Police officers, responding to a noise complaint, entered the fraternity house and found many intoxicated minors despite university policies that strictly forbids alcohol consumption inside fraternity houses. Trenton Dakota Jackson, a 19 year-old fraternity member, was charged with second-degree cruelty to animals after declaring ownership of the goat, which was found without food or water and standing in a puddle of its own waste.
The police are still investigating to determine whether the goat was part of a planned ritual for the hazing of fraternity pledges. Kentucky law requires state colleges to have campus policies that prohibit and set penalties for hazing. "From some of the students present at the party, we got some information that they were told they were supposed to have sex with the goat," said Barry Pruitt, a spokesman for the Bowling Green police department. A member of Alpha Gamma Rho denied that anyone had sex with the animal, and claimed that it had been borrowed with the owner's permission.
Lorri Hare, an executive director at Warren County's Humane Society, where the goat was delivered after its ordeal, said that the group has not determined to whom the goat belongs. The most credible caller to claim ownership of the goat told her that the fraternity had asked to borrow the goat to use as part of a petting zoo. Hare also claimed that a veterinarian at the Society found an abrasion of indeterminate origins in the goat's rectum. The Society is currently working to find a foster home for the animal. Hare expects the goat to make a full recovery.
Charley Pride, director of student activities at Western Kentucky, explained that the fraternity could be permanently suspended if the allegations of hazing are true, regardless of whether bestiality occurred. "Whether the goat-sex thing was meant as a joke or for real doesn't matter," said Pride. "Either way that would be mental hazing." The fraternity's national organization will send a representative to conduct an independent investigation.