Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele announced charges against four Cheltenham High School football coaches and six players Wednesday for two locker room assaults on a 15-year-old teammate in August and September 2025.
Head coach Terence Tolbert, 55, of Elkins Park; associate head coach Darian “DJ” McFadden, 42, of Roslyn, Pennsylvania; assistant coach Benjamin Johnson III, 45, of Cheltenham; and volunteer coach Ralph Burnley, 60, of Elkins Park are each charged with endangering the welfare of a child and conspiracy.
Two 18-year-old players, Isaiah Simpson and Josiah Peeler, also face charges, along with four other players who were minors at the time.
Steele said at a press conference, “The assaults on this victim were not the typical goofing around by teammates or horseplay as some of the coaches in this case called it.”
“They were crimes.”
The grand jury found that on August 15, and September 3, multiple football players restrained and assaulted a sophomore player, including poking him with a broomstick and kicking and stomping him while he was wearing football gear.
The first incident was recorded on video and showed several players restraining the victim while another player used a broomstick to poke the victim’s buttocks while teammates changed following practice.
At least one player can be heard chanting, “Broomstick him,” according to a grand jury filing.
The video was later shared with multiple players and students before being deleted.
“This incident was reportedly prompted by the team having to run extra conditioning drills assigned by the coaches after it was discovered that the victim took some equipment from another player’s locker,” Steele said.
The second attack happened after practice on September 3 after the victim was accused of taking equipment from another player’s locker. Multiple teammates allegedly kicked and stomped him while another player again used a broomstick during the assault, investigators found.
The victim reported being “punched, kicked and stomped in the head and groin with cleats,” prosecutors said.
The coaches became aware of the assault that same day.
Investigators allege the coaches learned about the September 3 assault after Burnley drove the victim home from practice. During the ride, the victim allegedly told Burnley he had been “jumped” by teammates and suffered an injury to his genital area.
Officials allege that McFadden and Tolbert instructed the victim to not tell his mother because “they would handle it” and did not report it to school administration at that time.
McFadden, the former assistant coach, wrote “if this gets out we are [expletive]. They will cancel the whole season,” according to the grand jury presentment.
The coaches kept silent about the assault for days.
The victim’s mother learned about the assault from a friend four days later and took him to a doctor for his injuries to his genitals.
Following the second incident on September 3, Steele said the victim “broke down” while being given a ride home from Burnley.
The hazing incident that has roiled Cheltenham and resulted in the cancellation of two high school football seasons was an attempted sexual assault, say lawyers for the student who was attacked.
Video footage from the August incident shows the student being dragged by his shirt on the floor of the locker room, according to his lawyers. About “seven or eight students are making physical contact” with him, while other students are standing by lockers, some with their phones out, said Alan Yatvin, one of the lawyers.
After the hazing allegations surfaced in October 2025, one of the coaches denied them. “None of that stuff is true, it didn’t happen,” McFadden told ABC Philadelphia station WPVI.
Steele said, “There’s been a lot of misinformation, I think, out there in the community about what happened to a 15-year-old football player, and there has been reluctance by most parties — adults and juveniles — to tell what they knew, what they saw, what they heard that day in the locker room, and afterwards in the next several weeks.”
A six-month-long grand jury investigation reviewed video evidence and heard testimony from the subjects involved, and Steele said his office moved the investigation into the grand jury to compel testimony.
In the viral moment that exposed the hazing,
the charges stem from two alleged assaults that happened in the locker room and led to the eventual cancellation of two football seasons.
District officials suspended the season on October 17 and canceled the remainder of the 2025 season on October 19, citing hazing allegations.
The school also canceled the 2026 football season because of the investigation.
Neumann-Goretti High School announced the firing of Benjamin Johnson, who was hired as the head coach in January.
Cheltenham Superintendent of Schools Brian W. Scriven said district officials appreciate that “those responsible are being held accountable through the criminal justice system.”
“No student should ever experience violence or fear in a school-related setting,” Scriven wrote.
The district has cut ties with every member of the football coaching staff in light of the investigation.
The grand jury also issued a report recommending state legislators change the law to make hazing an offense that mandated reporters must report.
Cheltenham High School will field a ninth-grade team this year.