| Blog and Media Roundup - Thursday, January 25, 2018; News Roundup | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jan 25 2018, 04:49 AM (108 Views) | |
| abb | Jan 25 2018, 04:49 AM Post #1 |
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https://www.freep.com/story/sports/college/michigan-state/2018/01/25/larry-nassar-tragedy-worse-than-penn-state-and-we-were-complicit/1063743001/ Larry Nassar tragedy is worse than Penn State — and we were complicit Shawn Windsor, Detroit Free Press Published 12:00 a.m. ET Jan. 25, 2018 | Updated 12:48 a.m. ET Jan. 25, 2018 This isn’t Penn State. It’s worse. At least in scope and number. And while there is no evidence of a top-down cover-up at Michigan State regarding its relationship with predatory doctor, Larry Nassar, there is absolutely gross negligence and willful ignorance. As in: I don’t want to know. Or: you don’t know what you’re talking about, little girl. And there’s the problem right there … little girl. Had this tragic and despicable story centered on little boys? Boys who were assaulted by, let’s say, a football coach? The NCAA would’ve stepped in sooner. So, too, would have state representatives and student governments and professor councils and, frankly, us, the media. We wouldn’t have needed live in-court testimony from 156 victims to hear calls for an attorney general investigation. Or calls for the dismissal of MSU president Lou Anna Simon. Or pleas for the university to stop being tone deaf, which it has been, and continues to be to a staggering degree. We wouldn’t have needed to hear — to actually hear with our own ears — the cracked and wounded voices of those who were violated by Nassar to truly begin to question why the sick doctor was allowed to sexually assault so many for so long. If this story had been about boys, the action would’ve come sooner. Much sooner. As it did with Penn State. And that’s a shame, yet hardly surprising. Because the truth is boys matter more than girls in this society. And if you don’t think that’s true, then ask yourself why satellite trucks haven’t encamped in East Lansing for the last 18 months, when the Indy Star originally broke the story. Or, ask yourself this: Would university-sponsored investigators tell a boy after he’d been fondled by a doctor that he misunderstood the procedure? In the way that MSU Title IX investigators told one of Nassar’s victims back in 2014? She missed the “nuance” of the procedure, they claimed. Never mind that they referred to sexual assault as a “procedure.” Those investigators — doctors appointed by MSU who had ties to Nassar — may have been inclined to find cover for their colleague. But, for argument’s sake, let’s assume they didn’t. Let’s assume they simply dismissed the patient's complaint as a matter of her medical ignorance. Again, place a boy in that equation and it’s easy to imagine the suspicion such a complaint would’ve caused. Then think about the difference, and about the innocence we ascribe to boys that we so often withhold from girls. Innocence we make them prove. Remember Ray Rice? The former NFL running back who hit his wife? His assault was a minor story until video was released. That video forced the NFL and, by extension, the rest of us, to confront an ugly truth in a way we didn’t couldn’t — or wouldn’t see. Last week’s testimony from a courthouse in Ingham County had the same effect. The courage and pain on display from Nassar’s victims finally gave this story the kind of depth — and breadth — it always deserved. Kyle Stephens gives a statement regarding Michigan State University's role in the Larry Nassar sexual abuse case during a press conference at the downtown Lansing Radisson on Wednesday, Jan. 24, 2018. It’s true that bearing witness to actual human emotion is more powerful than reading about it or hearing it second-hand in an office. And yet, the Penn State tragedy grabbed the attention of the nation immediately. We didn’t need to see Jerry Sandusky’s victims cry. The difference? Man on boy sexual assault unsettles in a way that man on girl sexual assault does not. It’s that simple, really. And that has to change. It’s why as recently as Tuesday an MSU regent, Joel Ferguson, described Nassar’s decades-long rampage so casually on a Lansing radio show. “Just this Nassar thing,” is how Ferguson referenced it, when talking about why he still supports Simon. He then went on to talk about all the other important things a president does. Like raise money for the men’s basketball team, and help fund shiny new additions to arenas. At this point, it’s impossible to know how many regents and influential MSU donors and other top brass at the school share Ferguson’s view. In a way, though, it’s irrelevant. They’ve had their opportunity to speak. And blew it. Either by silence or by failing to capture the gravity of what has happened. To lay all the blame at MSU’s doorstep, however, misses the point. The incompetence and mishandling that helped propel this tragedy is a symptom of a society that still doesn’t believe little girls. Or women in general. Sexism and misogyny are as American as the Constitution. In fact, you can find remnants of both in that very document. I’m guilty of that tradition, too. Only a few times have I written about this story, and even then it was in passing, mentioned as a back-burner issue while I focused on the sexual assault complaints surrounding a handful of MSU football players. I kept waiting for news of a cover-up. Or of some deeper, more sinister conspiracy to reveal itself. Meanwhile: football. Revenue-generating sports. Masculinity. For years, the system believed a single doctor over the words of dozens of abused girls, and it wasn’t until they confronted us in a courtroom that we finally began to truly grapple with the consequences. So, yes, Simon has stepped down, and some regents could feel the heat at the ballot box, and the state’s investigative arm may start pulling back the curtains and figure out why this played out for so long. And, the doctor whose twisted, self-absorbed mission brought all this pain just got 40 to 175 years — on top of the 60 he was already serving for child pornography. We are moving forward, and that’s important. But, important, also to remember why we keep ending up in the same place. Contact Shawn Windsor: 313-222-6487 or swindsor@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @shawnwindsor. |
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| abb | Jan 25 2018, 04:50 AM Post #2 |
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https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/01/25/investigation-michigan-state-nassar-ncaa-stepping-out-traditional-role Once Again, NCAA Tests the Boundaries In investigating Michigan State and Larry Nassar, sports group is crossing into new enforcement territory unlike anything since its inquiry and punishment of Penn State, experts say. By Jeremy Bauer-Wolf January 25, 2018 Widespread public opinion holds that the National Collegiate Athletic Association botched its punishment of Pennsylvania State University and the sex-abuse scandal of former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky. Most of the meaningful sanctions applied to Penn State were reversed. The NCAA was accused of overreaching its bylaws in investigating the university, and simultaneously of being toothless. The association is setting itself up for a similar dilemma with Michigan State University and the horrors committed by Lawrence G. Nassar, a former doctor with the American gymnastics team who also spent decades treating athletes at the university. More than 160 women accused him of sexual abuse, and Nassar, already serving a 60-year sentence on federal child-pornography charges, was sentenced Wednesday to up to 175 years in prison for his crimes, to which he pleaded guilty. The NCAA will investigate Michigan State, it confirmed Tuesday, but its questions around Nassar far exceed its usual inquiries into what is usually much milder misconduct -- misbehavior by coaches or impropriety among boosters. Once again, questions arise: Do NCAA rules allow the association to intervene in criminal matters? If so, does the Michigan State investigation, if done correctly, mark a new era of NCAA enforcement? Athletics and legal experts are skeptical, though, of the NCAA's rationale for investigating