1
00:00:04,680 --> 00:00:06,520
The basement was designed as a torture
chamber.

2
00:00:09,740 --> 00:00:13,640
Written on the wall is, in the basement,
nobody can hear the screen.

3
00:00:16,900 --> 00:00:18,100
We got hate mail.

4
00:00:18,720 --> 00:00:20,980
Someone threw a brick through our front
window.

5
00:00:22,540 --> 00:00:26,420
Your friend is dead, and people blame
you for it.

6
00:00:28,680 --> 00:00:30,180
They did torture him.

7
00:00:31,220 --> 00:00:32,720
They did humiliate him.

8
00:00:34,990 --> 00:00:40,550
I just wanted to hold him in my arms,
you know, because I knew it was the last

9
00:00:40,550 --> 00:00:41,770
time I was going to see him.

10
00:01:16,110 --> 00:01:18,830
These are all handprints of kids, you
know, in Pleasant Hill.

11
00:01:20,850 --> 00:01:23,610
They've just sold the plaque so we could
have all of our kids out here,

12
00:01:23,770 --> 00:01:24,770
hopefully forever.

13
00:01:25,950 --> 00:01:29,210
Just that we could come by the park and,
like, remember.

14
00:01:31,510 --> 00:01:34,390
Matt was 11 when we brought him here and
got his handprint.

15
00:01:36,410 --> 00:01:41,590
It's amazing that his handprint at 11 is
the same size as mine right now.

16
00:01:43,650 --> 00:01:45,150
This handprint's still here.

17
00:01:45,880 --> 00:01:46,880
He's not.

18
00:01:47,480 --> 00:01:49,360
It lasted longer than he did.

19
00:02:02,900 --> 00:02:05,640
My name's Greg Keeney. I'm a commander
with the Chico Police Department.

20
00:02:07,300 --> 00:02:11,160
When I arrived at the crime scene, I
looked at it for a time.

21
00:02:11,380 --> 00:02:12,440
It didn't really mean anything.

22
00:02:14,410 --> 00:02:18,010
Like there wasn't like a gun or a bullet
hole. I can look at all of this and

23
00:02:18,010 --> 00:02:21,050
there's no one thing that says, oh,
crime, definite crime.

24
00:02:21,690 --> 00:02:23,430
That's the crazy part about this whole
thing.

25
00:02:25,390 --> 00:02:30,730
And as I was coming down those stairs,
it was just bitter cold coming up. I

26
00:02:30,730 --> 00:02:32,210
mean, it just kind of hits you right in
the face.

27
00:02:32,790 --> 00:02:37,890
And then down in here, there was a bar
set up and there were fans.

28
00:02:38,750 --> 00:02:40,170
I mean, there's fans all around.

29
00:02:41,890 --> 00:02:43,130
Yeah, it was just...

30
00:02:43,840 --> 00:02:45,860
Just filthy and dirty and smelled.

31
00:02:47,440 --> 00:02:48,900
There was water all over the floor.

32
00:02:49,200 --> 00:02:52,800
There had been a sewer pipe that had
broke, and so there was raw sewage on

33
00:02:52,800 --> 00:02:53,800
floor.

34
00:02:54,580 --> 00:02:55,580
It smelled horrible.

35
00:03:00,860 --> 00:03:02,980
There was just graffiti written all over
it.

36
00:03:05,340 --> 00:03:07,020
All sorts of things.

37
00:03:08,420 --> 00:03:12,280
The overriding one was, in the basement,
no one can hear you scream.

38
00:03:23,790 --> 00:03:25,010
My name is Debbie Smith.

39
00:03:26,450 --> 00:03:29,290
I knew from the time I was 11 that I
wanted to have children.

40
00:03:29,890 --> 00:03:32,070
I always loved children. I loved
babysitting.

41
00:03:33,090 --> 00:03:36,610
But I knew that one day I wanted to have
children because I really wanted to be

42
00:03:36,610 --> 00:03:37,610
a mom.

43
00:03:44,190 --> 00:03:48,790
It took me a long time to have Matt, and
I ended up having to be artificially

44
00:03:48,790 --> 00:03:49,790
inseminated.

45
00:03:50,940 --> 00:03:55,780
Just having him, it was just that much
more precious because it had taken so

46
00:03:55,780 --> 00:03:58,760
long and worked so hard, which is how he
got his name.

47
00:03:59,600 --> 00:04:02,760
Matthew means a gift from God, and I
cherished that.

48
00:04:14,300 --> 00:04:16,800
Matt loved Travis from the minute he saw
him.

49
00:04:17,240 --> 00:04:18,240
He was so proud.

50
00:04:19,140 --> 00:04:23,380
Matt was his protector, he was his
teacher, he was his big brother.

51
00:04:25,600 --> 00:04:28,680
Matt was basically quiet, kind of shy.

52
00:04:30,820 --> 00:04:34,120
You couldn't help but like him because
he treated everybody equally.

53
00:04:34,800 --> 00:04:37,040
He never judged anybody.

54
00:04:38,060 --> 00:04:41,820
If he knew that maybe you had too much
to drink, he would take your keys. He

55
00:04:41,820 --> 00:04:43,160
would make sure that you got home
safely.

56
00:04:45,360 --> 00:04:47,360
I am Christy Pollitt.

