Monthly Archives: April 2020

JURY AWARDS $100,000 To Male Who Boston College Punished For A Different Student’s Assault

, , , /

JURY AWARDS $100,000 To Male Who Boston College Punished For A Different Student’s Assault

Last month, a jury awarded former Boston College student John Doe $100,000 for how the college mishandled sexual assault allegations against him. The case, Doe v. Trustees of Boston College, is the first of its kind to reach a jury since 2011, when Obama-era rules began to govern campus sexual misconduct claims. It joins a long line of other such cases claiming that Title IX offices are breaking the law.

What Happened in the John Doe Case?

In court, Doe claimed the school ignored his claim that JK was the real offender. And the jury agreed, awarding Doe lost income for one year and a semester’s tuition.

Boston College Ignored Evidence and Due Process

Three aspects of Boston College’s malfeasance stand out. First, the college failed to observe basic due process, in particular by neglecting to take seriously exonerating evidence. Second, the porous Title IX processes at Boston College fail to protect against malicious or false accusations. Third, and the most significant is not legal but moral. Boston College appeared to have complete disregard, perhaps malicious disregard, for the wrongful treatment of one of its own innocent students.

Wrongful accusations, wrongful convictions, and wrongful incarcerations are among the most monstrous indictments of any legal system, since they represent the full power of the state used — abused — against an individual, who is by definition a weaker party. When deliberate abuse of power against the weak happens, it should be universally condemned and duly punished. In this case, Boston College appeared simply not to care about the truth.

Without a recognized, objective moral order, a justice system itself makes little sense, other than as a show where the powerful pretend to follow rules while railroading the little guy. Is that what Title IX has become?

thefederalist-T. Manning insidehighered-Bauer-Wolf

Original post 11/2019. Re-posted 4/2020

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
9TH CIRCUIT Amends Title IX Liability Considerations

, , , /

9TH CIRCUIT Amends Title IX Liability Considerations

A panel of appeals court judges amended a previous opinion on the liability of colleges and universities for “pre-assault claims,” or the argument that inadequate Title IX policies created a “heightened risk” of sexual misconduct. The judges changed the language in their ruling to be more specific and in line with past United States Supreme Court opinions.

The panel’s decision sent a lawsuit against the University of California system’s Board of Regents back to district court to be heard with regard to this test. The lawsuit was filed by a former University of California, Berkeley, student. But after a lawyer for the regents wrote a petition for the case to be reheard in the Ninth Circuit, the court amended the language of the test, clarifying that the “heightened risk of sexual harassment” must be “known or obvious” to the institution, and as a result, the complainant must have suffered harassment “so severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive” that they were deprived “access to the educational opportunities or benefits provided by the school.”

insidehighered-Anderson

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
BAD RULING. Male Sues Over Expulsion For Alleged TitleIX Violation. Will Not Be Reinstated

, , /

BAD RULING. Male Sues Over Expulsion For Alleged TitleIX Violation. Will Not Be Reinstated

A student suing the University after he was expelled earlier this term over Title IX violations will not be able to finish the academic year, a federal court ruled. John Doe, sued the University on April 15, asserting that Princeton had violated Title IX, by expelling him for alleged violations of the University’s “Intimate Partner Violence” policy.  On the same day, Doe filed a motion for a temporary restraining order (TRO). The TRO sought to prevent the University from enforcing, while Doe’s lawsuit is pending, its decisions to expel him and prohibit him from attending class and sitting for exams. In an opinion published on April 21, Judge Brian Martinotti agreed with the University, ruling that Doe is unlikely to succeed in his claims against Princeton. 

According to the opinion, the lawsuit arose after Princeton’s Title IX Office investigated allegations of intimate partner violence brought against Doe by his ex-girlfriend, Jane Roe. In his ruling, Martinotti rejected Doe’s argument that the University had likely been motivated by gender bias. The judge ruled that Doe’s “conclusory allegations of gender bias” did not include “specific instances of gender bias” such as “statements by members of the disciplinary tribunal, statements by pertinent university officials,” or “patterns of decision-making that also tend to show the influence of gender.” 