the case. The association remained largely silent as the Nassar trial played out, as many Americans grew outraged as more women and girls came forward and media reports revealed that Michigan State representatives knew of the alleged abuse far before Nassar's arrest. Among them were the embattled Michigan State president Lou Anna Simon, who learned of a complaint against the doctor as early as 2014. On Tuesday, though, the NCAA wrote to athletics director Mark Hollis, asking for information on Nassar and any potential rule violations. “Larry Nassar’s heinous crimes of record against more than 150 victims raise serious concerns about institutional practices, student-athlete safety and the institution’s actions to protect individuals from his behavior,” the letter reads. The NCAA has declined to comment beyond a statement acknowledging the letter to Michigan State. Hollis said in a statement that Michigan State would cooperate with an investigation. “Since my first day on the job as athletic director, my focus has always been on the student-athlete. They are at the core of our athletic department mission statement. Our first priority has always been and will always be their health and safety,” he said. In the letter, an NCAA official cites a bylaw (which is what the association calls its rules) governing NCAA Division I institutions’ “commitments” to the NCAA model and the division. The bylaw notes that these particular commitments, related to athletes' well-being, “are not binding” on Division I colleges and universities “but serve as a guide for the preparation of legislation by the division and for planning and implementation of programs by institutions and conferences.” For this case, the official cited the following: "Intercollegiate athletics programs shall be conducted in a manner designed to enhance the well-being of student-athletes who choose to participate and to prevent undue commercial or other influences that may interfere with their scholastic, athletics or related interests. The time required of student-athletes for participation in intercollegiate athletics shall be regulated to minimize interference with their academic pursuits. It is the responsibility of each member institution to establish and maintain an environment in which student-athletes' activities, in all sports, are conducted to encourage academic success and individual development and as an integral part of the educational experience. Each member institution should also provide an environment that fosters fairness, sportsmanship, safety, honesty and positive relationships between student-athletes and representatives of the institution." Because of this language, it’s unclear whether an institution could "break" this bylaw. Never before has an athletics program been found to have violated these “commitments,” according to a search of the NCAA's database of major rules infractions. The letter does not mention any of the more serious infractions in the NCAA rule book -- a "lack of institutional control" (which Penn State was charged with) or "failure to monitor," but because these terms can be so ambiguous, the NCAA can essentially pick when it wants to come down on an institution, said Marc Edelman, professor of law at Baruch College and a sports law specialist. “The fact that the NCAA indeed punished Penn State seems to create, at least internally, some form of precedent,” he said. “If the NCAA were to turn around and say that it does not have jurisdiction to investigate Michigan State, then this would be one more instance the NCAA comes across as hypocritical and picking and choosing which schools it makes into examples.” Before the association told Penn State in November 2011 that it would examine possible infringements of its rules, it had historically skirted punishing its members for behavior that would be considered criminal. The association went after unethical conduct that lay firmly in the athletics realm. And indeed, initially NCAA president Mark Emmert, in a statement, deferred to law enforcement on the Sandusky case. Amid significant public pressure, though, Emmert announced in 2012 some of the most crippling sanctions in the association’s history, outside the rarely used “death penalty.” Emmert completely bypassed the typical NCAA process, in which consequences are typically investigated by the association's enforcement team and then adjudicated by a designated committee. Instead, basing its conclusions on the investigation into the Sandusky affair that was commissioned by Penn State and conducted by former FBI director Louis J. Freeh, Emmert, with the support of the NCAA's Executive Committee, slapped Penn State with a consent decree that meant the university would vacate 112 football wins from 1998 to 2011, including multiple Big Ten titles under the late coach Joe Paterno. The university also would give up four years of postseason play, see its scholarships drastically reduced and pay a $60 million fine, which would go toward preventing child abuse. (In a bit of irony, the head of the Executive Committee at the time was none other than Simon, the Michigan State president.) Then, one by one, the Penn State punishments were rolled back. The NCAA returned the full number of scholarships to Penn State and lifted the institution’s postseason ban. In 2015, it restored all of Paterno’s wins, part of a settlement in a lawsuit alleging the 2012 consent decree was illegal. NCAA emails emerged in court proceedings that showed some officials were unsure whether they had authority in imposing such strong sanctions, with one NCAA representative calling them “a stretch” and “a bluff.” Edelman said that in some ways, the NCAA has more grounds to investigate Michigan State because some of the sexual assault survivors were college athletes -- not so with Sandusky's victims. But Josephine R. Potuto, a former member of the Division I infractions committee and the Richard H. Larson Professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, said the NCAA erred stepping in on the Sandusky case, and has done so again with Michigan State. The NCAA hasn’t drafted bylaws to address this, Potuto said. While Nassar’s actions are “truly despicable,” she said, and some sort of university investigation should root out whether employees protected Nassar, right now, “it’s not the NCAA’s job.” Potuto suggested perhaps there could be a rule that a coach or employee would be fired in this situation, but she warned of unintended consequences. “This case was pretty easy,” she said, referring to Nassar. “There were criminal convictions, lots of victims. You have the individual pleading guilty. In any other case, do you suspend, fire people, make them ineligible? All of those things have consequences.” In the last year, the NCAA has been continually derided as ineffective. First, it was taken by surprise with the revelation of a scheme in the world of men’s basketball. Federal officials announced that four assistant or associate coaches at high-profile programs had been arrested for allegedly steering recruits to institutions sponsored by Adidas in exchange for cash payments. Several executives at the behemoth sports retailer also face federal corruption and bribery charges. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, which led the probe, has hinted at far more widespread corruption -- and said that the NCAA was unaware of scandal. Then, it declined to punish the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for creating faux classes that lasted decades, to the benefit of “mostly athletes,” the NCAA said. The association seemed at times hamstrung and frustrated by its own policies. It pointed out that the university had first admitted to the “paper” classes then reversed its stance during the NCAA investigation, and that officials could not definitively prove that the courses in the African and Afro-American studies department were created solely to keep athletes eligible, because other students enrolled in them. At the NCAA convention in Indianapolis last week, Emmert did not mention Michigan State in his address. He alluded to the UNC scandal and highlighted particularly the need to reform men’s basketball. His speech called for quick and decisive action at a time when the public is particularly cynical of higher education and the NCAA. “It doesn’t matter what division you’re in, what sport you’re in. When there’s things like that out there, and we don’t respond appropriately, it makes your job that much harder,” Emmert said during his remarks, referencing the basketball scandal. “We’ve got to respond to those things -- directly and forcefully. Not nibbling around the edges.” Read more by Jeremy Bauer-Wolf |
