Expand / Collapse search
☰

Teens to stand trial over hockey brawl

Published  November 28, 2017 10:13pm EST
US
FOX 29 Philadelphia

Hatfield, Pa. (WTXF) - A high school hockey brawl so out of control some teen players are going to trial over it. The video went viral months ago and now it's making its way through the justice system.

"I don't think charges should have been filed, no."

Martin Sterling has a kid at Ridley High School and was taken by surprise learning six members of last year's Ridley High School hockey club are charged with a vicious beating of CB West players.

The brawl was caught on tape during the Class 2A Quarterfinal for the Flyers Cup this past March.
Ridley trailed in a 7-1 blowout.

READ MORE: Caught on Camera: Massive brawl at high school hockey game

"Its hockey. If it was off the ice, if it was taken outside of the gym or whatever I could see that but it happened on the ice. Sometimes tempers flare while you're playing sports," Sterling said.

Montgomery County prosecutors say the attack in Hatfield went well beyond a traditional hockey fight when 19-year-old Thomas Plotts, 18-year-old Ryan Gricco, 19-year-old Nathan Dunning,19- year-old Jake Cross, 18-year-old Brock Anderson, plus an underage player all of the Ridley Hockey Club conspired to beat down members of the CB West team allegedly even naming names of the opponents they were going after.

"Seemed like half way through the second period they stopped playing hockey and just started trying to hit people, trying to hurt as much as they could," Shawn Philipps said.

CB West Defense player Shawn Philipps suffered a swollen eye and broken nose after the melee and spoke to FOX 29 not long after it happened.

"My helmet was off and some other kid was coming at me and he started throwing punches at my head and next thing I know I was bleeding all over the place," he explained.

"Hockey fights do happen all the time, but when it's a planned event and you have a conspiracy to go after the other team and fight them, that's when it crosses the line and that's when assault charges are appropriate," Ken Rothweiler said.

Attorney and FOX 29 legal analyst Ken Rothweiler is not on this case but sees it a game changer for high school sports as the Ridley players stand trial.

"I think it puts high school programs on notice that if you fight and if you go beyond the bounds of the athletic event you could be charged in a criminal courtroom," he said.