On Oct. 12 at 2:45 p.m., a former treasurer for Pi Kappa Alpha (PIKE) Garrett Brinker, was charged after turning himself in to authorities.
Jackson Berg, current Boise State PIKE vice president and senior political science major, had Brinker as his mentor back in 2020.
According to Berg, PIKE was founded at Boise State University in fall 2019. When the fraternity headquarters came in and placed members in positions of leadership, they decided to make Brinker the treasurer of the Mu Psi chapter.
PIKE had a retreat in spring 2020 before COVID hit. Brinker’s roommate had made comments on Brinker’s financial situation, which raised eyebrows among the executive board, especially with Brinker having access to the fraternity’s funds at the time.
Berg said that the executive board looked at their bank statements and found Brinker was paying for rent, food, car payments, Uber rides and bar tabs with fraternity funds over the span of a few months. After the retreat, PIKE leadership put Brinker on administrative leave.
They offered Brinker the option to pay back the money he spent in an effort to avoid legal charges, but according to Berg, Brinker fled to California a week after the retreat, which led to charges being filed.
“We filed a police report for grand theft because the amount was of a significant figure. Five digits, we don’t know the exact,” Berg said. “The police and the city have the statements and they have what they need to charge him, but we don’t have an exact figure ourselves.”
Over two years after charges were filed, an Ada County police report obtained via a public records request states that Brinker walked into the lobby of the Ada County Sheriff’s Office and notified the lobby technician and the officer writing the report, Officer Timothy Roller, that he had an active book and release warrant for felony grand theft.
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The officer confirmed the warrant with records by verifying his Washington state driver’s license, his date of birth and social security number before serving the warrant on Brinker. The officer then directed the technician to photograph and fingerprint Brinker in the jail lobby booking area.
“Brinker was not restrained at any time, and he was cooperative throughout the warrant process. After his photograph and fingerprints had been taken, Brinker left the jail lobby without incident,” the report stated.
Brinker’s mugshot appeared shortly after his booking. This was the first time Berg or other members of PIKE had heard from him since he fled.
“As for reparations for ourselves, we don’t know if we’ll get any money back from it. That kind of stuff is tough because if he has no money he’s just going to jail for it,” Berg said.
According to the Ada County Clerk’s office, Brinker has a preliminary hearing scheduled for Dec. 1 at 9:30 a.m. with Judge Annie McDevitt.