57
00:04:48,060 --> 00:04:52,120
Me and Matt knew each other since we
were really little. Our parents were

58
00:04:52,120 --> 00:04:57,380
friends, so we were always at each
other's house, just playing into the

59
00:04:58,880 --> 00:05:02,100
Oftentimes we'd spend the night at each
other's house, too. So we were really

60
00:05:02,100 --> 00:05:03,100
close when we were kids.

61
00:05:12,560 --> 00:05:14,580
I loved going to school in Chico.

62
00:05:16,560 --> 00:05:22,760
Matt was a year or two behind me, so I
kind of brought Matt into the life that

63
00:05:22,760 --> 00:05:23,760
had while I was there.

64
00:05:25,380 --> 00:05:28,920
We moved him into this really awesome
old house.

65
00:05:29,320 --> 00:05:32,560
And he was super excited because he
hadn't really ever been out on his own.

66
00:05:36,400 --> 00:05:38,440
I was dating Mike Quintana.

67
00:05:39,980 --> 00:05:43,980
And I introduced him to Matt because I
thought maybe Matt would like some

68
00:05:43,980 --> 00:05:47,940
friends that were male and not just my
female roommates.

69
00:05:49,840 --> 00:05:51,880
Matt and I, we hit it off pretty
quickly.

70
00:05:53,500 --> 00:05:57,940
I think our personalities were
different. I think I was a little bit

71
00:05:57,940 --> 00:05:59,580
outgoing, a lot more outgoing.

72
00:06:01,700 --> 00:06:03,300
Matt was a little bit more reserved.

73
00:06:03,520 --> 00:06:04,720
He was very thoughtful.

74
00:06:06,020 --> 00:06:08,580
Never had a harsh or mean word about
anybody.

75
00:06:09,450 --> 00:06:11,610
That's why we became such great friends.

76
00:06:12,730 --> 00:06:17,310
Anytime I would ask, hey, you want to go
do this or you want to go here, he was

77
00:06:17,310 --> 00:06:18,310
always up for it.

78
00:06:20,250 --> 00:06:21,250
Chica Police.

79
00:06:21,450 --> 00:06:24,250
Hello, we have an emergency.

80
00:06:27,670 --> 00:06:34,510
February 2nd, 2005, I was actually
driving to work and I got a call from

81
00:06:34,510 --> 00:06:38,050
detective sergeant who asked me to come
to fraternity.

82
00:06:38,570 --> 00:06:39,570
on 4th Street.

83
00:06:41,030 --> 00:06:44,430
They discovered a student unconscious in
the basement of the house.

84
00:06:45,870 --> 00:06:52,650
I thought, okay, did this kid overdose
on drugs or alcohol or something

85
00:06:52,650 --> 00:06:53,650
like that?

86
00:06:57,270 --> 00:07:02,130
I had actually gotten a call really
early in the morning from Mike, probably

87
00:07:02,130 --> 00:07:03,510
like 4 or 5 in the morning.

88
00:07:03,790 --> 00:07:07,490
He just told me that something had
happened with Matt and he didn't really

89
00:07:08,080 --> 00:07:15,080
what was going on it was at 6 10 in the
morning because i'll never forget the

90
00:07:15,080 --> 00:07:21,640
time i got this text from my husband and
it said to call him you know it was

91
00:07:21,640 --> 00:07:25,880
urgent he had gotten a call from bill
vall which was christie's dad his best

92
00:07:25,880 --> 00:07:31,620
friend he said that there was something
wrong with matt he was in a hospital

93
00:07:31,620 --> 00:07:34,240
so i called the hospital in chico

94
00:07:37,109 --> 00:07:42,410
And so when the doctor came on, he said,
when he found your son,

95
00:07:43,230 --> 00:07:44,650
he was at full arrest.

96
00:07:47,830 --> 00:07:52,330
And he said, I just need you to get to
the hospital as soon as possible, but

97
00:07:52,330 --> 00:07:53,330
don't drive yourself.

98
00:07:54,250 --> 00:07:57,030
And I was like, is he going to make it?

99
00:08:09,100 --> 00:08:11,660
I walked down into the basement of the
residence.

100
00:08:13,420 --> 00:08:15,140
It was like a refrigerator down there.

101
00:08:17,180 --> 00:08:20,280
The basement had several vents that were
open to the outside.

102
00:08:21,260 --> 00:08:24,800
The fans were kind of set up in those
areas to pull the cold air in from the

103
00:08:24,800 --> 00:08:25,800
outside.

104
00:08:28,180 --> 00:08:32,179
Certainly somebody had made some
attempts to make it very cold down

105
00:08:33,559 --> 00:08:37,960
There was a small amount of blood pooled
in front of the bench.

106
00:08:40,360 --> 00:08:45,340
Based on other incidents that we've had
at fraternity houses with overdose -type

107
00:08:45,340 --> 00:08:49,600
situations, we thought, oh, hey, this is
what happened here.

108
00:08:51,180 --> 00:08:55,200
But we processed it as a crime scene, as
if somebody had been murdered down

109
00:08:55,200 --> 00:08:57,460
there, because otherwise you don't get a
second chance.

110
00:09:11,690 --> 00:09:16,890
We just go racing out to Chico, and I'm
making phone calls.

111
00:09:18,070 --> 00:09:19,530
Mike's not answering his phone.