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| abb | Jan 25 2018, 04:52 AM Post #3 |
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https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/01/could-michigan-state-officials-face-jail-over-larry-nassar.html Could Michigan State officials face jail over Larry Nassar? Ben Mathis-Lilley 1/24/18 On Wednesday afternoon in Lansing, Michigan, disgraced Michigan State and USA Gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar was sentenced to 40 to 175 years in state prison for the seven counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct to which he’s pleaded guilty. (That’s on top of a sentence of 60 years in prison for pleading guilty to federal child pornography charges; Nassar also awaits sentencing on criminal sexual conduct charges in a different Michigan county.) Over the last week, 156 of Nassar’s victims either spoke in court or had their statements read aloud. Many of them have condemned USA Gymnastics and Michigan State officials for failing to seriously investigate early complaints against Nassar, with the first allegations of inappropriate behavior—which were reportedly made to a Michigan State coach—as early as 1997. The Detroit News and Michigan State’s student newspaper have both, in recent issues, called on Michigan State president Lou Anna Simon to resign. The nature of Nassar’s crimes, and the focus on Simon and other school officials who supervised him, obviously calls to mind the Jerry Sandusky sexual abuse scandal at Penn State. In that case, the university’s president, vice president, and athletic director were all sentenced to jail terms for their failure to alert law enforcement officials to a 2001 report that Sandusky had been seen behaving inappropriately with a young boy in a shower at the school’s football facility. (Penn State administrators are known to have been made aware of potentially inappropriate behavior by Sandusky, an assistant coach, in 1998, and other victims have said they told football coach Joe Paterno they were abused by Sandusky as early as 1971. Sandusky was not banned from Penn State facilities until he was arrested in 2011.) How does Michigan State’s institutional response to Nassar compare to the way Penn State handled Sandusky? An extensive Detroit News report published last week, based on testimony and interviews with victims, lists the following occasions on which Michigan State employees were allegedly told that Nassar may have committed sexual abuse: • In 1997, a high school gymnast allegedly told an unidentified youth coach and MSU gymnastics coach Kathy Klages that Nassar had abused her. A second, unidentified youth gymnast allegedly told Klages at a subsequent group meeting that she had also been abused. Klages declined to comment on the News’ story. • In 1999, a track/cross-country runner allegedly told an assistant coach named Kelli Bert that Nassar abused her. Bert says she does not remember ever being told Nassar had abused anyone. • In 2000, a softball player allegedly told trainers Lianna Hadden and Destiny Teachnor-Hauk that Nassar had abused her. In 2002, a volleyball player allegedly told Hadden that Nassar had made her uncomfortable during a treatment. Teachnor-Hauk has denied receiving any such complaints; Hadden declined to comment to the News. • In 2004, two individuals allegedly told a MSU clinical psychologist named Gary Stollak that Nassar had abused their young daughter. Stollak, who is retired, says he suffered a stroke in 2016 and does not remember anything about the alleged incident. • In 2014, a MSU alumnus told a school doctor named Jeff Kovan that Nassar may have abused her. Klages and Stollak, victims say, told Nassar about the allegations against him. But neither they nor Hadden, Teachnor-Hauk, or Bert appear to have reported any concerns to the university’s police department or its Title IX officials, who are tasked with ensuring that the campus maintains a safe and non-discriminatory environment for women. Kovan, the school doctor, did report the allegation he heard from an MSU alumnus to the school’s Title IX office , whose 2014 investigation cleared Nassar after three other doctors (and Teachnor-Hauk) said in interviews that Nassar’s techniques were medically appropriate. The Lansing State Journal reported last year that one of those doctors, Brooke Lemmen, subsequently resigned after the university learned she had failed to alert anyone else on campus after being told in July 2015—that is, after she’d helped clear Nassar during Michigan State’s investigation—that USA Gymnastics was also investigating him. Nassar was not fired by Michigan State until September 2016, after an Indianapolis Star article detailed allegations of abuse against him. As to whether any of these actions may have been illegal, victims’ lawyers have said, without naming specific employees, that Michigan State staffers failed to fulfill their obligations under laws and rules that mandate the reporting of sexual assault accusations to appropriate authorities. Michigan State’s administration has responded by saying it has “no reason to believe” that any criminal violations by anyone other than Nassar took place. Last week, however, the university’s trustees sent Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette a letter asking him to investigate the school’s handling of Nassar, and Schuette said in a statement that his office will conduct a “full and complete review” of the situation. The ambiguous nature of the laws concerning child endangerment will make any potential prosecutions complicated. The Penn State administrators who were sentenced in in the Sandusky case were convicted under a broadly worded Pennsylvania statute titled “Endangering welfare of children”: A parent, guardian or other person supervising the welfare of a child under 18 years of age, or a person that employs or supervises such a person, commits an offense if he knowingly endangers the welfare of the child by violating a duty of care, protection or support. Former Penn State president Graham Spanier is appealing his conviction, arguing (among other things) that he could not have been reasonably expected, as a university president, to have a “duty of care” over the abuse victim, a minor who had been brought on campus by Sandusky in the coach’s capacity as a youth charity volunteer. Michigan’s child abuse statute, meanwhile, is even more ambiguous on what constitutes a criminal failure to report potential abuse. Jordan Harris, who has practiced education and labor law in Michigan and now manages legal issues for a large Detroit-area school district, suggested to me that this section might be the most relevant: (7) A person is guilty of child abuse in the fourth degree if any of the following apply: (a) The person’s omission or reckless act causes physical harm to a child. (b) The person knowingly or intentionally commits an act that under the circumstances poses an unreasonable risk of harm or injury to a child, regardless of whether physical harm results. Even here, however, “omission” is specifically defined as “a willful failure to provide food, clothing, or shelter.” Harris says prosecution under the statute would be a “stretch,” but notes that there is also a Michigan statute called the Child Protection Law that specifically lists categories of people, among them “teachers” and “school administrators,” who are legally obligated to tell state authorities about the potential abuse of minors. Yet that law, too, is ambiguous. Harris pointed me to Michigan State’s own guidelines on the Child Protection Law, which state (correctly, Harris told me) that “Michigan courts have not yet addressed the status of university faculty, academic advisors, and administrators as mandated reporters.” (One more fact worth noting: Not all of Nassar’s victims were minors.) Title IX, meanwhile, is its own mess. The role of Title IX offices in combatting sexual assault has developed relatively recently and been the