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UVA Rape Story Collapses; Duke Lacrosse Redux
Topic Started: Dec 5 2014, 01:45 PM (60,472 Views)
sdsgo

Walt-in-Durham
Dec 19 2014, 09:33 AM
abb
Dec 19 2014, 04:14 AM
There's a Board of Visitors meeting today. Wonder if any of them will have the stones to ask Sullivan what she was thinking.

I think they tried once before and it didn't take. But, there's a petition on Change.org petition to remove her. So sayeth the Washington Times.

Walt-in-Durham
"The petition has only gathered a few signatures ..." The Washington Post article

Given the totality of the circumstances, was Sullivan's decision to suspend Geek social activities for few weeks really unreasonable?
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Baldo
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MikeZPU
Dec 19 2014, 01:10 AM
But don't doubt for a minute that Erdley will try and write a new piece
where "something happened to Jackie" and arguing that the essence of
her original piece is still spot on.

Jackie will no doubt be releasing a book

"Jackie Coakley: If I was actually Raped. Here's How It Happened".


by

Jackie Coakley & Sabrina Rubin Erdely(Ghostwriter)

Foreword by Nancy Grace

Credits: The cast & crew of Dawson's Creek

Published by Trolling Stone Press

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chatham
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I think that decision was unreasonable. It shows two ideas. One is guilty until proven innocent. Better yet almost hate for the male Greek system. The other is believing the narative at any cost.

Presidents should keep their mouth shut until they know what they need to say.
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chatham
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There is obviously an agenda behind what university presidents say in cases like these. We have seen it at UVa, Duke, and at UNC with the couse scandle. So far batting 100%. Oh yeah and one can add in penn state.
Edited by chatham, Dec 19 2014, 11:59 AM.
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Quasimodo

Quote:
 
Given the totality of the circumstances, was Sullivan's decision to suspend Geek social activities for few weeks really unreasonable?


That gets into the question of what did Sullivan know, and when did she know it? A dean met with the fraternity after the initial
claim was made, but before the RS story came out. I assume the resulting lack of action indicates the university did not
think there was a case (or that any major issue was involved).

Then, after the RS story appeared, the university swung into action. But was Sullivan doing this after having been advised that
there was no "there", there?

Don't know. But that should be part of any "final" report.



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MikeZPU

Baldo
Dec 19 2014, 11:53 AM
MikeZPU
Dec 19 2014, 01:10 AM
But don't doubt for a minute that Erdley will try and write a new piece
where "something happened to Jackie" and arguing that the essence of
her original piece is still spot on.

Jackie will no doubt be releasing a book

"Jackie Coakley: If I was actually Raped. Here's How It Happened".


by

Jackie Coakley & Sabrina Rubin Erdely(Ghostwriter)

Foreword by Nancy Grace

Credits: The cast & crew of Dawson's Creek

Published by Trolling Stone Press

:toast: :roflmao:
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abb
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http://www.tribtown.com/view/story/2f1350f2cd2e489e874e4447fda842a4/US--UVa-Board-of-Visitors

U. Va. Board chairman decries 'drive-by journalism' in wake of Rolling Stone rape article
bug

By ALAN SUDERMAN Associated Press
First Posted: December 19, 2014 - 4:47 pm
Last Updated: December 19, 2014 - 4:50 pm



CHARLOTTESVILLE, Virginia — The chairman of the University of Virginia Board of Visitors ripped into Rolling Stone magazine Friday, saying the magazine unfairly tarnished the school's image with a piece of "drive-by journalism," hurt innocent people and set back sex assault prevention efforts.

At a special board meeting on campus, Rector George K. Martin gave his most expansive comments since doubt was cast on a Rolling Stone article that described a culture of sexual violence hiding in plain sight at U.Va.

The article, published last month, described in graphic detail an alleged gang rape at a fraternity house on campus. Its publication set off a frenzy of recriminations at the school, one of the top public universities in the country. U.Va. suspended fraternity activities until January, the Board of Visitors appointed an independent investigator to look into the allegations and the university handed the case over to the Charlottesville police.

But problems with the story became apparent after publication. Many of the students described in the article have since said the magazine's account is misleading and wrong. The magazine has since apologized for what it calls discrepancies.