112
00:09:21,810 --> 00:09:27,890
I called the fraternity house, and
there's nobody at the house answering

113
00:09:27,890 --> 00:09:28,890
phone.

114
00:09:30,350 --> 00:09:31,470
Nobody's answering any phones.

115
00:09:36,790 --> 00:09:39,850
And then I get this phone call from the
hospital's social worker.

116
00:09:41,640 --> 00:09:45,700
When I'm thinking, you know what, a
social worker is calling me, that means

117
00:09:45,700 --> 00:09:46,700
bad.

118
00:09:48,580 --> 00:09:54,700
And she said, she said, Debbie, we don't
like to do this over the phone.

119
00:10:01,480 --> 00:10:02,480
Chico Police.

120
00:10:02,680 --> 00:10:08,420
Hello, we have an emergency. We have a
guy that went into seizures earlier and

121
00:10:08,420 --> 00:10:09,460
we're afraid he's not...

122
00:10:17,419 --> 00:10:18,880
I was woken up.

123
00:10:19,240 --> 00:10:21,920
They told me that something had gone
wrong in the basement.

124
00:10:24,620 --> 00:10:26,200
I was the junior active general.

125
00:10:27,480 --> 00:10:29,480
I was the one that was in charge at the
time.

126
00:10:32,940 --> 00:10:37,420
And so I went down towards the entrance
to the basement. I could see all the way

127
00:10:37,420 --> 00:10:38,420
down the flight of stairs.

128
00:10:39,040 --> 00:10:42,680
that there were paramedics performing
some kind of triage to Matt.

129
00:10:44,520 --> 00:10:50,020
And that was when I was told that he had
gone into a seizure and foam was coming

130
00:10:50,020 --> 00:10:52,260
out of his mouth or something like that.

131
00:10:54,480 --> 00:10:58,640
The paramedic kept saying, what
happened, what happened? Were you guys

132
00:10:58,880 --> 00:10:59,880
Was he drinking?

133
00:11:00,080 --> 00:11:02,780
Is there drugs involved? What drugs?

134
00:11:04,480 --> 00:11:07,240
I said, he drank water. He only drank
water.

135
00:11:08,080 --> 00:11:09,180
They didn't believe us.

136
00:11:11,140 --> 00:11:13,900
And then they rushed him off to the
ambulance.

137
00:11:15,000 --> 00:11:17,200
By this time, everybody in there is
scared.

138
00:11:19,500 --> 00:11:22,820
We were all conversing amongst ourselves
to figure out what happened.

139
00:11:25,040 --> 00:11:29,840
I think someone thought that he had had
a seizure, that he had maybe epilepsy or

140
00:11:29,840 --> 00:11:30,840
something.

141
00:11:31,340 --> 00:11:32,980
I was really out of it.

142
00:11:33,820 --> 00:11:36,800
I hadn't slept in four days, and I just
watched.

143
00:11:37,580 --> 00:11:38,640
My best friend collapsed.

144
00:11:40,880 --> 00:11:42,220
I didn't have a good feeling.

145
00:11:49,320 --> 00:11:53,280
We brought him down to a common area to
find out exactly what happened.

146
00:11:57,040 --> 00:11:59,720
We knew that Matt was a pledge to their
fraternity.

147
00:12:01,640 --> 00:12:06,240
So the story that we were getting from
the group was that the pledges were

148
00:12:06,240 --> 00:12:12,500
calisthenics and that Matt had had some
sort of seizure that

149
00:12:12,500 --> 00:12:16,240
led him to the situation he was in now.

150
00:12:24,180 --> 00:12:27,780
So as we're driving, Stephanie, the
social worker, keeps calling.

151
00:12:28,990 --> 00:12:31,850
She said, you just need to get here as
soon as possible.

152
00:12:32,890 --> 00:12:36,630
Finally, I said, Stephanie, I can't take
it anymore, and I think there's

153
00:12:36,630 --> 00:12:38,750
something that you're not telling me I
need to know.

154
00:12:41,170 --> 00:12:44,670
And I hear her saying, I'm sorry Matt
didn't make it.

155
00:12:47,090 --> 00:12:52,110
The phone slips from me, and all I can
see is I turn everything I went in slow

156
00:12:52,110 --> 00:12:53,110
motion.

157
00:13:17,439 --> 00:13:18,320
I just

158
00:13:18,320 --> 00:13:27,260
know

159
00:13:27,260 --> 00:13:31,690
that like we pulled into some little
truck stop or something and And we got

160
00:13:31,770 --> 00:13:34,030
and we just jumped into each other's
arms.

161
00:13:38,070 --> 00:13:44,570
In that instant, I was like, our lives
are changed forever because our family

162
00:13:44,570 --> 00:13:45,570
four is now three.

163
00:14:07,720 --> 00:14:12,300
We were asking for the fraternity
brothers' assistance in the

164
00:14:12,300 --> 00:14:15,600
to let them know the severity of the
investigation, we let them know that

165
00:14:15,600 --> 00:14:16,600
had died.

166
00:14:21,820 --> 00:14:28,080
When we were told by the police that
Matt had died, it just kind of hit the

167
00:14:28,080 --> 00:14:29,080
room.

168
00:14:29,920 --> 00:14:36,260
It's almost as if everything happened on
a two -minute delay, you know?