subject of a great deal of confusion and controversy. While the Title IX gender-equity law itself was passed in 1972, a federal guideline asserting that “the requirements of Title IX pertaining to sexual harassment also cover sexual violence” was only issued in 2011—and then substantially revised by the Trump administration in 2017. Michigan State’s current policy mandates that coaches and trainers report allegations of sexual misconduct to the school’s Title IX office. But no matter what an investigation of Michigan State officials’ behavior were to uncover, Title IX does not authorize criminal penalties. If authorities eventually conclude that MSU violated Title IX, however, the school could potentially lose some federal funding. Finally, there’s the NCAA, which announced Tuesday that it would investigate Michigan State’s handling of Nassar. But the NCAA is a private organization whose punishment of the university would only extend to its participation in college athletics, and even its jurisdiction over those matters has been on shaky ground in recent years as it’s faced heavy criticism for its inept and inconsistent handling of a number of scandals—including, most prominently, the one at Penn State. At the moment, it seems like the most likely avenue for significant punishment against Michigan State officials and staffers who failed to report Nassar allegations would be a Child Protection Law prosecution. As Harris cautions, though, that wouldn’t be a sure thing even if the failures alleged in the Detroit News article could be proven in court. “This could be an issue where this is the test case, ” he says. “There would be litigation over whether [the law] applied to community colleges and universities. It would be a novel legal question—they could make that allegation, and then it would be up to the court to decide.” Update, 1:40 p.m.: While he wasn’t the recipient of a direct report about Nassar, this piece also should’ve mentioned William Strampel, the former dean of the Michigan State College of Osteopathic Medicine. As Nassar’s boss, Strampel told him after he was cleared by the university’s 2014 Title IX investigation that he would be required to have an observer present whenever he performed “sensitive” procedures on patients. Multiple accounts, however, indicate that Strampel did not follow up to make sure this new rule was followed and that Nassar continued to see—and molest—some patients without an observer. Strampel, Kovan, and Klages, meanwhile, are among those named as defendants in nine civil lawsuits filed by Nassar victims which are being handled collectively as a single case in federal court . The suits also name Michigan State itself as a defendant; the school has moved to have the cases dismissed. |
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| abb | Jan 25 2018, 04:53 AM Post #4 |
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https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/01/25/michigan-state-doctors-case-raises-questions-about-when-presidents-are-responsible When Is a President Accountable for What She Didn't Know? The question is often “What did a president know, and when did she know it?” But in complex sexual misconduct cases that involve institutional failures, at what point does that stop mattering? Under fire, Michigan State president resigns. By Rick Seltzer January 25, 2018 For seven days, dozens of young women and teenagers stepped into a Michigan courtroom that was suddenly a national stage, delivering harrowing accounts of sexual abuse they suffered at the hands of former American gymnastics team and Michigan State University doctor Larry Nassar. They spoke of how abuse they endured as young athletes has affected them for years. They spoke of attempting to report Nassar to authority figures, and they spoke about what they see as the failure of Michigan State to properly investigate complaints about him and protect more children from abuse. On Wednesday, the last of the 156 women spoke. She was Rachael Denhollander, the first to publicly accuse Nassar. In the 16 months since she came forward, several press investigations have found that multiple Michigan State coaches, trainers and officials had heard reports of sexual misconduct by Nassar in previous decades. But, Denhollander said, every time she talks about the number of women who reported Nassar’s actions, the university issues a statement saying no one who heard the reports believed the doctor was committing abuse. “You play word games saying you didn't know because no one believed,” Denhollander said. “And the reason everyone who heard about Larry's abuse did not believe it is because they did not listen.” She also asked Michigan State president Lou Anna Simon and its Board of Trustees: Is this the right way to handle disclosures of abuse on campus? Denhollander is far from the only speaker to question Michigan State leaders in her statement. As the women spoke over the last several days, calls for Simon’s firing or resignation multiplied. The university’s student newspaper, local editorial boards at multiple papers, state lawmakers and petitioners became a chorus calling for Simon’s ouster, even as national outlets speculated about her future. Students planned a protest for Friday, and faculty leaders weighed a no-confidence vote. Blistering comparisons were drawn between Michigan State’s current situation and Penn State’s infamous Jerry Sandusky scandal, and the NCAA is now investigating the way the university handled the Nassar case. Nassar was sentenced Wednesday to 40 to 175 years in prison after earlier pleading guilty to seven sexual assault charges. He was already sentenced to 60 years for a federal child pornography case, and he has yet to be sentenced for additional sexual abuse charges in a nearby Michigan county. The case of the doctor, which rose to prominence after women accused him of digitally penetrating them under the auspices of providing treatment for medical issues like back or hip problems, has already brought down the leadership of U.S.A. Gymnastics, the governing body for the sport in the United States. Several of the organization’s board members resigned this week, and its former CEO stepped down in March. Yet at Michigan State, Simon appeared firmly dug in, receiving the public support of the majority of the members of Michigan State’s Board of Trustees. Cracks finally began to form in her position Wednesday evening, as reports surfaced saying trustees were working on a succession plan. Simon submitted her resignation to the board Wednesday night. Some college presidents have been able to survive situations involving allegations of sexual abuse or misconduct at their institutions. Last year, Berklee College of Music president Roger Brown apologized for past wrongs and promised to root out abusive behavior after The Boston Globe reported the institution had terminated 11 faculty members in 13 years for sexual misconduct. His supporters now cast him as someone who wants to take the lead in changing a culture of harassment. But there is also a long list of presidents forced out amid cases of sexual assault or sexual harassment at their institutions. Graham Spanier was ousted from Penn State’s presidency in the wake of the Sandusky scandal in 2011 -- and eventually convicted of child endangerment. Ken Starr resigned as Baylor University president and chancellor in 2016 following allegations the university had mishandled reports of sexual assaults committed by students, football players among them. In a more recent case that was arguably less extreme, University of Rochester president Joel Seligman announced his resignation this month in the aftermath of a controversial situation in which a professor was accused of harassment and inappropriate conduct. An independent investigation found the professor didn’t break the law or university rules but acted unprofessionally and inappropriately. Nonetheless, Seligman resigned, saying the university would be best served with new leadership and a fresh perspective. While some saw the independent report as vindicating Seligman on the case's facts, his early statements comparing accusations at Rochester to the discredited University of Virginia Rolling Stone gang rape story left many on campus feeling he had lost credibility. In these highly charged, complex and