"Like a neighborhood thrown into chaos by drive-by violence, our tight knit community has experienced the full fury of drive-by journalism in the 21st century," Martin said in his opening remarks. "Our great university's reputation has been unfairly tarnished."

Martin pledged that the campus would not respond in anger, but would continue to work on sex assault prevention efforts and try to learn from the entire episode.

He said Rolling Stone's "catastrophic failure of professionalism" should "teach us to be less quick to judge."

U.Va. President Teresa Sullivan said the Rolling Stone article provided the school an opportunity to be a leader in increasing the "culture of reporting" sexual violence and eliminating the stigma that victims of sexual assault may feel. She said the article had prompted many campus community members to come forward with their own stories of sexual assault.

"We are in the spotlight, so we have the opportunity to lead," she said.

She added that while the school's culture was "generally good" there was room to improve student attitudes on sexuality.

Sullivan updated the board on the school's efforts to combat sexual violence, many of which she stressed had been underway years before the Rolling Stone article was published. Those efforts include trying to curb underage drinking; hiring new investigators and counselors; installing new surveillance cameras and improving lighting around campus; and increasing police patrols near where students live.
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abb
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http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/uva-official-blasts-rolling-stone-over-rape-article

UVA official blasts Rolling Stone over rape article
12/19/14 04:06 PM
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By Irin Carmon

A top University of Virginia official blasted Rolling Stone’s “false portrayal” of the university in a public meeting Friday, saying the university had fallen victim to “drive-by journalism” that showed “callous indifference to the truth.”

Rector George Keith Martin, speaking at a special Board of Visitors meeting, said of the story of an alleged gang rape and the university’s reported indifference to it that “innocent people have been hurt, some of them even devastated,” and that “our great university’s character has been tarnished.”

RELATED: UVA knew of rape claim before Rolling Stone, newspaper reports

The fierce tone contrasted starkly with the comments made by University of Virginia president Teresa Sullivan on Dec. 5, after questions about some of the allegations as reported were raised by The Washington Post. She said then that “While all of us who care about the University of Virginia are upset by the Rolling Stone story, I write now with a different message. Over the past two weeks, our community has been more focused than ever on one of the most difficult and critical issues facing higher education today: sexual violence on college campuses. Today’s news must not alter this focus. Here at U.Va., the safety of our students must continue to be our top priority, for all students, and especially for survivors of sexual assault.”

Martin did say that sexual assault is under-reported, but also said that “the truth is, we don’t know how common sexual assault is” at both UVA and across the country. ”We know that too many incidents go unreported, either to law enforcement or to university personnel.”

But he blamed federal statutes requiring confidentiality for preventing the university from defending itself from allegations made in the Rolling Stone article, which reported that the school failed to act on an alleged gang rape, even though the young woman at the center of the story told a university dean about it.

RELATED: Does the media cover rape more when women are suspected of lying?

“The record will show that we have acted in good faith, responding to new and shocking allegations … in the best way we could,” Martin said. He added that the lesson was to be ”less quick to judge and a little more reluctant to assume the worst of each other when it’s contrary to all we know of our community.”

“It is a good and noble place, Mr. Jefferson’s University, and it is blessed by God,” Martin said, before the meeting adjourned to a closed session.
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http://reason.com/blog/2014/12/19/more-bad-news-for-rolling-stone-jackie-u


More Bad News for Rolling Stone: Jackie Used Dummy Texting Service, Sent Email to Crush Implying Drastic Measures

Robby Soave|Dec. 19, 2014 9:20 am

Email

UVAWikimedia CommonsWhile at this point nothing could redeem Rolling Stone's tall tale about a gang rape at the University of Virginia, it's remarkable that new details further undermining Sabrina Rubin Erdely's shoddy reporting are still emerging on a daily basis—and each is more revealing than the last.

Since I last wrote on this subject, there have been several major developments, all concerning the three friends of Jackie who purportedly picked her up from the Phi Psi party and urged her not to go to the police. Those three friends—Ryan Duffin, Alex Stock, and Kathryn Hendley—have now given interviews disputing nearly all aspects of Jackie's story regarding what happened that night.