Instead, the court concluded that Doe had attempted to demonstrate gender bias by “pointing to the alleged disparate treatment he and Jane received throughout the investigation” and “the fact that Jane was given credibility for her version of the events while he was not.” But Doe’s allegations fell short because they did not claim that Jane’s gender was the basis for these differences, the court ruled. The court also rejected Doe’s arguments that Princeton was holding men to a different standard than women. Martinotti explained that to successfully make such a claim, a “male plaintiff must demonstrate that a female was in circumstances sufficiently similar to his own and was treated more favorably by the university.”

The Court also concluded that Doe would not suffer irreparable harms — an element of the high legal standard required of a plaintiff seeking a temporary injunction — as a result of his expulsion remaining in place while his suit against the University proceeds. Doe’s legal team asked the Court to “provisionally reinstate” him by allowing him to watch recorded classes, sit for spring exams, and have those exams graded and sealed, to be opened should he prevail in his suit. But the court rejected this request, too, ruling that because Doe’s claims will likely take months to completely resolve, he would still suffer the harm—a gap in his resume—whether or not he is provisionally reinstated. Yet, according to an April 21 letter to the judge by Princeton’s counsel,  the University confirmed it is able “to take steps” to preserve existing and future recordings of John Doe’s lectures from this semester “for the pendency of this litigation.” As a result of the ruling, Doe’s expulsion will remain in place as he litigates his claims against the University.

dailyprincetonian-Sheinerman

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
RULING For The Innocent Little Guy. A David & Goliath Story. Judge Slams UMich Policy Over Lack Of Due Process

, , , , /

RULING For The Innocent Little Guy. A David & Goliath Story. Judge Slams UMich Policy Over Lack Of Due Process

When you can make sexual assault allegations with no possibility of being challenged, why wouldn’t you? After a stinging court ruling last month that ordered the University of Michigan to allow cross-examination and a “live hearing,” the female who accused John Doe of sexual misconduct has dropped out rather than face scrutiny.

UMich had appealed the district court ruling to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals shortly after it came down. Deborah Gordon, the accused student’s lawyer, told the 6th Circuit in a filing recently that the appeal was moot because UMich was dropping the Title IX proceeding. “This case should never have been necessary,” Gordon said, noting that UMich’s Title IX policy was found to be in violation of pre-existing 6th Circuit precedent. 

Gordon accused the university of sowing “chaos” by suddenly scheduling a hearing in Doe’s case for April 22, right before a week of final exams started. He had already relocated to California following the COVID-19 closure of campus, and both parties were set to graduate in May. UMich pushed back when he asked for rescheduling after exams, making “several false representations” as to why it couldn’t postpone the hearing, Gordon claimed.

A day ahead of a court hearing on John’s emergency motion to postpone his Title IX proceeding, UMich “revealed the true reason” for the rush: It wanted to hold his degree. Less than an hour before its brief was due with the court, UMich’s Title IX coordinator emailed Gordon to notify her the proceeding would be “permanently closed.” John’s accuser informed the university that she “no longer wants to proceed or participate in the investigative resolution process.” Gordon disputed that the hearing depended on the accuser’s participation, which is not required by university policy: “It was solely the decision of the University – not the student– to close the entire process with no finding.”

Gordon told the 6th Circuit that public records requests show the university has spent $1.2 million so far on lawyers just in this case, which is nearly twice as much as it had spent as of last summer. Brooklyn College Prof. KC Johnson, who chronicles Title IX litigation, speculated that the university was appealing in spite of the canceled proceeding so it wouldn’t have to pay Gordon attorney’s fees.

thecollegefix.com-Piper  campusreform.org-McInturff

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
INNOCENT. Alex Heineman Was Cleared Of Rape. Judge Apologized. Girl Lied. So Why Is Alex Being Threatened/Attacked?

, , , /

INNOCENT. Alex Heineman Was Cleared Of Rape. Judge Apologized. Girl Lied. So Why Is Alex Being Threatened/Attacked?

When Alex Heineman was 16 years old, he stole off into the woods behind the Hudson YMCA with Sierrah Parmeter, a girl he liked.