contentious situations, the question often becomes: What did the president know, and when did she know it? But another question is worth asking, too: When is not knowing the president's fault? How directly should a president be held accountable for the acts committed by those who report to her -- even if she did not know about those acts? ‘Play It Straight Up’ at Michigan State Michigan State’s leadership has not weighed in directly on that question. A spokesman declined to comment earlier this week when asked how Simon would answer it, and the university did not make Simon available for an interview. Asked if any single MSU administrator has been tasked with overseeing issues arising from the Nassar case, the spokesman, Jason Cody, first referred to “several external and internal reviews led or received by different individuals at the university.” Asked again if there is any one administrator overseeing the situation, the spokesman replied that, “Yes, the president oversees the university.” Simon’s public comments have not directly addressed the matter of presidential accountability. But they have provided some light on what she knew and when. She was told in 2014 that a Title IX complaint and police report had been filed against a physician, according to The Detroit News. But she did not know the name of the physician. “I was informed that a sports medicine doctor was under investigation,” Simon said. “I told people to play it straight up, and I did not receive a copy of the report. That’s the truth.” Photo of Lou Anna SimonSimon made the comments last week after she sat in on part of Nassar's sentencing hearing -- one of the hearings in which victims gave their accounts. She also told reporters gathered around her that she did not want to be a disruption to the court proceedings. “I came in today, and I didn’t want to be a disruption, but you guys are, you guys are reinforcing my view that I am a disruption for a process that is for the victims and the survivors and not about us at Michigan State today,” Simon said, according to an account from the Detroit Free Press. “There’ll be a time for that to happen, and that’s not today.” The Detroit News has reported that at least 14 Michigan State university representatives had heard reports of sexual misconduct by Nassar over the course of approximately 20 years before he was arrested. At least eight different women reported his actions, according to the newspaper. In addition to Simon learning of the Title IX complaint in 2014, athletic trainers, assistant coaches, a university police detective and an administrator who is now Michigan State’s assistant general counsel were aware of reports of abuse, according to the newspaper. Yet Nassar was not fired from Michigan State until after The Indianapolis Star ran a report in September 2016 about former gymnasts, one of whom was Denhollander, accusing him of sexual abuse. He was, however, relieved of clinical and patient duties in August 2016 after Denhollander filed a criminal complaint with Michigan State University police. The university’s Title IX investigation started before that, in the spring of 2014. But emails indicate Nassar was back on the job months later, at the end of July of that year. The Title IX investigation included interviews with four experts to evaluate treatment Nassar administered. All four had ties to Nassar, ESPN has reported. One of those interviewed was considered to be a close friend of Nassar’s and allegedly did not tell superiors that Nassar informed her in 2015 he was being investigated for suspected abuse by U.S.A. Gymnastics. She has since resigned. Nassar saw patients for another 16 months while a police investigation remained active, ESPN reported. Prosecutors decided not to charge him in December 2015. At least a dozen girls and young women reported being assaulted after he was allowed to return to work, according to ESPN. Other reports indicate concerns were raised about the doctor as early as 1997. The Indianapolis Star published its report Sept. 12, 2016. Eight days later, Michigan State fired Nassar from his position as an associate professor in the College of Osteopathic Medicine. Michigan State has said none of its officials believed Nassar committed sexual abuse prior to newspaper reports in the summer of 2016. On Jan. 19 of this year -- after four days of victims delivering impact statements in court -- the university’s Board of Trustees asked the state attorney general to review the situation. The same day, Simon wrote a long public letter apologizing for the abuse Nassar’s victims suffered and the pain it caused. “The testimony of Nassar’s victims this week made many of us, including me, listen to the survivors and the community in a different way,” she wrote. “It is clear to the board and me that a review by the Attorney General’s Office can provide the answers people need. I hope this review will help the survivors and the entire MSU community heal and move forward.” Simon also outlined a recently authorized $10 million fund to help survivors with counseling services. She described reviews of patient care, medical services provided to student athletes and the university’s Title IX program. She pledged to continue to improve the university’s systems. But Michigan State still faces lawsuits from approximately 150 victims. Simon warned that Michigan State will mount “an appropriate defense” in the cases. “There is nothing extraordinary about such legal efforts -- they are typical at this stage of civil litigation,” Simon wrote. “Given Nassar’s horrendous acts, these arguments can seem disrespectful to the victims. Please know that the defenses raised on MSU’s behalf are in no way a reflection of our view of the survivors, for whom we have the utmost respect and sympathy, but rather represent, as the board has said, our desire ‘to protect MSU’s educational and research missions.’” Trustees also read a statement calling Simon the right leader for Michigan State. But the next day, Trustee Mitch Lyons issued a statement calling for Simon to step down. "I believe our best recourse is for President Simon to resign immediately in order to let the healing process begin, first and foremost for the survivors and secondarily for our university,” Lyons said, according to the Lansing State Journal. Wednesday, a second trustee, Dianne Byrum, also called for Simon to resign. Photo of Michigan State trustee Joel FergusonAs of Wednesday evening, no other trustees had publicly joined them. The Board of Trustees’ vice chairman, Joel Ferguson, said during a Tuesday radio appearance that Simon would not be departing. She would not be run out by something someone else did, Ferguson said, calling her the best president Michigan State has had in his three decades on the board. “There’s so many more things going on at the university than just this Nassar thing,” he said. He went on to say that something will be happening in the favor of “the young ladies who have been wronged by” Nassar. He also predicted people will move on and rejected comparisons to Penn State. "I mean, when you go to the basketball game, you walk into the new Breslin [Student Events Center], and the person who hustled and got all those major donors to give money was Lou Anna Simon," Ferguson said. "There’s just so many things that make up being president at a university that keeps everything moving and everything right with the deans, everything at a school where we have a waiting list of students who want to come." He later issued an apology, with a statement saying he meant to refer to the situation as “the Nassar tragedy.” The board’s chair, Brian Breslin, did not respond to a request for comment for this story. Some faculty members had called for a vote of no confidence. While the idea had not made its way through parliamentary measures and to a vote when news of Simon's resignation broke, faculty members had expressed numerous reasons for supporting it. “Some people are personally impacted,” said Anna Pegler-Gordon, an associate professor of social relations and policy at Michigan State who was one of two faculty members to call for a vote of no confidence Tuesday. “Some people are very concerned about the university’s ability to heal and function as an institution. Some people are very concerned about listening to and responding to the survivors who