We now know the "real" given name of Jackie's date on the evening of her alleged rape, September 28, 2012: Haven Monahan. Jackie claimed that Monahan was an older student who had taken an interest in her. Prior to September 28th, Duffin, Stock, and Hendley had pressed Jackie for details about this mysterious love interest. She gave them several different cell phone numbers for Monahan, and they corresponded with him. He eventually sent a picture of himself. Many of his messages contained not-so-subtle hints that Jackie had (unrequited) feelings for Duffin.

We now know that no one named Haven Monahan attended UVA. The phone numbers aren't even real—they redirect back to an internet service that allows people to send texts without having actual phone numbers. And the picture is of a former high school acquaintance of Jackie's who never attended UVA and spent no time in Charlottesville that year.

This strongly implies, of course, that Jackie sent the messages herself. The Daily Caller's Chuck Ross has gathered compelling evidence—including an interview with Duffin himself—that Jackie may have been trying to make Duffin sympathetic to her or develop feelings for her.

Most recently, Ross obtained and published a bizarre email that sheds more light on the nature of Jackie's feelings for Duffin. The email purports to be a message from Jackie to "Monahan" in which she confesses to being totally in love and obsessed with Duffin. "Monahan" forwarded the email to Duffin, claiming that he thought Duffin should read it. If Monahan were a real person, the message would have been oddly timed: it was forwarded to Duffin on October 3, 2012—just a few days after Jackie told Duffin that she was raped by five men during her date with Monahan. But since Monahan almost certainly doesn't exist and is in all likelihood actually Jackie, the email makes the most sense as a form of elaborate cover for Jackie to indirectly share her feelings with the true object of her affection.

The full thing can be read here. A selection:

I didn’t fall for Ryan Duffin the first day I met him. Nor did I fall for him on the second day or the third day for that matter. But once I did fall for Ryan, you see, my world flipped upside down. Kathryn doesn’t understand what I see in Ryan. I guess I don’t understand what she doesn’t see in him. He’s gorgeous, but gorgeous is an understatement. More like you’re startled every time you see him because you notice something new in a Where’s Waldo sort of way. More like you can’t stop writing third grade run on sentences because you can’t even remotely begin to describe something, someone, so inherently amazing. More like you’re afraid that if you stare at him too long, you’ll prove your grandparents right that, yes, your face will get stuck that way…but you don’t mind. You, like everyone else, may think I’m exaggerating, but then again, you probably don’t know Ryan Duffin. Ryan has no idea what he does to me…he can make me feel more emotions in one second then I would normally feel in one year. He makes my head spin. And the truth is, I’m crazy about him.

Jackie also discusses "doing anything to switch the scales" to make Duffin like her. (Note: Monahan/Jackie appears to have used famous TV and movie quotes to write the bulk of the email.)

I should note it's still technically possible that Jackie suffered a traumatic sexual encounter at some point during her college years—perhaps even on September 28, 2012, although that now seems implausible given the extent of her deception both before and after that night. Whatever the cause of her trauma, it's difficult not to feel sympathy for a suffering person. I wish her well.

All ire should be reserved for Erdely and her editors: the sole perpetrators of this utter journalistic trainwreck. On that note, the Poynter Institute just awarded Rolling Stone its "error of the year" distinction. Given the incredible chaos this thoroughly false story has wrought, any distinction—even a dubious one—seems almost too kind.

Watch me discuss these matters on CNN's Smerconish below.
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http://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2014/12/19/unbelievable-rolling-stone-writer-is-rereporting-her-botched-uva-story-n1934002

December 19, 2014
Unbelievable: Rolling Stone Writer Is Re-Reporting Her Botched UVA Story
Matt Vespa
12/19/2014 11:45:00 AM - Matt Vespa

Talk about sending the arsonist to put out the fire. Rolling Stone made it known that a re-reporting mission will be assembled to address the abysmal journalism in their disgraceful Nov. 19 story about an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia. Sabrina Rubin Erdely wrote the piece and came under fire for failing, amongst other things, to reach out to the alleged attackers for their account of the night’s events. Now, it seems Erdely is re-reporting what happened on the night of the alleged assault, a night where the fraternity allegedly at fault held no social gathering.

