes. But the damages profile of this case — an 18-year-old college student-athlete, clear liability, pending criminal charges including felony aggravated hazing, a well-funded private university defendant, and a state with no damage caps — creates a case value at the highest end of Pennsylvania wrongful death cases.
Economic damages include the medical expenses for the two-day hospitalization, funeral and burial costs, and the substantial loss of future earning capacity for an 18-year-old whose entire career trajectory was eliminated. A forensic economist projects lost earnings using worklife expectancy tables built from federal labor data, then adds the value of employer-paid benefits — which federal figures show run roughly 30% on top of wages. For an 18-year-old college student-athlete, the lost earning capacity spans a full working lifetime. The present value of that lifetime of earnings, reduced to today’s dollars per the standard the U.S. Supreme Court established in Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp. v. Pfeifer, is a multi-million-dollar figure before a single dollar of non-economic damage is added.
Non-economic damages include the conscious pain and suffering the athlete experienced during the approximately 48-hour period between his collapse and his death — the acute kidney injury, the electrolyte derangement, the progressive organ failure, the knowledge that his body was shutting down. They also include the wrongful death damages for the family’s loss of companionship, guidance, and emotional support from a son whose adult life was just beginning. The exertional rhabdomyolysis mechanism would have produced significant pain, distress, and systemic organ failure during every hour of those two days.
Punitive damages are strongly supported. The coach knew of the SCT condition, had completed training on the dangers, and nonetheless ordered contraindicated exercises while pushing a visibly struggling athlete to continue, then delayed calling for medical assistance until after the athlete lost consciousness. The Attorney General characterized this as “intentional, deliberate hazing.” Pennsylvania imposes no cap on punitive damages in this case type. A jury that hears these facts can award punishment money on top of every compensatory dollar — and in an uncapped jurisdiction, that number is limited only by the jury’s judgment of the conduct.
Based on the case characteristics — the age of the decedent, the clarity of liability, the criminal charges, the institutional defendant’s resources, and Pennsylvania’s absence of damage caps — the case value range we assess is approximately $8,000,000 to $35,000,000. The primary deflator is the rural Union County venue, where central Pennsylvania juries tend to be more conservative than those in Philadelphia or Pittsburgh. But the egregious facts and the criminal charges may overcome venue conservatism. A jury in Lewisburg — a town where Bucknell is the dominant economic and cultural institution — will include people who have economic and social ties to the university. Voir dire must carefully explore those connections. But the same jurors who know Bucknell also know what it means when a coach pushes a kid to death.
The University’s Playbook: What to Expect and How to Counter It
The university and its insurers have a playbook. We know it because Lupe Peña, our associate attorney, spent years inside a national insurance-defense firm — the rooms where claims like yours are priced, where adjusters and their software decide how to deny, delay, and devalue people exactly like the reader. He sat at that table. Now he sits on your side of it. Here are the plays and the counters.
Play 1: Blame the athlete. “He should have stopped. He knew his condition. He chose to participate.” This is the oldest and cruelest defense in the book. The counter is the power dynamic: an 18-year-old freshman on his first day of collegiate practice, facing a conditioning coach who outranks him in every dimension, cannot practically refuse a drill. The NCAA protocols are written on the assumption that the athlete cannot stop — which is why the duty falls on the coach. The law does not expect a first-day recruit to diagnose his own sickling crisis and override his coach.
Play 2: Blame the condition. “Sickle Cell trait is inherently dangerous. This could have happened during any exercise.” The counter is the NCAA standard of care: SCT is a known, manageable condition with specific, published protocols. Thousands of athletes with SCT compete safely every year when their coaches follow the guidelines. The danger is not in the trait — it is in the violation of the protocols designed to protect it. A coach who follows the NCAA guidelines does not kill SCT athletes. A coach who ignores them does.
Play 3: Limit liability to the individual coach. “The strength coach acted alone, outside the scope of his employment. The university is not responsible.” The counter is respondeat superior and the institutional duty chain: the coach was doing exactly what the university hired him to do, on exactly the practice the university scheduled, on exactly the day the university brought freshmen to campus. The university trained the coach on SCT protocols. The university had a duty to supervise his programming. The university had a duty to ensure compliance with NCAA standards. The coach’s failure is the university’s failure.
Play 4: Claim assumption of risk. “Football is inherently dangerous. The athlete assumed the risk of injury by participating.” The counter is the Piazza Anti-Hazing Law: assumption of risk does not cover hazing or reckless conduct. The law was written to close this exact escape hatch. A student does not assume the risk of being hazed to death by a coach who knows his medical condition and ignores it.
