Snejana Farberov, Daily Mail, November 27, 2017

Three 16-year-old high school football players from Pennsylvania have been charged as adults with raping a 14-year-old girl at gunpoint after she left a town fair.

The teenage suspects from the Central York High School football team were taken into custody last Tuesday, following a two-month investigation into the suspected sexual assault.

The victim said she was with friends at the York Fair on September 16 and the trio of boys, identified as Daishon Richardson, Andrew Miller and Kelvin Mercedes, followed them.

The victim said she was with friends at the York Fair on September 16 and the trio of boys followed them

She said when she left the fairgrounds, she was ‘taken to unknown locations’ and was ‘forced’ to get down on her knees and perform oral sex on the three suspects while Mercedes held a gun to her head, according to a probable cause affidavit cited by the York Daily Record.

The trio of suspects and the victim then walked over to someone’s yard, where the young men took turns holding down and raping the 14-year-old next to a fire pit, according to police.

During an interview with police on September 22, the girl said she complied with the boys’ demands because she was afraid for her life.

After the sexual attacks, the girl said her assailants threw her into a maroon SUV and drove her back to the fairgrounds.

The 14-year-old eventually made her way home, where she told a relative about what happened and was taken to York Hospital, where staff performed a ‘rape kit’ examination and contacted police about a possible sexual assault.

Sometime after the incident, the teenage girl told police she got a text message from Miller, which contained a photograph of the gun she said the trio of boys used to threaten her.

The trio of suspects and the victim walked over to someone’s yard, across the street from this athletic field, where the young men then allegedly took turns raping the girl

According to documents, Richardson also texted her telling her to stop lying.

The 14-year-old told police she thought one of her alleged attackers videotaped or photographed her during the rape, but when police seized the cellphones of the suspects, no videos or still images of the girl were found.

West York police say two of the boys were picked up without incident on November 21 and the third arranged to surrender.

They were charged as adults with rape – forcible compulsion, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, unlawful restraint and terroristic threats.

All three were released the following day after posting $25,000 bail each. Under the conditions of their release, the teens are prohibited from making any contact with the victim.

A preliminary hearing is scheduled for January 11.

Richardson, Miller and Mercedes are juniors at Central York High School and play on the school’s varsity football team.

The school district says what happened was ‘a non-school related issue’ and it has no comment on the police investigation, but a district spokesperson said the trio of suspects will not be present on school property until further notice.