169
00:14:37,950 --> 00:14:42,550
Everyone's faces were the exact same
upon finding out that he passed away

170
00:14:42,550 --> 00:14:44,610
about two minutes later when it really
sunk in.

171
00:14:47,370 --> 00:14:52,310
One of the fraternity members, Dave
Mastretti, started screaming and yelling

172
00:14:52,310 --> 00:14:53,610
pounding his fists against the walls.

173
00:14:56,530 --> 00:14:57,670
He wanted to leave.

174
00:14:58,050 --> 00:15:00,070
He was stopped by officers.

175
00:15:03,730 --> 00:15:06,770
I don't think anybody had to tell me
Matt had passed away.

176
00:15:08,520 --> 00:15:11,460
I think I knew when he got carried out
of that house.

177
00:15:22,740 --> 00:15:26,120
Then we finally got to the hospital.

178
00:15:27,660 --> 00:15:29,120
I said, I want to see Matt.

179
00:15:32,480 --> 00:15:36,480
When we got into the room where he was,
we walk in.

180
00:15:37,150 --> 00:15:41,050
And it's kind of dark, and there's all
these beds, and it's quiet in there.

181
00:15:45,570 --> 00:15:49,850
And at the very end, there's a light,
and there's a person down there, and you

182
00:15:49,850 --> 00:15:51,230
could tell that there's a body down
there.

183
00:15:54,790 --> 00:15:57,690
And I said, is that Matt?

184
00:15:58,490 --> 00:15:59,870
And she said, yes.

185
00:16:00,650 --> 00:16:03,330
And my knees buckled.

186
00:16:07,500 --> 00:16:14,460
I just wanted to hold him in my arms,
you know, because I knew it was the last

187
00:16:14,460 --> 00:16:15,680
time I was going to see him.

188
00:16:18,180 --> 00:16:21,960
And she was like, you can't touch him. I
was like, I touched his arm.

189
00:16:28,280 --> 00:16:30,200
Because I had to. I just had to.

190
00:16:34,060 --> 00:16:39,580
But I just wanted to scoop him up and
just... Hold him like you hold your

191
00:16:39,580 --> 00:16:40,580
babies.

192
00:16:48,620 --> 00:16:55,560
You had a healthy young man that was
doing an hour's

193
00:16:55,560 --> 00:16:58,160
worth of calisthenics and had a seizure
and died.

194
00:16:58,560 --> 00:17:03,800
And what the fraternity members were
telling us about how Matt died didn't

195
00:17:03,800 --> 00:17:04,800
up.

196
00:17:05,579 --> 00:17:07,980
The level of suspicion of all of us
there was pretty high.

197
00:17:18,140 --> 00:17:24,319
So we divided up all of the fraternity
members and conducted interviews back at

198
00:17:24,319 --> 00:17:25,420
the police department with them.

199
00:17:33,260 --> 00:17:34,760
I don't have our full rights yet.

200
00:17:35,840 --> 00:17:39,560
The stuff we did last night was pretty
much what we do every year, especially

201
00:17:39,560 --> 00:17:40,780
before I went through it.

202
00:17:41,980 --> 00:17:44,520
It's like a peasy night. It's a lot of
work.

203
00:17:45,480 --> 00:17:46,480
It's water.

204
00:17:46,840 --> 00:17:48,340
It's humiliation. It's mental.

205
00:17:48,820 --> 00:17:52,560
It didn't work out at all, you know. We
did less than 50 push -ups, and that was

206
00:17:52,560 --> 00:17:57,160
it. Everything was okay with Matt and
Mike when they went to bed. It was

207
00:17:57,160 --> 00:17:58,160
fun.

208
00:18:01,680 --> 00:18:03,140
They were definitely trying to hide
something.

209
00:18:04,880 --> 00:18:08,220
There was something going on there that
they didn't want us to know.

210
00:18:09,800 --> 00:18:16,080
I remember looking at my hands and them
still being covered in Matt's blood.

211
00:18:17,080 --> 00:18:23,440
And that's when I broke down.

212
00:18:25,580 --> 00:18:27,300
His blood is still here.

213
00:18:28,830 --> 00:18:31,470
That's when I lost it.

214
00:18:39,870 --> 00:18:46,870
The police asked to go individually with
them to the police station

215
00:18:46,870 --> 00:18:47,950
to answer a few questions.

216
00:19:02,000 --> 00:19:05,640
I remember being in the police station
in the interrogation room.

217
00:19:06,680 --> 00:19:11,740
That was the moment that it just got
extremely real.

218
00:19:59,250 --> 00:20:02,330
Throughout Hell Week, you just undergo a
bunch of rituals.

219
00:20:03,980 --> 00:20:06,140
The last night is the worst night ever.

220
00:20:06,780 --> 00:20:08,380
It's called movie night.

221
00:20:10,080 --> 00:20:13,800
The pledges are instructed to stand on
top of a bench.

222
00:20:14,200 --> 00:20:20,980
There are fans put in place around you,
and you're handed a five -gallon jug and

223
00:20:20,980 --> 00:20:24,760
told to drink and pass and drink and
pass and drink and pass.

224
00:20:25,620 --> 00:20:31,280
The active members were watching a movie
or playing poker while they're going

225
00:20:31,280 --> 00:20:32,280
through this.

226
00:20:35,050 --> 00:20:37,830
During that time, you're asked
questions.