To recap, the alleged victim named Jackie claims several men gang raped her in a darkened room on a broken glass table. When the ordeal was over, she was bloodied, beaten, and traumatized. Yet, her three friends (“Andy,” “Cindy,” and “Randall”) who also weren’t contacted by RS, claimed that they felt something traumatic had happened to her, but there were no visible injuries on her when they saw her that night. They wanted to go to the authorities, but Jackie was against this course of action.

It’s a far cry from how Erdley described them. In her piece, they were distant, apathetic, and consumed about their position on UVA’s social ladder; claims they rejected in their recent interview with ABC News. Oh, and their real names are Ryan Duffin (“Randall”), Alex Stock (“Andy”), and Kathryn Hendley (“Cindy)”

Now, Erdely is reaching out to them (via Associated Press) [emphasis mine]:

One of the friends, a 20-year-old, third-year student referred to as "Randall" in the Rolling Stone article but whose real name is Ryan Duffin, told the AP that not only did he encourage the alleged victim to go to police, but he started to dial 9-1-1 on his cellphone until she begged off saying she just wanted to go back to her dorm and go to sleep.

"I couldn't help but notice that everything that the article said about me was incorrect," Duffin said.

The AP also spoke with the other two friends portrayed in the article: third-year, 20-year-old U.Va. students Kathryn Hendley and Alex Stock, known as "Cindy" and "Andy" in the article. None of the three friends was contacted by Rolling Stone's reporter, Sabrina Rubin Erdely, before the article was published; each of them rejected multiple assertions made in the article, for which Rolling Stone has since apologized for and noted discrepancies.

All three say Erdely has since reached out to them, and that she has told them she is re-reporting the story. Hendley told the AP Erdely apologized to her for portraying her the way she did.

Erdely and Rolling Stone Managing Editor Will Dana did not respond to an email from The Associated Press on Sunday morning seeking comment.

Should we be skeptical about this effort? Yes! Alex Pinkleton, a student at UVA and a friend of Jackie, was interviewed for the original RS piece, and mentioned that Erdely had an agenda when writing this story (via Newsbusters) [emphasis mine]:

BRIAN STELTER, HOST OF CNN’s RELIABLE SOURCES: So what did you experience with the reporter? She was on campus for a long time. She interviewed you and a lot of other students. What were your impressions of her?

ALEX PINKLETON, FRIEND OF ALLEGED UVA ASSAULT VICTIM: I think she had her heart in the right place. She wanted to bring light to this issue – and it is a prevalent issue at UVA, and on campuses across the nation. However, she did have an agenda, and part of that agenda was showing how monstrous fraternities themselves as an institution are, and blaming the administration for a lot of the sexual assaults.

STELTER: What were some of the questions she asked you that made you feel that way?

PINKLETON: When she asked about my own assault, she kept asking – you know, did he feed you the drinks? Was he keeping tabs of the drinks that night? And he wasn't, and that's something that I had to keep saying over and over again, and I think – I felt like she wasn't satisfied with my perpetrator as someone who wasn't clearly monstrous.

[…]

PINKLETON: I think that she should have fact checked, and I'm really upset and angry, like a lot of people are, that that didn't happen. And now, we're in a very difficult situation....

...Again, I think her intentions were good. I just think that the job was done poorly, and I am upset with that aspect of it. But I also know that she was trying to come from a point of advocacy. But as a reporter, you can't be like an advocate and support a story and listen to it and think everything is true; and then, report on it without trying to figure out if it's true.

My job as an advocate was never to question Jackie's story or question the details, because I didn't need to. But the role that she's in, as a reporter....she needed to do that.

Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone, who incurred the wrath of the right on social media when he penned an inflammatory obituary to the late Andrew Breitbart; said the magazine is feels awful about how this story fell apart, especially on the fact-checking side. According to Taibbi, the process for him is a slow, arduous one, but noted that he feels safe publishing pieces there since he knows everything has been looked at with a fine-tooth comb (via WaPo):

“For people like me and for a lot of the other reporters who’ve worked there over the years, this was a real shock to us because, speaking personally — people laughed at me when I said this on Twitter — what I go through normally in the fact-checking process at that magazine has always been a really difficult, long, thorough, painful process,” said Taibbi. “And that was actually one of the things that always attracted me to working there, which is that I feel safe when I publish things because I feel like it’s been double-checked and, you know, that was always a good feeling. And clearly I think in this particular situation, the controls got broken down somewhere and they’re looking into that. I’m sure they’re coming up with some answers.”

