There are millions of men in this country who would claim they have benefitted from the brotherhood they gained by being a part of a fraternity. Timothy Piazza will never see that positive side to the Greek Life system.
Piazza was a pledge at the Penn State chapter of Beta Theta Pi when he died after falling down a flight of steps during a night of drinking. The engineering student had been forced to guzzle vodka, beer and wine during a February pledge night. His blood alcohol content reached 0.28 and 0.36 percent that night.
Heavy drinking is a common practice for fraternity pledges. What makes this incident so horrible is Piazza was reportedly motionless on a couch for 12 hours before anyone decided to cal 911. The 'brothers' allegedly were scared to make the call and they let him die instead.
18 members of the now-disbanded fraternity have been criminally charged. They face more than 850 charges, including manslaughter, after a grand jury found the men responsible for Piazza's death.