227
00:20:40,110 --> 00:20:44,210
And when you get answers incorrect, the
fans would turn on.

228
00:20:45,210 --> 00:20:47,410
You'd be soaking wet, and so you'd be
cold.

229
00:20:51,110 --> 00:20:57,870
The detectives were pulling

230
00:20:57,870 --> 00:21:02,740
little bits of information out of all of
them and kind of... fit the puzzle

231
00:21:02,740 --> 00:21:05,320
together, as it were, kind of put the
night together.

232
00:21:08,160 --> 00:21:13,980
When we interviewed the EMT crew that
came out there, one of the interesting

233
00:21:13,980 --> 00:21:19,020
things that they actually said was they
thought that Matt, he looked like a

234
00:21:19,020 --> 00:21:20,020
drowning victim.

235
00:21:21,500 --> 00:21:25,440
So we all thought that there was
something more going on than just some

236
00:21:25,440 --> 00:21:27,080
calisthenics and a seizure.

237
00:21:41,510 --> 00:21:45,110
Gabe really downplayed his involvement.

238
00:21:45,350 --> 00:21:48,370
He said that basically there had to have
been something else wrong with him

239
00:21:48,370 --> 00:21:50,350
because it was no big deal and it was
easy.

240
00:21:50,990 --> 00:21:52,750
And so that was a huge red flag.

241
00:21:56,790 --> 00:21:58,810
In the beginning, in those first hours,

242
00:21:59,660 --> 00:22:04,060
We didn't know anything other than he
died in a basement.

243
00:22:05,040 --> 00:22:10,500
He just looked bruised, and he just
looked like he'd been through hell, you

244
00:22:10,500 --> 00:22:13,040
know? How is this an accident?

245
00:22:20,200 --> 00:22:23,700
You know, I was just trying to do
whatever I could for Greg and Debbie.

246
00:22:27,280 --> 00:22:31,740
So we put together the candlelight vigil
that we held at the fraternity house.

247
00:22:34,780 --> 00:22:40,360
There must have been hundreds of people,
if not a thousand people, that all came

248
00:22:40,360 --> 00:22:41,540
to pay their respects to Matt.

249
00:22:42,480 --> 00:22:46,500
People gave talks about who he was as a
person.

250
00:22:48,720 --> 00:22:53,100
It was about coming to heal at that
point.

251
00:22:55,080 --> 00:22:56,540
All the guys were really nice.

252
00:22:57,930 --> 00:23:01,210
We didn't talk about anything that
happened in that basement. It wasn't

253
00:23:01,210 --> 00:23:02,790
that that night. It was just about Matt.

254
00:23:03,950 --> 00:23:04,990
That's all we wanted to hear.

255
00:23:06,170 --> 00:23:12,750
I naturally assumed, since they were
considered fraternity brothers, that

256
00:23:12,750 --> 00:23:14,910
were his friends, that they would take
care of him.

257
00:23:15,310 --> 00:23:18,750
So, of course, nothing nefarious
happened in that basement, right?

258
00:23:25,200 --> 00:23:27,620
The autopsy occurred, I believe, two
days after his death.

259
00:23:29,260 --> 00:23:30,480
It was rough.

260
00:23:31,560 --> 00:23:35,380
So what we learned, the pathologist, Dr.

261
00:23:35,600 --> 00:23:41,680
Resk, did a very thorough analysis and
found that the cause of his death was

262
00:23:41,680 --> 00:23:44,740
water intoxication coupled with
hypothermia.

263
00:23:55,760 --> 00:23:58,900
I think initially everybody expected it
to be some sort of drug or alcohol

264
00:23:58,900 --> 00:24:04,880
-related issue with it, and when it
wasn't and the actual facts of the case

265
00:24:04,880 --> 00:24:08,140
out, I think everybody's pretty shocked.

266
00:24:09,420 --> 00:24:15,160
They said, we think that he was killed
during a hazing. I was like, killed? It

267
00:24:15,160 --> 00:24:16,160
wasn't an accident?

268
00:24:26,000 --> 00:24:29,420
So in this investigation, there was a
lot of information flowing in.

269
00:24:30,360 --> 00:24:34,780
We learned that this water hazing had
been going on for many, many years,

270
00:24:34,860 --> 00:24:41,320
rituals and initiation processes, even
one that involved a coffin that they had

271
00:24:41,320 --> 00:24:46,560
made that they would put their pledges
in and then lower them into a pool of

272
00:24:46,560 --> 00:24:48,760
water, almost to simulate like drowning.

273
00:24:50,780 --> 00:24:53,460
It was only a matter of time before
somebody was going to die.

274
00:25:02,380 --> 00:25:06,520
After everything happened, the
fraternity fell apart.

275
00:25:07,520 --> 00:25:10,200
People were at each other's throats.

276
00:25:11,920 --> 00:25:15,960
Everybody knew, like, Kytow killed a
pledge.

277
00:25:16,360 --> 00:25:21,540
They also ruined the Greek system
because all the Greek system was

278
00:25:21,540 --> 00:25:25,020
a year after what happened with Matthew.

279
00:25:27,340 --> 00:25:29,580
It started to sink in.

280
00:25:30,170 --> 00:25:34,090
how the rest of the world looked at us
and these events.

