Actually, there is a legal obligation. First, she was underage. Any member of the organization who was there drinking with her that night (who is 21 or older) has the legal requirement not to provide alcohol to a minor or they are liable for the consequences(and my guess is that the state is right now looking at the evidence and deciding if they want to prosecute whomever purchased the alcohol with at least contributing to delinquency and/or possibly contributory negligence in her death). It is a risk people take all the time, but it is a chance they want to take, so with that goes consequences if you get caught.

Also, if any one of them suspected she was in a life-threatening situation, or questioned her health (as in thought the line may have been crossed from drunk to coma), many jurisdictions have laws requiring someone to at least contact proper help (anonymous 9-1-1 call, for example). I don't know about CO, but I know many have laws to prevent people from just walking by a person bleeding out on the street (not that it is really enforced much -- I think usually the state is hoping people will do the right thing).

Re: Re: Re: Re: unfortunately...
 

I never said that. I meant it wouldn't be appropriate to mourn in the way that a wife would. Being sad and mourning are two different things.

I have to agree with IvySpice.

This is a terrible tragedy, but at the same time I feel it could have been prevented.

People die almost every day from drug overdoses, or by effects of their other individual choices.

When you do something like that, you're taking a risk. Sure you might feel good or whatever, but it is really worth it to have 547 drinks in your system??

I can't speak for everyone on this board, but I will openly admit that I drank when I was underage during my freshman and sophomore years. I'm almost certain most people here have, and you have to have gotten the alcohol somewhere.. but that was a choice we made. I don't blame my underage drinking to my older friends or my sister who would buy it for me on occasion, because I'm the one who asked them in the first place. To bring out this "everyone over 21 has a legal obligation" stuff is ridiculous... because driving over the speed limit is illegal, but most people do it anyway. I drive over the speed limit, and I have even got a ticket.. sure that was no fun having to pay for it, but I was the one who chose to drive that fast, so I'm going to deal with it.. I'm not going to blame the bank because they were about to close so I had to drive that fast to get there in time.

Plain and simple, you have to know your limit. I know things like when I should stop drinking, I know that I don't want to take the risk of dying from a drug overdose - so I've never touched the stuff, heck, I've never even smoked a cigarette before, I've never driven drunk before because I didn't want to put my life or other innocent bystanders on the line.

To think you can have that many drinks and be ok is crazy. If you are that intoxicated there is no telling *what* could happen b/c you'd be too "not there" to not realizing what was happening... and that's a scary place to be.

Has there been any indication that there is evidence that she was even drinking at the house?

Couldn't tell you. Really, it's whomever supplied is the liable party, both criminally and civilally.

Yes, she did make the choice to drink, Texas Princess, however I was responding to IvySpice's note that no one hgad legal obligation on any of this.

Yes, I drank when I was underage, and I speed and do many things that as an adult, I understand that I am responsible for the consequences. However, when I was underage and drinking, unless I was to have bought it myself with a fake ID (which I did not), anyone who bought for me was criminally responsible for providing alcohol to a minor. It's just that simple. Again, we all have to decide for ourselves if the consequences are worth the actions. As I remember from my party days in college, at that time the fun outweighed the chance of getting caught. It was the chance I chose to take, and I was lucky. In this case, the former Chi Omega sister was not, and her family and friends have to live with the consequences (of no longer having her with them).

And for that result, I am truly sorry. I almost lost my own brother when he was drinking underage (in high school with, with friends who were aged from HS to over 21), and fell from a 2-1/2 story balcony onto a parking lot. He landed on his head & face. His friends were not prosecuted, but it was considered (I was not caring one way or the other, since he was my concern, but it was a consequence they had to face).

We were very lucky, as were his friends, but not everyone is.

People have a legal obligation not to supply alcohol to the underage, true. But I was responding to a point that had been made earlier that someone should have noticed how drunk she was, taken care of her, etc. As far as I know, there's no legal obligation to do that. I don't know Colorado law, either, but even if they have the strictest good-samaritan laws in the nation, the fact that a drunken college student has fallen asleep at a party at 5 a.m. probably doesn't qualify as the kind of situation where you can be liable for not calling 911...unless you witnessed the person drinking 30+ shots, then there's no reason to assume that their life's in danger.

At this point I don't think there's been any clues as to where she got the liquor. My guess is that no one place is going to give you 35 shots, and she probably got it at a lot of different parties.

The U Colorado story just made me ill...people were drawing on the face of the passed-out pledge, ha ha ha, and it turned out he was dead, oops! Some brotherhood. We shouldn't be surprised that a lot of schools are fighting Greek life so hard. It's tough for the responsible people to hang on to their reputations when behavior like this is poisoning the water.

I could not agree more. Although, I am hoping that they drew on him before they figured out he was dead. I seem to remember that guys in my crowd ran the risk of getting their toenails painted if they were among the first heading to bed after drinking much "party juice" (aka passing out). I don't think we ever used ink, though. But, yeah, I'm guessing the brothers aren't thinking it is too funny now. This is one of those things I'm sure they feel really badly for now.

Yes. According to the FCPD's timeline investigation she drank beer and shots at the house after visiting the other parties. That's either posted somewhere here or in the Risk Management forum.

Here's a quote from the Rocky's timeline article...

"Two hours later, Spady would make her final stop at Sigma Pi, a house where she had concluded drinking nights before by passing out, the police said.

Change in demeanor

Twenty-five people had gathered in the brick fraternity house near campus, and Spady switched back to beer.

But as the crowd dwindled to about 10 at 3:30 a.m., Spady began what would be her final descent. Taking swigs from one or two bottles of McCormick's vodka, the former Nebraska high school honor student and homecoming queen's demeanor changed. She became visibly drunk and slurred her speech, Deputy Coroner Beers said.

About an hour before sunrise, Spady could no longer stand. She couldn't make sense when she spoke.

Two men who didn't live in the fraternity house put Spady's arms around their necks and carried her to an unused bedroom converted into a lounge.

Her girlfriend, who would tell police she drank close to what Spady did, checked on her and then went back to her dorm room.

The last time Spady was seen alive, she was lying on a couch on her stomach, using her hands to cushion her head, police said.

"We don't know if she was alive an hour or two beyond that point," Beers said.

In Spady's last moments, she slipped into unconsciousness, went into a coma and died. Beers said a blood-alcohol level of 0.4 is considered lethal."

This is just way too sad.

According to the above, this wasn't the first time she has passed out at the Sigma Pi house, so perhaps those there were off their guard.

On the other hand, it appears that there were numerous people and times to intervene, but nobody understood the gravity of the situation.