Play 5: Try to settle quickly. A fast check may arrive with a release attached, before the full scope of the harm is known, before the criminal case resolves, before the family understands what the case is actually worth. The counter is patience and information: a quick settlement before criminal proceedings conclude may be a fraction of what the case is worth. A conviction or guilty plea would establish facts that dramatically strengthen the civil case. The family has maximum leverage when the university fears a criminal conviction more than it fears a civil verdict.
Play 6: Argue against punitive damages. “This was negligence, not recklessness. The coach made a mistake.” The counter is the Attorney General’s own words: “intentional, deliberate hazing.” The coach had actual knowledge of the SCT condition, had completed training on the dangers, and ordered the exact drills the protocols exist to prevent. This is not a mistake. This is a choice. Pennsylvania allows punitive damages upon a showing of reckless or outrageous conduct, and the reported facts clear that bar.
The First 72 Hours: What to Do Now
If you are the family of a hazing victim — whether at Bucknell or anywhere in Pennsylvania — here is what the first days require.
Get the medical records. The hospital records from the 48-hour survival period are the spine of the survival action. They document the CK levels, the kidney failure, the electrolyte derangement, the pain, the decline. These records exist now. Request them immediately.
Send the preservation letter. The day you call a lawyer is the day the preservation letter goes out — to the university, to the athletic department, to the individual coach, to every entity that holds evidence. That letter is what converts an automatic overwrite into sanctionable destruction. Without it, the footage cycles out, the emails archive, the personnel file reorganizes, and the proof of what happened disappears on a schedule the law permits.
Do not sign anything. A release may arrive fast, attached to a check, before the family understands the full scope of the harm. Do not sign it. Do not initial it. Do not return it. A release signed in grief is a release enforced in court.
Do not give a recorded statement. Someone friendly will call to “check on the family” and ask you to “just tell us what happened” on a recording built to be quoted against you. This is not a wellness call. It is procedure. Decline politely and call a lawyer.
Do not post on social media. Every post is evidence. A photograph, a comment, a tribute — all of it can be screenshotted, taken out of context, and used to minimize the loss. Grieve privately. Let your lawyer speak publicly.
Get the personal representative appointed. Before any wrongful death or survival lawsuit is filed, a court appoints a personal representative — the one person Pennsylvania law authorizes to bring the family’s case. We handle that appointment. It is the first procedural step, and it cannot be skipped.
Check the statute of limitations. Pennsylvania’s wrongful death statute of limitations generally runs two years from the date of death. If your loved one died on July 12, 2024, the deadline is approximately July 12, 2026. If you are reading this and no civil action has been filed, call a Pennsylvania attorney today. Not next week. Today. Whether tolling arguments apply given the pending criminal investigation is a question that must be answered immediately by counsel admitted to practice in Pennsylvania.
How We Build the Case
Here is how a hazing wrongful death case is actually built, from the first call to the number at the end.
Week one: preservation. The preservation letter goes out to every entity that holds evidence — the university, the athletic department, the individual coach, the EMS provider, the hospital. The letter names every record by type: SCT training records, communication chain documentation, internal emails and texts, practice footage, witness identities, hospital records, autopsy report, EMS dispatch records, athletic department policies, NCAA compliance records, weather data, personnel files. The letter is what freezes the evidence before it cycles out.
Discovery. The records come out in discovery. University training records prove the coach’s actual knowledge. SCT screening and communication chain documentation proves who knew and when. Internal communications between athletic staff may reveal prior concerns or warnings. Athletic department policies establish the standard of care the university set for itself. NCAA compliance records show whether the university was monitoring its own coaches.
Expert witnesses. A sports medicine physician specializing in SCT and exertional rhabdomyolysis establishes the standard of care and causation — what the NCAA protocols required, how the coach’s programming violated them, and how the violation caused the death. A forensic pathologist testifies to the autopsy findings. An athletic training and conditioning expert opines that the ordered drills were contraindicated for any athlete, especially one with SCT. A forensic economist projects the lost earning capacity of an 18-year-old across a full working lifetime, with fringe benefits and household services, reduced to present value.
Depositions. The strength coach explains his choices under oath. The athletic director explains the supervision and oversight structure. The head football coach explains what he knew about the conditioning programming. The team physician explains the SCT screening and communication chain. The athletic trainer explains what was done when the athlete began to struggle. Every deposition is a chance to lock in testimony before memories fade or stories align.
The criminal case. The criminal proceedings are monitored closely. Any conviction on the felony aggravated hazing charge would dramatically increase settlement leverage and support the punitive damages theory. A conviction or guilty plea would establish facts potentially admissible in the civil proceeding through collateral estoppel principles — meaning the civil case would not have to re-prove that the conduct was hazing, that it was reckless, or that it caused the death.