281
00:25:34,830 --> 00:25:39,670
Letters being sent that people were
hoping that we would get anthrax and

282
00:25:41,950 --> 00:25:47,210
Someone threw a brick through our front
window telling us that they hoped that

283
00:25:47,210 --> 00:25:48,490
this place would be burned down.

284
00:25:50,450 --> 00:25:54,770
It became an us -against -the -world
type of thing. You can almost start to

285
00:25:54,770 --> 00:25:57,830
delude yourself that even things that
you know were wrong all of a sudden

286
00:25:57,830 --> 00:25:58,830
weren't wrong.

287
00:25:59,880 --> 00:26:05,380
I think the gravity of what had occurred
sunk in, and so we were getting less

288
00:26:05,380 --> 00:26:09,620
and less cooperation from the fraternity
members as the investigation continued.

289
00:26:12,280 --> 00:26:14,380
And then everyone started pointing
fingers.

290
00:26:15,180 --> 00:26:22,180
Mike was a witness for the police at
this point, and he became like one

291
00:26:22,180 --> 00:26:23,180
of the enemies.

292
00:26:25,200 --> 00:26:28,080
And so with that, we brought the
district attorney in.

293
00:26:28,560 --> 00:26:34,780
It would have been very difficult to
know exactly what happened without Mike

294
00:26:34,780 --> 00:26:35,780
there.

295
00:26:36,760 --> 00:26:41,540
He provided the base upon which much of
the investigation was done.

296
00:27:11,130 --> 00:27:16,350
He shattered that wall of silence
because he felt that he didn't want to

297
00:27:16,350 --> 00:27:21,390
part of a organization that killed his
friend.

298
00:27:24,780 --> 00:27:31,520
Having your friend pass away from
something that you survived, I can't

299
00:27:31,520 --> 00:27:34,900
to feel, you know, I would have rather
it been the other way around.

300
00:27:37,020 --> 00:27:43,460
Especially because it was me who wanted
to go party and be a rat boy and run

301
00:27:43,460 --> 00:27:44,460
around.

302
00:27:46,640 --> 00:27:49,620
He wasn't as gung -ho about it as I was.

303
00:27:51,630 --> 00:27:54,190
The beginning was all about bonding.

304
00:27:55,050 --> 00:28:00,210
So by the time Hell Week came around, we
had put in a lot of time and energy,

305
00:28:00,290 --> 00:28:03,510
five months, and we weren't going to
quit on each other.

306
00:28:10,730 --> 00:28:14,650
That Hell Week, the junior actives,
which would be myself and the seven

307
00:28:14,650 --> 00:28:18,270
people that I had pledged with, were
going to be the ones in charge.

308
00:28:20,560 --> 00:28:26,080
So movie night, we showed up, and they
told us that we're going to balance on

309
00:28:26,080 --> 00:28:27,440
the bench on one leg.

310
00:28:29,620 --> 00:28:33,620
And then they hand us one of those big
five -gallon jugs.

311
00:28:35,800 --> 00:28:42,780
And we're to drink this water and pour
it on ourselves while we're questioned.

312
00:28:45,240 --> 00:28:49,900
So they had maybe about four house fans
pointed towards us.

313
00:28:50,860 --> 00:28:52,500
I've never been so cold in my life.

314
00:28:52,700 --> 00:28:54,480
Our bodies are ready to give out.

315
00:28:55,640 --> 00:29:01,120
We went through about five of those
jugs. We peed ourselves. We threw up.

316
00:29:03,580 --> 00:29:06,000
You know what happens when you drink a
lot of water?

317
00:29:06,280 --> 00:29:08,060
Your thinking goes first.

318
00:29:08,280 --> 00:29:10,160
You can't think. You can't concentrate.

319
00:29:10,840 --> 00:29:14,120
It's called water intoxication because
you feel drunk.

320
00:29:14,680 --> 00:29:19,800
And then your eyesight gets blurry.
Everything is hazy.

321
00:29:26,320 --> 00:29:30,380
That night, everything felt fine and
normal.

322
00:29:30,740 --> 00:29:36,840
Matt and Mike seemed a little tired.
They seemed exhausted. They seemed

323
00:29:37,120 --> 00:29:39,440
And that was to be expected.

324
00:29:41,500 --> 00:29:45,000
Every fraternity member had gone through
the same thing.

325
00:29:49,100 --> 00:29:51,360
Around 1 .30 in the morning.

326
00:29:52,240 --> 00:29:55,300
Jerry said, you know, okay, we've had
enough.

327
00:29:55,520 --> 00:29:57,200
We've been at it for five, six hours.

328
00:29:58,220 --> 00:30:03,180
I had class at 8 in the morning, and I
remember thinking, I need to get at

329
00:30:03,180 --> 00:30:04,180
a few hours of sleep.

330
00:30:08,000 --> 00:30:14,100
I remember telling everybody to just
kind of finish up the night and that I

331
00:30:14,100 --> 00:30:15,300
would check on them afterwards.

332
00:30:17,500 --> 00:30:20,400
Carlos and JP and Gabe were still down
there.

333
00:30:23,450 --> 00:30:28,570
Gabe had come back from the bars at that
time. I know that he had been drinking.

334
00:30:30,090 --> 00:30:33,290
And that's when Gabe took over.

335
00:30:36,870 --> 00:30:42,050
Gabe got us up on the bench again, got
us drinking water again, got us throwing

336
00:30:42,050 --> 00:30:44,670
up again, pulling us down, working out.