That’s fine, but Erdely’s fact-finding mission is already complete. All she has to do is read the Washington Post. After all, they did the job she was supposed to do when first reporting on this story. Red flags should have gone up when the pictures of her date that her three friends saw on the night of Jackie’s alleged assault turned out to be one of her former classmates from high school. But, Erdely never contacted them, so this tripwire was never seen.

I can only imagine what kind of Frankenstein monster-like article will come out of this re-reporting initiative on behalf of RS. Seriously RS, everyone else did the legwork for you; it’s over now.
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http://wtop.com/news/2014/12/439846/


UVa. leaders lash out at magazine, announce new changes
By Max Smith | @amaxsmith December 19, 2014 5:44 pm
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WASHINGTON — The University of Virginia’s leaders are lashing out at Rolling Stone and promising new, more specific changes in the wake of the article detailing an alleged gang-rape in a fraternity house that the magazine has since said included factual discrepancies.

At a Board of Visitors meeting Friday, UVA President Teresa Sullivan outlined a $3.5 million investment in improved cameras, lighting around the grounds and at intersections, and fencing and lighting around railroad bridges.

The university will also add new counselors to the women’s center and dedicated Title IX coordinators. There will also be new sexual misconduct investigators, a new police sub-station on the Corner, unarmed security officers called ambassadors, student-led security programs, and a study of a late-night transportation program.

The total cost will be at least $2.5 million each year, mainly for the so-called ambassador program, on top of the one-time infrastructure improvements.

The school also plans to expand training for students and staff on sexual assault and alcohol use.

Some of the focus on additional safety measures and counseling is tied not just to the Rolling Stone article, but also to the concerns of parents and alumni after the deaths of three UVA students this semester, including Hannah Graham.

The university plans to pay for the changes by “reallocating cash and reserves”.

The school says some of the changes were already in the works, but have been accelerated in the wake of the reaction to the Rolling Stone article. Sullivan had announced plans for many of the changes in the weeks following the article’s publication.

Sullivan says she is considering requiring students to take sexual misconduct and alcohol training every year, not just prior to registering as a first-year.

Fraternal organizations on the grounds remain banned from holding social functions through the start of the spring semester on Jan. 9. Sullivan says she expects new operational agreements with fraternal groups within the next few weeks, and adds that she plans to seek revised agreements with other student groups.

At the start of the meeting, Rector George Martin attacked Rolling Stone: “Like a neighborhood thrown into chaos by drive-by violence, our tightly knit community has experienced the full fury of drive-by journalism in the 21st century—of callous indifference to the truth and callous indifference to the consequences. “

He said innocent people have been hurt, the school’s reputation has been “unfairly tarnished” and the community has been “cast into self-doubt”. Martin added that the article harmed the effort to root out sexual assault.

Read his full statement here.

The board opened Friday’s meeting by going into closed session to get legal advice about the school’s legal obligations under federal privacy laws, and later concluded with a public briefing on the university’s obligations under the Clery Act and Title IX, including warnings to students of possible crimes on the Grounds.

Even before the Rolling Stone article, the school had been one of dozens under federal investigation over sexual assaults.

Sullivan says UVa. can become a leader in the “culture of reporting”.
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cks
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"reallocating cash and reserves" - note to parents of UVA students - look for tuition and fees increase.

The requirement of all students, not just incoming freshmen, "to take sexual misconduct and alcohol training every year" should be interesting - what requirement will there be (can't graduate if one does not attend?) to enforce this? Who will teach these? I will just say this - if I were a college student I would be livid at such a mandate.
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Baldo
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Next up will be story by Sabrina Rubin Erdely that Jackie had her hands up saying I can't breathe.
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Joan Foster

Baldo
Dec 19 2014, 06:48 PM
Next up will be story by Sabrina Rubin Erdely that Jackie had her hands up saying I can't breathe.
Best post of the weeK! :cher: :cher:
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Payback
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Teresa Sullivan really is a little south of moronic not to get, even now, that this is a great teaching moment--that is, a great moment to teach UVA students not to make false accusations.

She really is almost unbelievably thick.
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