Two CPS Coaches, Four Students Charged In High School Hazing Incident (VIDEO)

Two High School Coaches, Four Students Charged In Hazing Incident

Two Chicago Public Schools football coaches and four of their team members have been charged in the alleged hazing of a 14-year-old boy on Chicago's Northwest Side.

Coaches Tom Cipriani, 47, and Jonathan Manning, 21, allegedly participated with four members of the Prosser Career Academy's varsity football team in beating the young victim with belts at the school on Oct. 18, the Chicago Tribune reports. All of the players and both coaches have been charged with misdemeanor battery, the coaches were charged with endangering the health or life of a child and Manning faces an additional charge for allegedly videotaping the beating.

Both coaches have been barred from the school and will face additional discipline, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

Though all the students involved and both coaches were charged in the incident, many Prosser students downplayed its significance. One football player told ABC Chicago, "They always just playing around. There was no harm to him. He didn't get no bruises or nothing." Another said, "Everybody was laughing."

The incident follows on the heels of a similar incident early this month, when two CPS football coaches at Fenger Academy High School were suspended after they allegedly participated in a group of their players' attack on Derion Jones. The attack was so severe that Jones lost a tooth and had his prosthetic eye knocked out of its socket. The attack was reportedly launched over an allegation that Jones had taken a pair of flip-flops from another student.

WATCH a video report on the alleged hazing incident:

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