Farrell Area School District officials have suspended their investigation of the Feb. 2 brawl at a Farrell-Sharon high school basketball game in Sharon while law enforcement officials conduct a criminal probe.

"That's going through the DA," Farrell Area High School Principal Charles Sanitate said, referring to the Mercer County District Attorney's Office. "They're doing the investigation. We're waiting for them at this point."

Sanitate said law enforcement officials have been at the school to take statements from students. He said he believes the investigation will take some time.

The fight started in the stands during the basketball game and escalated into a brawl between 70 and 100 people, Sharon police said. Sixteen people injured in the melee were treated at local hospitals.

Two days after the brawl, Farrell Councilman Louis Falconi asked Farrell residents to cooperate, or allow their children to cooperate, with the school probe.

Falconi, who teaches U.S. history and American government at the high school, said he heard stories from students of what he considered "inappropriate" behavior by Sharon police.

Falconi also asked for an accounting of the brawl by Farrell city officials.

City Manager LaVon Saternow said she was informed by the district attorney's office of its involvement with the Sharon investigation and has talked with Southwest Mercer County Regional Police Chief Joseph Timko and Sgt. Riley Smoot, a conflict specialist and Drug Awareness Resistance Education officer for the school district who was at the game.

"It would be my hope council would be satisfied with the fact the district attorney is now involved," Mrs. Saternow said.

Timko has said that his department is not investigating the brawl. Smoot said he has been assisting with Sharon's probe.

Farrell Area School Board member James Guerino added a back-handed slap at Sharon school officials Monday.

Guerino complimented Farrell administrators and employees who work sporting events for the way they seat spectators and maintain the aisles, saying those chores are performed "so much better than they were handled at a nearby community so recently."