337
00:30:47,970 --> 00:30:51,850
It had to be about another hour and a
half, if not two hours.

338
00:30:57,930 --> 00:31:03,010
Gabe came across as a bully. He was
relishing in administering pain and

339
00:31:03,010 --> 00:31:04,210
discomfort to these two.

340
00:31:06,350 --> 00:31:08,570
He just wouldn't stop. He would not let
up.

341
00:31:13,070 --> 00:31:19,170
Me and Matthew were doing push -ups, and
Matthew, on his way down,

342
00:31:19,450 --> 00:31:20,650
collapsed.

343
00:31:24,190 --> 00:31:29,580
And he rolled on his back, and he... I
could tell he was having a seizure, and

344
00:31:29,580 --> 00:31:35,300
he was convulsing, and he had bitten
down on his tongue really hard. His

345
00:31:35,300 --> 00:31:40,400
was stuck in between his teeth, and his
eyes were rolling back in his head.

346
00:31:42,420 --> 00:31:49,260
I put my finger in his mouth to try to
release his tongue, and he bit down

347
00:31:49,260 --> 00:31:50,840
on me so hard I started to bleed.

348
00:31:53,260 --> 00:31:55,760
I said, Matt is having a seizure. Call
the ambulance.

349
00:31:56,620 --> 00:32:01,860
And that's when a few of the brothers
adamantly convinced me that they were

350
00:32:01,860 --> 00:32:06,540
of the fire department and EMTs and this
is what they're studying. And it's

351
00:32:06,540 --> 00:32:09,140
fine. He's fine. It's no big deal. It's
over.

352
00:32:09,360 --> 00:32:10,360
He's fine.

353
00:32:13,860 --> 00:32:19,160
What that does to the human body,
drinking lots of water, is it washes out

354
00:32:19,160 --> 00:32:20,460
electrolytes in your blood.

355
00:32:20,780 --> 00:32:24,300
And if you don't have it, your body just
shuts down.

356
00:32:27,560 --> 00:32:30,280
They pulled me and him out of the water
onto the couch.

357
00:32:31,740 --> 00:32:35,400
And Matt's head was in my lap. And I
heard him snoring.

358
00:32:37,620 --> 00:32:39,360
And I said, guys, he's snoring.

359
00:32:39,800 --> 00:32:41,440
He's asleep, you know.

360
00:32:46,100 --> 00:32:47,500
And then he stopped breathing.

361
00:32:48,700 --> 00:32:51,040
I said, guys, he stopped breathing. He
stopped breathing.

362
00:32:51,940 --> 00:32:53,000
Call the ambulance.

363
00:32:54,920 --> 00:32:56,560
And still there was pushback.

364
00:32:58,480 --> 00:33:02,480
And then he started to foam out of his
mouth.

365
00:33:07,440 --> 00:33:11,200
I finally, finally one of them called
911.

366
00:33:12,320 --> 00:33:13,320
Chica Police.

367
00:33:13,680 --> 00:33:19,460
Hello, we have an emergency. We have a
guy that went into seizures earlier and

368
00:33:19,460 --> 00:33:22,640
we're afraid he's not... What's the
address?

369
00:33:32,330 --> 00:33:38,030
The biggest question that I had was, why
didn't anyone call 911 earlier?

370
00:33:39,690 --> 00:33:44,430
That these people should have known,
should have called an ambulance.

371
00:33:44,750 --> 00:33:51,750
They deprived him of that opportunity
for early medical intervention

372
00:33:51,750 --> 00:33:57,670
was an important part in what we were
looking at this homicide.

373
00:34:00,680 --> 00:34:07,160
We went to the precinct and the
detective told us we think that he

374
00:34:07,160 --> 00:34:09,360
was killed during a hazing.

375
00:34:11,239 --> 00:34:15,420
I was like, so they killed our son?

376
00:34:19,000 --> 00:34:23,600
They said, with the way the laws are
written, we probably won't be able to

377
00:34:23,600 --> 00:34:24,600
anybody accountable.

378
00:34:27,420 --> 00:34:28,820
You can't use the word kill.

379
00:34:29,400 --> 00:34:31,380
and nobody accountable in the same
sentence.

380
00:34:49,520 --> 00:34:51,960
There's no really explaining it, you
know.

381
00:34:54,940 --> 00:34:56,940
You just want to find answers.

382
00:34:59,980 --> 00:35:06,860
And going back to the scene of the
crime, where the answers are, I just had

383
00:35:06,860 --> 00:35:09,580
pull where I had to be where Matt was.

384
00:35:13,620 --> 00:35:18,820
I thought after 14 years I could walk
into this basement and, I mean, not have

385
00:35:18,820 --> 00:35:19,820
breakdown.

386
00:35:20,720 --> 00:35:23,060
It was really harder than I thought it
was going to be.

387
00:35:34,800 --> 00:35:38,720
From a legal standpoint, a case like
this was a very difficult case to make.

388
00:35:39,420 --> 00:35:42,960
I thought that there was a pretty good
chance that we were not going to be able

389
00:35:42,960 --> 00:35:45,560
to hold anybody criminally responsible.

390
00:35:46,740 --> 00:35:48,880
And so we kept pushing.