have called very forcefully for President Simon to resign.” Pegler-Gordon believes the university needs to conduct a fully independent investigation of the handling of the Nassar case. Given recent history, she worried the university could not have had a fully independent investigation conducted transparently without Simon stepping down. But Pegler-Gordon is also trying to consider a president’s accountability in a case like this. The university cannot know what happened without an independent investigation that would cover the 2014 Title IX investigation and its aftermath, she said. “The way the investigation was handled, and the way Larry Nassar was allowed to continue as an MSU employee and continue to assault MSU students, I do think that the president is accountable there -- and many other people,” she said. “But we don’t really know what happened.” Usually, a vote of no confidence stems from faculty being troubled by a continuing pattern of presidential conduct considered dysfunctional, improper or abusive, according to Mae Kuykendall, a law professor at Michigan State who is currently writing a book about faculty votes of no confidence. It would probably be rare or even unheard-of for a single, highly visible failure to prompt a faculty vote unless a majority of professors were already deeply unhappy, she said via email. “I don’t believe the latter circumstance is the case at MSU,” she said. “There are features of the culture that attract criticism, but my impression is not one of widespread unhappiness. It is only an impression. I could be wrong, since most of my contact is within the College of Law, not with the wider community.” Kuykendall made that evaluation before Wednesday's reports of Simon stepping down. The president's resignation would presumably render moot any discussion of a no-confidence vote. It is always dangerous to attribute an institution’s culture to any one single person. And some faculty members argued the president stepping down would not be the only change that should be considered at Michigan State. “If she resigns, is fired, steps down, that’s important,” said Andaluna Borcila, an associate professor who is also calling for a vote of no confidence. “But she’s not the whole structure of leadership at this university, and I think we really need to think hard about that.” Several faculty members who asked not to be named described Michigan State’s leadership as insular, troubled by secrecy or hurt by a lack of transparency. It should be noted that few college presidents have careers as closely intertwined with the institutions they lead as does Simon. She earned her Ph.D. from Michigan State in 1974 and has been at the university in an academic or administrative capacity ever since. She became provost in 1993 and was named interim president for a time in 2003. She has been Michigan State’s president on a permanent basis since January 2005. How Much Can Be Expected of One Person? Outside experts declined to comment on the situation that has developed at Michigan State, or specific situations elsewhere. But advocates for victims and those who represent administrators disagree about when college presidents should be held accountable for actions that take place on their watch. “It’s just not possible, and it’s not fair in any sense of the word, to say the president has to be involved in every single allegation,” said Raymond D. Cotton, a Washington-based lawyer who represents boards and presidents. Presidents are often put in untenable positions, Cotton said. He argues against piling on presidents and calling for their jobs without a full accounting of facts and due process. Yes, systems have to be in place to handle allegations, Cotton said. And presidents need to be able to send messages through the chain of command and hold their employees accountable for failures. But there is a difference between the failure of an employee or system and the failure of an employee or a system that is the president’s fault. Many presidents worry about student affairs and sexual assault cases generating a firestorm on campus before anyone can get a full handle on the facts. They worry they will be held accountable when people feel frustrated. “I haven’t done a scientific study, but I can tell you that virtually all of my presidents are concerned about those issues for a number of reasons,” Cotton said. “One of the questions is, ‘Am I going to be held responsible for something that happened on my campus?’” Some advocates maintain that it is clear a college or university president is the captain of the ship, responsible for running the entire organization. That includes everything happening at organizational levels beneath them. While some might say it isn’t practical to hold a president to the standard of knowing everything happening on campus, advocates retort that clear expectations, good personnel and strong policy should allow presidents to know what cases are important and when they need to get involved. Those structures should also allow institutions to handle bad situations effectively without a president’s involvement, they say. “You may not be conscious about it or thinking about it, but unfortunately, when you’re running an institution, you are creating a leadership structure,” said Laura Dunn, founder and executive director of SurvJustice, which advocates for sexual assault victims. “If you are a college president and you don’t realize sexual violence is a reality you could face, then you have no business being in that leadership position.” Mistakes, of course, happen. Constituencies are often willing to forgive if the president has proven attentive to a crisis and has built up a well of good will to draw upon. The flip side of the coin is that forgiveness might not materialize if a president comes off as tone-deaf or fumbling the situation. “I generally see communities willing to forgive,” said Brett Sokolow, president and CEO of NCHERM Group, a risk-management firm. “When there are multiple mistakes or the problems are systematic, then the community is more likely to ask why the president wasn’t aware of some of these issues.” A president saying they did not know about an event is not a good answer if they have failed to build a culture of reporting. People can sniff out lip service, Sokolow said. Sweeping under the rug reports of sexual misconduct or assault is a failed strategy, said Kevin Kruger, president of the NASPA Foundation, a group focused on student affairs. There is little gray area in how an institution is expected to respond, he said. “Managing these at the moment, at the time in which they occur, and managing them with the appropriate systems is clearly the best way to go to protect the victim,” he said. “Anything that would discourage someone from pursuing a complaint is just, in today’s climate, really a poor decision.” Sometimes, stepping down might be a final act of necessary leadership if a campus truly needs a new president in order to move on from past events. Still, it should also be noted that a president’s ouster is not a cure-all for issues -- structural or otherwise -- laid bare in cases involving sexual assault or harassment. When Seligman announced that he will step down from the University of Rochester presidency in the wake of the investigation into harassment allegations against professor T. Florian Jaeger, it did not stop faculty members from wrestling with the case. The University of Rochester’s Faculty Senate is weighing censuring Jaeger. Faculty members are also trying to decide how to respond to the university counsel’s office searching the email accounts of professors who were whistle-blowers and sharing those emails with the professors’ department chair. Read more by Rick Seltzer |
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| abb | Jan 25 2018, 04:57 AM Post #5 |
