A 2-year-old hazing case turned into a lawsuit yesterday, as a former football player at Thomas Jefferson High School claimed he was attacked and sexually assaulted by an older teammate.

The victim was 14 when he says the attack occurred on a bus ride home from a summer football camp at Edinboro University. He and his parents filed suit in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court against Thomas Jefferson's football coaches, the West Jefferson Hills School District, Matthews Bus Co., and the alleged attacker, Adam Lotis.

Lotis, then 17 and a high school senior, is accused of pushing the younger boy to the floor of the bus, then placing his penis in the boy's face for five to 10 seconds.

About 25 other players aboard the bus witnessed the attack, which occurred on July 11, 2002. None of the coaches, though, saw what happened. They drove home from football camp in cars, apart from most of the players.

Jesse Torisky and Bruce Gelman, lawyers for the plaintiff, said coaches and school administrators soon heard about the hazing but tried to cover it up. The boy's parents finally learned about it on Halloween night 2002, when they overheard people at a football game recounting the attack.

Lotis eventually was suspended from playing in one game, even though the district's written policy specifies that hazers are to be dismissed from the team.

"They ignored their own policy. The fact that they so cavalierly dealt with this as a non-incident is what annoyed the family," Torisky said.

The lawsuit accuses the school district and district officials of being aware of the assault and later attempting to cover it up. It also says that boy and his family suffered embarrassment and humiliation as a result of the attack. The lawsuit seeks unspecified monetary damages.

Gelman said the boy's parents did not want to sue, but decided going to court was the only way they could get the attention of coaches and school administrators. Their motivation, he said, is to force the district to crack down on hazing so no one else is victimized.

In a telephone interview yesterday, Lotis' father said his son would not comment on the civil lawsuit. Lotis also faces juvenile criminal charges of indecent assault and indecent exposure.

Neither Bill Cherpak, then the head football coach and now Thomas Jefferson's athletic director, nor school Superintendent John Lozosky would comment on the lawsuit. Instead, Lozosky referred questions about the case to the district's solicitor, Ira Weiss.

Weiss had not seen the lawsuit, but promised that the district's insurance carrier would fight it vigorously.

"There is a lot to be said about these allegations. Suffice it to say that I am confident that, at the end of the day, the district will prevail," he said.

Bill Kunkel, president of the school board, said he believes the school system is blameless because it had nothing to do with the football camp or the bus trip during which the sexual assault supposedly occurred.

"The parents got together and sent their kids to a camp. Why weren't the parents on the bus, providing supervision?" Kunkel said.

Asked why Lotis eventually was suspended from the team if the camp was not a school-sanctioned activity, Kunkel replied: "I don't know. I can't answer that."

In fact, five members of the coaching staff attended the camp and supervised the Thomas Jefferson players as a unit. In addition, team members were picked up at the high school and dropped off there. Matthews Bus Co., which was hired to transport them to football camp, is the school district's regular carrier.

Paul Calise, vice president of the school board, said he did not know all details of the case, but was sympathetic with the family that sued.

"I understand their position. If it was my kid, I'd be ticked, too," Calise said.

Gelman said the alleged victim went to live with a grandmother so he could transfer to another public high school after his sophomore year. The boy's embarrassment over the hazing was a primary reason he left Thomas Jefferson, according to Gelman.

The boy himself would not comment. Because he is an alleged victim of sexual assault, the Post-Gazette is not publishing his name. That is the newspaper's standard practice in such cases.

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The family's lawsuit comes less than a week after Cherpak was elevated from football coach to athletic director.

Cherpak, who made his living as a funeral home employee, coached football as a sideline.

With his appointment as athletic director, he became a full-time employee of the school district.