The number. The number at the end is built from all of it — the medical expenses, the funeral costs, the lifetime of lost earnings, the 48 hours of conscious pain and suffering, the family’s loss of companionship and guidance, and the punitive damages that a jury can award without a cap in Pennsylvania. A policy-limits demand may be served early, given the criminal charges and the strength of the liability narrative. Pennsylvania’s excess-exposure and bad-faith framework creates pressure on the university’s insurers to resolve the case before a criminal conviction further strengthens the civil position.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I sue a university for a hazing death in Pennsylvania?
Yes. Pennsylvania law allows the family of a person killed by hazing to bring a wrongful death action against the individuals and institutions responsible. The university can be held liable under respondeat superior for the acts of its employee coach, and independently for negligent supervision, negligent training, and failure to enforce NCAA safety protocols. The university is also subject to Pennsylvania’s anti-hazing law obligations. A private university like Bucknell, with a substantial endowment and layered insurance coverage, is a defendant with the resources to pay a verdict.
How long do I have to file a wrongful death lawsuit in Pennsylvania?
Pennsylvania’s wrongful death statute of limitations generally runs two years from the date of death. If your loved one died on July 12, 2024, the filing deadline is approximately July 12, 2026. This deadline is unforgiving — missing it can bar the case forever. Whether any tolling arguments apply given the pending criminal investigation is a question that must be answered by a Pennsylvania attorney immediately. If you are reading this and no civil action has been filed, call today.
What is the Timothy J. Piazza Anti-Hazing Law?
The Timothy J. Piazza Anti-Hazing Law is a Pennsylvania statute enacted in 2018 following the hazing death of Penn State student Tim Piazza. The law criminalizes hazing and creates a more serious offense called aggravated hazing when the conduct involves reckless disregard for human life or serious bodily injury. The strength coach in the Bucknell case was charged with felony aggravated hazing under this law. The violation of this law can also serve as negligence per se in a civil action — meaning the jury can be told that the defendant violated a statute written to protect students from the exact type of harm that occurred.
What is Sickle Cell trait and why is it dangerous in athletics?
Sickle Cell trait is a genetic condition in which a person carries one copy of the sickle cell gene. Under normal conditions, a person with SCT is asymptomatic. But under extreme physical exertion — especially sustained, high-intensity exercise with heat and dehydration — red blood cells can change shape, becoming rigid and sticky. These sickled cells block capillaries in muscles, cutting off oxygen and causing muscle cells to die. The dying muscle cells release proteins and electrolytes into the bloodstream that cause acute kidney injury, electrolyte derangement, and potential cardiac arrhythmia. This cascade is called exertional rhabdomyolysis, and it can be fatal. The NCAA mandated SCT screening and published specific conditioning protocols because this mechanism of death is known, documented, and entirely preventable when coaches follow the guidelines.
What are the NCAA’s Sickle Cell Trait protocols?
The NCAA mandated SCT screening for Division I student-athletes following a 2010 settlement agreement. The NCAA Sports Medicine Handbook provides specific guidelines for conditioning athletes with SCT, including gradual acclimatization (easing athletes into conditioning over days and weeks), adequate rest intervals between exertion periods, hydration monitoring, and avoidance of all-out exertion without proper preparation. These protocols are the standard of care for every NCAA member institution. One hundred up-downs and prolonged plank drills on a freshman’s first day of practice violate every one of these protocols.
Can a strength coach be held personally liable for a player’s death?
Yes. The strength coach who ordered the contraindicated drills, who had actual knowledge of the athlete’s SCT condition, who pushed a visibly struggling athlete to continue, and who delayed medical intervention until after the athlete lost consciousness faces both criminal charges and civil liability. His personal assets and individual insurance may be limited, but his conduct — characterized by the Attorney General as “intentional, deliberate hazing” — supports both compensatory and punitive damages claims against him individually, separate from the university’s vicarious liability.
What is exertional rhabdomyolysis?
Exertional rhabdomyolysis is a catastrophic medical condition in which extreme physical exertion causes skeletal muscle cells to rupture and release their contents into the bloodstream. The released myoglobin clogs the kidney’s filtering tubules, causing acute kidney injury. Released potassium disrupts the heart’s electrical rhythm, potentially causing cardiac arrest. The process develops over hours to days — which is why an athlete who collapses during practice may not die until days later in the hospital, as the muscle destruction progresses through the bloodstream and shuts down the organs. In a person with Sickle Cell trait, the sickling of red blood cells during intense exercise triggers the muscle ischemia that starts the cascade. The NCAA’s SCT conditioning protocols are designed to prevent this exact mechanism.
How much is a hazing wrongful death case worth in Pennsylvania?