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https://www.lansingstatejournal.com/story/news/local/2018/01/24/msus-lou-anna-simon-resigns-hours-after-nassar-sentencing/1064186001/ 1 1 Michigan State President Lou Anna Simon resigns hours after Nassar sentencing Eric Lacy and Beth LeBlanc, Lansing State Journal Published 9:00 p.m. ET Jan. 24, 2018 | Updated 12:40 a.m. ET Jan. 25, 2018 EAST LANSING - Michigan State University President Lou Anna Simon resigned on Wednesday evening, confirming it in a letter addressed to MSU's Board of Trustees that was posted on MSU's website. "The last year and a half has been very difficult for the victims of Larry Nassar, for the university community, and for me personally," Simon said. "To the survivors, I can never say enough that I am so sorry that a trusted, renowned physician was really such an evil, evil person who inflicted such harm under the guise of medical treatment. I know that we all share the same resolve to do whatever it takes to avert such tragedies here and elsewhere." Simon's resignation came hours after the former MSU doctor was sentenced in Ingham County Circuit Court to 40 to 175 years in prison for sexual assault. At the sentencing hearing, 156 women and girls who said they were assaulted by Nassar gave victim-impact statements. "I urge those who have supported my work to understand that I cannot make it about me now," Simon wrote in her letter to the board. "Therefore, I am tendering my resignation as president according to the terms of my employment agreement." The university posted a statement from board Chairman Brian Breslin saying the trustees accepted Simon's resignation. Trustee Brian Mosallam said in a statement late Wednesday night that the university has "a long road ahead to repair the damage that has already been done." Mosallam said the respect and admiration he has for all of Nassar's victims who came forward "will stay with me the rest of my life." "Because of your example," he said, "I am faithful that we too, together, will be able to overcome this stain on our university." News of Simon's resignation was encouraging for Lindsey Lemke, a former MSU gymnast. She said in court last week that she was sexually assaulted by Nassar and that university officials, including Simon, could have prevented it. "Obviously, I think it is a great step in the healing process for all of the survivors," Lemke said Wednesday in a statement. "As a current student at MSU, I am excited and hopeful they will choose a fitting person for her position, one who cares about our stories and one who is willing to actually take the correct steps in handling the situation, something Simon could never do and never would have done." Former Lansing Mayor David Hollister, a friend of Simon's for over 30 years, said he's saddened by the news and the Nassar case and said Simon's resignation has "massive ramifications." “I think there will be a period of reflection and deep soul searching of what went wrong and how (MSU) might correct it," Hollister said. "They can never fix it, but they can address it." Hollister added MSU's leadership will remain under fire indefinitely because of the Nassar case, especially during this election year. "I think this whole question of the legitimacy of the trustees will be litigated politically," Hollister said. "People will challenge the incumbents, and I think it will be a very painful period. There are terrible costs associated with it.” Trustee Melanie Foster, asked about naming an interim president, said: “I think we need someone that can be instrumental in the healing process and a visionary for the future.” Foster said she wouldn't be surprised if Mark Murray, former Grand Valley State University president, is one of the names discussed at Friday's meeting as a potential candidate for interim president. "I'm not ready to speculate," said Foster, when asked for names of other potential candidates. "There are several names that have been circulated. On Friday, I'm anticipating we will form a board committee to expedite a search." Jennifer Granholm, Michigan's governor from 2003 to 2011, posted on Twitter that she knows Simon to be "a good person," but emphasized the resignation is what's best for MSU. "A fresh start with extreme clarity is in order," Granholm said. State House Speaker Tom Leonard said in a statement he's "glad Simon finally did the right thing." He called for Simon to step down on Dec. 11 and said state legislators should consider withholding funding from MSU because of officials' alleged role in the Nassar case. "The university's response to this crisis simply hasn't been good enough," Leonard said in a statement Wednesday night, "and I hope that changes going forward for the sake of both the victims and the entire Michigan State University community." Sue Carter, an MSU journalism professor, resigned Wednesday as the faculty athletic representative and chair of the university's Athletic Council because, she said, she disagreed with the university's "ineffective response" to the Nassar scandal. "Part of me feels relieved that we can finally have the opportunity to move forward and part of me feels sad because it involves people I have known and worked with for a long time," she said, describing Simon as a friendly colleague. "And yet the institution is much larger than all of us." As turmoil grew within MSU's ranks over the past week, several student groups became more outspoken about Simon. And many, including Associated Students of Michigan State University, MSU's student government, demanded her resignation. Lorenzo Santavicca, ASMSU's president, thanked Simon for her leadership and expressed hope for a fresh start that empowers and engages the student population. “One of the key roles is how to include the student voice in decisions moving forward," Santavicca said. Only four Michigan State University presidents served longer than Simon and perhaps only John Hannah has left a deeper mark on the institution. During her 13 years leading MSU, the university won a long-shot bid to design and build the $730 million Facility for Rare Isotope Beams and opened a new medical school campus in Grand Rapids. It built the Zaha Hadid-designed Eli & Edythe Broad Art Museum and research buildings dedicated to bioengineering, nursing and molecular plant sciences. It renovated residence halls and dining halls and remade its dining system top to bottom. Its enrollment crossed the 50,000-student mark, and its endowment crossed the $2 billion mark. There were missteps: A campus in Dubai that opened in 2008 and shut down most of its academic programs suddenly in 2010, a Title IX investigation that found the university had mishandled sexual assault complaints. And the fact that Larry Nassar was able to sexually assault patients on campus for years and that too few heeded the warning signs, or believed the victims, until it was too late. Simon was the first woman to lead MSU. |
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| abb | Jan 25 2018, 04:59 AM Post #6 |
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https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=10424 Male student sues Dartmouth over 'sexual misconduct' finding Sandor Farkas @sandor24601 on Jan 24, 2018 at 10:18 AM EDT A former Dartmouth College student is suing the school, alleging that administrators ignored overwhelming evidence and testimony from both parties in order to find him guilty of a Title IX violation. The male student alleges that he was severely intoxicated when a female student engaged in "sadomasochistic activities" with him, after which she reported him for injuries sustained during that episode. Although the female student freely acknowledged being the instigator, even reaching a mutual settlement with the male student, Dartmouth found the male student guilty of "putting another student at risk of physical harm." A January 12 lawsuit alleges that Dartmouth College expelled a male student based on a biased investigation that ignored both parties’ wishes, overwhelming evidence, college policy, and federal law. Lawyers for “John Doe,” an anonymous student at the New Hampshire Ivy League, are seeking a trial by jury in the United States District Court District of New Hampshire. The lawsuit calls on Dartmouth to reinstate Doe as a student, expunge his record, and award him compensatory damages. "Why could we not expel a student based on an allegation?" Tweet This The Encounters According to the lawsuit, Doe first met “Sally Smith,” an anonymous female Dartmouth student, over Dartmouth’s 2016 Sophomore Summer, and in late July, the pair “had a consensual sexual interaction.” During that episode, Smith told Doe that “she was interested in sadomasochistic (‘S&M’) sexual practices” and commenced “slapping him across the face.” On August 4, the two independently attended an