Three Pennsylvania high school football players are accused of raping a 14-year-old girl at gunpoint after following her out of a town fair.
The 16-year-old suspects, who played varsity football at Central York High School, were arrested Tuesday and are being charged as adults with rape and several other charges, the Daily Mail reported.
The arrests mark the end of the police’s two-month investigation into the alleged sexual assault.
The victim told police she attended the York Fair September 16 with friends when the three boys—Daishon Richardson, Andrew Miller, and Kelvin Mercedes—followed them.
She said the boys took her “to unknown locations” after she left the fairgrounds and “forced” her to perform oral sex on the three teenagers while Mercedes put a gun near her head, according to a probable cause affidavit obtained by the York Daily Record.
Police say the three suspects took the victim to someone’s yard before they took turns raping her next to a fire pit.
The girl told police in an interview September 22 that she complied with the suspects’ demands because she feared for her life.
She added that her alleged attackers threw her in the back of an SUV after the alleged incident and drove her back to the fairgrounds.
The 14-year-old victim found her way home, notifying her relatives about what happened before she went to York Hospital. Hospital staff performed a rape kit exam and notified the authorities of the alleged assault.
The teenager told police that Miller texted her a picture of the gun she said the boys threatened her with and Richardson sent a text message telling her to stop lying after the incident.
West York Police took all three boys into custody November 21. All three posted $25,000 bond each and were released.
Police prohibited the teens from making any contact with the victim as a condition of their release.
The suspects are scheduled to appear in court at a preliminary hearing January 11.
A spokesperson for the school district said it would not comment on the police investigation because it was a “non-school related issue,” but confirmed the three boys would not be on school property until further notice.