Two more ex-San Diego State football players – both local high school grads – have been added to a lawsuit that alleges an underage girl was gang raped at a 2021 house party.
Former players Jaiden Brown, 20, and Jonathan Harrison, 21, were added to a complaint filed in August. Brown graduated from Helix High in La Mesa, and Harrison, 21, from Carlsbad High, according to the 2021 SDSU team roster.
The original suit named one-time star punter Matt Araiza, as well as Zavier Leonard and Nowlin “Pa’a” Ewaliko.
Court documents filed earlier this month state that Brown and Harrison were originally referred to in the lawsuit as “Roe 1” and “Roe 2,” but their true names since have been discovered. The documents don’t state what the exact allegations are against the men.
In December, the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office announced that no criminal charges would be filed in connection with the alleged rape, said to have occurred at an off-campus party.
The lawsuit alleges the plaintiff, when she was 17, had sex with Araiza outside the home during an Oct. 17, 2021 party. She was then brought into a bedroom where a group of men raped her, the suit alleges.
Araiza, a Rancho Bernardo High alum, who was cut from the Buffalo Bills during the 2022 NFL preseason after the allegations surfaced, claims that he left the party before the alleged gang rape. He and others have said that all interactions with the girl were consensual and that she had represented that she was 18 years old.
In addition, San Diego police targeted Ewaliko, who they say was found to have child pornography in his possession during the course of the rape investigation. He pled not guilty to those charges in March.
– City News Service