391
00:35:55,680 --> 00:36:00,020
We knew, based upon our conversations
with the University Police Department,

392
00:36:00,380 --> 00:36:03,440
members of fraternities and sororities
had to go through

393
00:36:04,330 --> 00:36:06,590
that were put on by the university.

394
00:36:07,590 --> 00:36:11,410
I specifically asked the gentleman that
gave the training if drinking water

395
00:36:11,410 --> 00:36:13,010
could be deadly.

396
00:36:14,570 --> 00:36:19,470
The trainer said it would be as clear as
pointing a gun at somebody that if you

397
00:36:19,470 --> 00:36:21,750
make somebody drink mass quantities of
water, you can kill them.

398
00:36:23,630 --> 00:36:29,390
We were able to secure the sign -in
sheet from that training.

399
00:36:32,680 --> 00:36:35,740
So that was the moment that we knew that
we had something.

400
00:36:46,380 --> 00:36:53,340
And so it was our smoking gun that we
were looking at. It all was

401
00:36:53,340 --> 00:36:57,760
able to be put together into that jigsaw
puzzle of evidence.

402
00:37:10,960 --> 00:37:14,340
Sergeant Keeney called and he said,
Debbie, we've got warrants out.

403
00:37:15,080 --> 00:37:16,340
They're going out this morning.

404
00:37:20,320 --> 00:37:23,680
He started going through the details of
what had happened to Matt.

405
00:37:31,820 --> 00:37:33,500
We just thought it was going to have a
breakdown.

406
00:37:37,220 --> 00:37:40,360
It was a shock to be presented with an
arrest warrant.

407
00:37:41,160 --> 00:37:45,100
I was told that I was being charged with
involuntary manslaughter.

408
00:37:45,740 --> 00:37:51,780
I was in uncharted territory emotionally
on how I feel being a murderer.

409
00:37:55,980 --> 00:38:00,740
That was important to say, okay, we're
getting felony convictions here.

410
00:38:01,520 --> 00:38:05,040
This necessitated very severe
consequences.

411
00:38:11,470 --> 00:38:14,230
Nothing I can say here today will bring
back Matthew Carrington.

412
00:38:14,450 --> 00:38:18,330
I will do whatever I can to inform
others of the stupidity and

413
00:38:18,330 --> 00:38:21,690
hazing. I will live with the
consequences of hazing for the rest of

414
00:38:22,450 --> 00:38:24,010
My actions killed a good person.

415
00:38:40,030 --> 00:38:43,870
After... What happened with Matthew, my
drinking got a lot worse.

416
00:38:45,610 --> 00:38:49,510
I blamed myself for what I didn't do to
protect my friend.

417
00:38:50,190 --> 00:38:55,710
I wish I was somebody different who
would have been able to do things

418
00:38:55,710 --> 00:38:56,710
differently.

419
00:38:59,750 --> 00:39:04,790
Got up, ran out of the house, ran past
them, went and got on the phone and

420
00:39:04,790 --> 00:39:07,790
called the ambulance. If somebody would
have called an hour earlier, Matt would

421
00:39:07,790 --> 00:39:08,790
be alive.

422
00:39:20,430 --> 00:39:27,350
After I got out of jail, I continued to
drink and do drugs and screw up my

423
00:39:27,350 --> 00:39:30,650
life, partly because it had no value
anymore.

424
00:39:32,110 --> 00:39:36,530
And I'd love to sit there and tell
myself that it might have been different

425
00:39:36,530 --> 00:39:40,010
was down in the basement, but I don't
even know if it would have been

426
00:39:40,010 --> 00:39:42,270
if I was down there. I don't know if I
would have made the right decision.

427
00:39:52,110 --> 00:39:53,810
I don't even know how I atone.

428
00:39:54,690 --> 00:40:01,490
Matt, by all accounts, was a great net
bonus for

429
00:40:01,490 --> 00:40:02,490
this world.

430
00:40:03,070 --> 00:40:07,830
I don't know what he could have
accomplished or the people whose lives

431
00:40:07,830 --> 00:40:10,950
have touched and probably touched in a
much better way than I did.

432
00:40:11,730 --> 00:40:17,970
I felt that Matt was a way better person
than I was.

433
00:40:20,250 --> 00:40:26,370
If one of us were supposed to die that
night, whoever's in charge got that one

434
00:40:26,370 --> 00:40:27,370
wrong.

435
00:40:34,210 --> 00:40:35,210
It's a struggle.

436
00:40:35,430 --> 00:40:39,230
Some days are worse, especially when you
get to his birthday. You go through the

437
00:40:39,230 --> 00:40:40,230
holidays.

438
00:40:43,590 --> 00:40:44,650
How do you say goodbye?

439
00:40:47,339 --> 00:40:51,900
It's important for people to remember,
you know, it was a horrible tragedy that

440
00:40:51,900 --> 00:40:53,300
didn't need to happen.

441
00:40:56,160 --> 00:40:59,720
And in order for us to make change and
for them to understand, they need to

442
00:40:59,720 --> 00:41:01,460
remember, you know, what happened in
this house.

443
00:41:11,480 --> 00:41:15,320
I knew at some point I was going to have
to let it go and forgive them in order

444
00:41:15,320 --> 00:41:16,320
to move forward.

445
00:41:17,390 --> 00:41:20,190
I can't live with hate in my heart.