evening party at Doe’s fraternity. Doe drank “approximately 36 ounces of a drink that was predominantly hard alcohol” within the span of one hour, and his last memory was throwing up into a trash can. He did not remember seeing Smith before he blacked out. When Doe woke up in his bed on August 5, he found Smith beside him and they “engaged in consensual sexual intercourse.” Smith then told Doe that “things had gotten a bit ‘rough’” during their “sexual encounter the previous night,” which Doe did not remember. The lawsuit argues that due to his conspicuous consumption off alcohol, Doe had “not been capable of consenting to sexual activity” with Smith. Following the conversation, Smith left the room and Doe fell asleep. When he awoke, he “noticed that he had bruises and scratches on his arms and back, that his nipple was bleeding, and that he was experiencing extreme pain in his genitalia.” Smith sent Doe a text later that day with pictures of her own bruises, stating that the previous night had been “fun.” When they talked that afternoon, she revealed that they had participated in “rough foreplay,” which included “slapping each other” and falling off the bed multiple times. She also admitted that Doe had asked her to leave multiple times during the encounter. Doe was disturbed by these revelations, while Smith “indicated she wanted to have sexual intercourse” with Doe, who turned her down. Smith then made a comment about “a friend of hers who had been falsely accused of sexual assault,” and said that if Doe agreed to sex, it would “help his ‘case.’” Doe held his ground and attempted to avoid her thereafter. The Investigation In October, Smith spoke to Heather Lindkvist, then Dartmouth’s former Title IX Coordinator, and “filed a complaint of physical assault against John Doe.” Smith made explicitly clear that the sexual encounter had been consensual (ignoring Doe’s intoxication), and that her complaint was limited to the bruises she received from the sadomasochistic activities. Lindkvist ignored this distinction and launched an investigation targeting Doe under Dartmouth’s procedures for handling sexual assault instead of the college’s Committee on Standards, the body responsible for handling offenses of a non-sexual nature. The college chose Nancy Sheahan, a former prosecutor and attorney specializing in government defense, to investigate Doe for “sexual misconduct” and “actions that could harm another student.” Doe then filed a complaint against Smith on November 2 for “assaulting him” and for “engaging in sexual acts with him…when he could not consent because he was incapacitated by alcohol.” Dartmouth instructed Sheahan to include these allegations in her investigation. Both Doe and Smith submitted photographic evidence of their injuries “showing bruises and in John’s case, scratches.” Smith submitted text messages with Doe and with her friends, which confirmed that she knew Doe was “super blacked” [severely drunk] at the time. Smith told Sheahan that she had “engaged in sexual acts” with Doe and “instigated a wrestling match” with him. She stated that she was “on top of John Doe during their entire encounter” and that Doe’s participation was due to his state of intoxication. Despite these admissions, she insisted that “this is not a nonconsensual sex case.” Her text messages to a friend the morning after the encounter confirmed that she was “so so in to” the “rough play” they had engaged in, and that she believed they had been “both fully consensual.” After receiving Sheahan’s final report in early January 2017, the pair reached an agreement that they would both drop their charges and Doe “would voluntarily stay off campus until she graduated.” When Doe’s lawyer shared this development with the college in February, however, Dartmouth refused to end the investigation. Dartmouth notified both students on March 3 that it had found Doe responsible for “putting another student at risk of physical harm,” but not for sexual misconduct, and had not found Smith responsible for any violations. The Sentencing Dartmouth’s Interim Director of Judicial Affairs, Katharine Strong, initially tried to convene a sexual misconduct disciplinary panel, contrary to the college’s procedure. After a reminder from Doe, she agreed to convene a Committee on Standards (COS) Misconduct Panel and asked Doe to submit a sanctioning statement. Both Doe and Smith submitted statements reminding the panel that they had come to a mutual settlement. Strong “stated that she would be creating a 1.5-page summary of the investigator’s 531-page investigation report” that would constitute the only evidence available to the panel. The abridged report did not contain the evidence showing that Smith had initiated the physical altercation and had told her friends that she enjoyed it. On March 29, Doe received notification from the college that the COS panel had imposed a sanction of “immediate separation” on him. Doe appealed both the investigator’s findings and the sanction on April 5, citing bias and procedural irregularities. Dean of the College Rebecca Biron heard the appeal on May 2 and upheld both decisions. The Aftermath The lawsuit claims that the procedure violated Dartmouth’s policy on COS hearings, which states that accused students are “entitled to request witnesses, to present information and argument, and to hear and question the information presented during a hearing.” While the policy also states that students are “expected to attend their own COS hearing,” the lawsuit alleges that Strong did not permit Doe or Smith to attend the hearing or present any type of statement to the members of the panel. Doe’s lawyers argue that this and other violations of Dartmouth’s own procedures constitute a breach of contract, and that the lack of a “preponderance of evidence” is a breach of federal policy. They also make the case that individuals involved in the process, particularly Biron, harbored “biased views against men accused of sexual assault,” citing an article Biron wrote in 2014, which equated a Dartmouth student found not guilty of rape to convicted murderer Oscar Pistorius. Samantha Harris, the Vice President of Policy Research at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), told Campus Reform that FIRE keeps track of lawsuits arising from university mishandling of sexual assault cases. FIRE currently knows of 210 such cases, many of which contain breach of contract allegations stemming from procedural discrepancies with written policy. Harris said that these cases have met with mixed outcomes, particularly when they allege sex discrimination, which is harder to prove than breach of contract. She pointed to a 2015 case at Washington and Lee University, in which the court found that a school official held a bias against the plaintiff based on an article arguing that even consensual sex constitutes sexual assault if the woman later comes to regret it due to internal reservations. FIRE, which rates colleges and universities on a number of metrics relating to individual rights, assigned Dartmouth a grade of “F” for its lack of due process in cases of sexual misconduct. The lawsuit points to a heated climate concerning issues of “violence against women and sexual misconduct,” arguing that the administration let this pressure overpower the facts of the case. A 2014 speech by Amanda Childress, the head of Dartmouth’s center for combating sexual violence, lends credence to this claim. “Why could we not expel a student based on an allegation?” she asked a conference on sexual assault. “It seems to me that we value fair and equitable processes more than we value the safety of our students. And higher education is not a right. Safety is a right. Higher education is a privilege.” Dartmouth College, the Dartmouth Title IX office, and Rebecca Biron all declined to comment. Nancy Sheahan and Doe’s lawyers did not respond to requests for comment. Follow the author of this article on Twitter: @SFarkas48 |
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| kbp | Jan 25 2018, 08:53 AM Post #7 |
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This article reads like it started out as a project to write about gender bias in search of any case that would allow it to grab headlines. . Edited by kbp, Jan 25 2018, 08:54 AM.
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