Based on the case characteristics — an 18-year-old decedent, clear liability, pending criminal charges including felony aggravated hazing, a well-funded private university defendant, and Pennsylvania’s absence of damage caps on non-economic or punitive damages — the case value range is approximately $8,000,000 to $35,000,000. Pennsylvania does not cap non-economic or punitive damages in this case type, which removes the most common value suppressor. The rural Union County venue is the primary deflator, but the egregious facts and criminal charges may overcome venue conservatism. Past results depend on the facts of each case and do not guarantee future outcomes.
What if my loved one “agreed” to participate in the conditioning drills?
Participation is not consent to hazing. Pennsylvania’s anti-hazing law was written to close the “he agreed to it” escape hatch. An 18-year-old freshman on his first day of collegiate practice, facing a conditioning coach who outranks him in every dimension of authority, does not have the practical ability to refuse a drill. The NCAA protocols are written on the assumption that the athlete cannot stop — which is why the duty falls on the coach. Pennsylvania’s modified comparative negligence rule with a 51% bar is unlikely to be a significant defense here, given the coach’s actual knowledge of the SCT condition and the power dynamic between a first-day freshman and a conditioning coach.
Will the criminal charges against the coach help my civil case?
Yes, significantly. The criminal charges strengthen the civil case in two ways. First, the Attorney General’s public characterization of the conduct as “intentional, deliberate hazing” directly supports the punitive damages theory. Second, a conviction or guilty plea would establish facts potentially admissible in the civil proceeding through collateral estoppel principles — meaning the civil case would not have to re-prove that the conduct was hazing, that it was reckless, or that it caused the death. Even without a conviction, the pending charges create settlement pressure because the university and its insurers know that a criminal conviction would make the civil case nearly unlosable on liability.
Can I still file a lawsuit if the hazing happened months or years ago?
Pennsylvania’s wrongful death statute of limitations generally runs two years from the date of death. If your loved one died more than two years ago, the standard deadline may have passed — but tolling arguments may apply, particularly if the criminal investigation was ongoing and the full facts were not known. If you are unsure whether the deadline has passed, call a Pennsylvania attorney immediately. The only way to know for certain is to have a lawyer admitted to practice in Pennsylvania review the specific timeline of your case.
Why This Firm: Ralph Manginello and Lupe Peña
We are Attorney911 — The Manginello Law Firm, PLLC. We are a trial firm that takes Pennsylvania hazing and wrongful death cases, working with local counsel where required. We are not your lawyers yet. But if you call us, here is who answers.
Ralph P. Manginello is our managing partner. He has been licensed to practice law for 27+ years — admitted November 6, 1998, Texas Bar #24007597, with federal-court admission to the U.S. District Court, Southern District of Texas. He was a journalist before he was a lawyer — a B.A. in Journalism and Public Relations from the University of Texas at Austin, then a J.D. from South Texas College of Law Houston. He built this firm to fight for people, not corporations. He is a member of the Texas Trial Lawyers Association and the Houston Bar Association. He is currently lead counsel in an active $10 million hazing lawsuit against a university and fraternity — a case that involves the same institutional accountability fight, the same hazing dynamics, and the same duty of a university to protect the students it recruits. That case is in Texas. The principles are the same in Pennsylvania.
Lupe Peña is our associate attorney. He was a former insurance-defense attorney at a national defense firm — the rooms where adjusters and their software decided how to deny, delay, and devalue claims exactly like yours. He knows how claims are valued, how IME doctors are selected, how surveillance is deployed, and how delay tactics work — because he used to run those plays. Now he uses that knowledge for injured clients. He is fluent in Spanish and conducts full client consultations in Spanish without an interpreter. He is a third-generation Texan with family roots to the King Ranch.
We have recovered millions for injured clients — including a $5M+ brain-injury settlement, a $3.8M+ amputation settlement, a $2.5M+ truck-crash recovery, and a $2M+ maritime back-injury settlement. We currently litigate a $10M hazing lawsuit. Past results depend on the facts of each case and do not guarantee future outcomes. But the medicine, the corporate-accountability fight, the catastrophic-injury and wrongful-death work do not change because the mechanism is new. The live case in front of you is the bridge.
We handle hazing cases and wrongful death cases on contingency. That means we do not get paid unless we win your case. The consultation is free. The call is confidential. We have 24/7 live staff — not an answering service, but people who can take your call at any hour and connect you to a lawyer.
Hablamos Español. Lupe Peña conducts full consultations in Spanish without an interpreter. If your family is more comfortable speaking in Spanish, we serve you fully in your language.
If you are the family of a hazing victim — at Bucknell, at any Pennsylvania university, or anywhere else — and you need to understand your legal options before the statute of limitations runs, call us. The number is 1-888-ATTY-911 (1-888-288-9911). The consultation is free. There is no fee unless we win your case. And if we are not the right fit for your case, we will tell you — and help you find the lawyer who is.
The evidence is on a clock. The statute of limitations is on a clock. The criminal case is moving. Call today.