Not so much to national experts.

Hank Nuwer, an associate professor of journalism at Franklin College in Indiana, says sex crimes in hazing are simply a fact of life nationally.

"These are common by the week," Nuwer said. "We typically have one sexual hazing a week."

The 15-year-olds from East are charged with forcible sodomy, attempted forcible sodomy and sexual abuse.

Each incident, which had three separate victims, involved two kids touching their genitals and buttocks to the faces and heads of the victims.

The slang term used to describe the actions is "teabagging." It's not the first time Brian Crow has heard the word. Crow is the associate professor of sport management at Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania and has written law reviews and textbook articles about hazing.

"Sadly, it's too common, particularly in high school sports," Crow said. "One thing that's surprising is it's sexual in nature. From all the research I've done, it's all about power. It's very unhealthy. A lot of times, there are minor physical scars, but major psychological scars from these incidents."

And it might be more common in Utah than people think. In the East case, only one of the three incidents was reported. Two others were uncovered by police investigators.

A study conducted by Alfred University in New York found 48 percent of high school students reported being hazed. Of those, the majority said they were hazed on a sports team. The next highest number was for gangs.

Still, experts found one thing in particular unusual about the East incident: It wasn't exactly hazing because it was three sophomores picking on three sophomores.

Rick Barnes was the athletic director at Vermont when he canceled the men's hockey season in 1999-2000 because of a hazing incident involving upperclassmen and freshmen. This, he said, doesn't sound anything like typical hazing.

"This sounds to me like bigger, tougher kids trying to humiliate kids by saying, 'You just got teabagged,' '' Barnes said. "They sure as hell didn't go up to the biggest guy on the team, because he'd smack 'em one. This wasn't part of joining a club."

And it has ramifications beyond East High School. Steve Marlowe, Skyline's athletic director, said kids at Skyline live in the area around the alleged perpetrators.

"They've known about this for a few weeks but haven't said anything," he said. "They're just heartbroken."

The heartbreak might not have been avoidable, the experts all said, but schools can take better steps to prevent problems.

Some Utah coaches make sophomores carry in equipment until they've earned their spot on the team. Nuwer, Barnes and Crow all said that's not a good idea. The problem, Crow said, is coaches endorsing any kind of hazing.

"[Coaches] are a major problem," Crow said. "A lot of them think boys will be boys, or girls will be girls. A lot of times, coaches go into the locker room and say, 'I'm supposed to tell you that hazing is bad, and don't do it,' and then they walk out and don't come back for 25 minutes."

"You build camaraderie by having the older and younger kids carry equipment one day and then the coaches carry the equipment the next," Nuwer said. "That way, you're all in it together. . . . Hazing is meant to bring the team together, but it has the opposite effect. It's like a lightning bolt."

It certainly has had that effect in Utah. For Utah coaches and athletic directors, it's eye-opening to see what happened in their back yard.

"It's a whole new ballgame, as far as that is concerned," Judge Memorial athletic director Dan Del Porto said. "You've gotta worry about a lot of things, but this isn't even on the same planet as what we've been talking about."

jpatrick@sltrib.com