Alex had learning disabilities, his home was a disaster. His mother had him young. His biological father was a nonfactor, but his stepfather hated the sight of him. Sierrah was another poor kid from a broken home, born to a meth-addicted mother who abandoned her in infancy. They were similar that way, and shared an on-again, off-again attraction… Discreetly, they followed the bike path through the woods. They kissed. He left a conspicuous hickey on her neck. Then they returned to the YMCA and parted ways. Forty minutes later, the girl’s biological father told police that his daughter had been assaulted.

Alex was soon charged with second-degree sexual assault, a felony punishable by 20 years in prison. Alex’s mother urged him to follow his public defender’s advice to plead guilty to a lesser charge of third-degree sexual assault. Alex’s conviction triggered a cascade of collateral consequences that derailed his life. “I felt horrible about that,” she says now. “Maybe we should have done more. Maybe we could have done something different.” Alex dropped out of school, registered as a sex offender, and was ordered to undergo treatment.  He made no progress in treatment. In the world of correctional therapy, an unrepentant sex offender lacks the self-awareness required for reform—a Catch 22 for the wrongfully convicted.  No one believed him when he protested his innocence. Once separated from family, he deteriorated rapidly. 

…”I was like, ‘Screw this, no one cares about me.’ Alex fought with other inmates and tried to kill himself half a dozen times. On his 18th birthday, Alex was released to a halfway house. His roommates were grown men in their 30s who scared him. 

…In June 2019, a woman who volunteered as a mentor for disadvantaged youth called the Hudson Police Department to report 18-year-old Sierrah Parmeter might have falsely accused Alex Heineman of rape. According to police reports, Sierrah told the mentor she had sex with a boy who wasn’t her boyfriend, so she was planning to accuse him of rape in order to save her relationship. The mentor thought of the Hudson incident two years prior and asked Sierrah if it had really happened as she claimed. Sierrah admitted it wasn’t a true story. The mentor then informed Sierrah’s grandmother. The grandmother consulted Sierrah’s social worker about what to do. The social worker said let it “lie.” The mentor could not.

Hudson Police interviewed Sierrah Parmeter. According to the report, she said she and Alex had been planning to have sex when they went for a walk in the woods on May 5, 2017. They made out. He started giving her a hickey, and at one point stuck his hand down her pants. She told him to stop, so he did and walked away. She said he never pushed her.

The following month, the St. Croix County District Attorney’s Office moved to vacate Alex Heineman’s sexual assault conviction due to actual innocence. Circuit Court Judge Scott Needham apologized. At last, Alex Heineman was scrubbed from the sex offender registry. It didn’t matter that he’d been cleared in court. In Hudson, Alex couldn’t shake the reputation of a sex offender. The town became a prison. People called him from blocked numbers and sent him hate mail from fake Facebook accounts. He deleted his social media. Still strangers came to the door. “Alex was treated terribly by obviously people in the public and frankly by law enforcement officers,” Hudson Police Sgt. Glen Hartman says. 

While the local news broadcast his charges, no one ever bothered to report his exoneration. Exoneration alone cannot fix all the harm that stems from miscarriage of justice. The consequences—social ostracism, job loss, public housing denial—are virtually infinite. Judges are often willing to clear a record if the district attorney agrees to it.  But prosecutors are all different. 

In March, Sierrah Parmeter was charged with two counts of misdemeanor defamation and one count of obstructing an officer. Alex Heineman, now considered the victim, was invited to attend her first hearing. He brought his mother to help manage the anxiety.  “Imagine you have a bear in front of you. Your whole body’s shaking and you can’t move. You can’t even look at the person. All that fear comes down your body. That’s what it felt like,” Alex recalls.

“If she hadn’t lied, I never would have had to go through any of this. I could have had a normal life. I could have been in college by now. I haven’t even graduated high school because I’ve been in the system so long. Alex gets rejected everywhere he applies for work. College is an illusory dream. His best shot is to get a GED and learn a trade. But it’s hard to feel motivated to do anything in a world full of closed doors.

citypages.com-Susan Du

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
OLIVIA LECLERC Claimed She Was Drugged At UNH. She Then Admitted To Police She Forged The Report.

, /

OLIVIA LECLERC Claimed She Was Drugged At UNH. She Then Admitted To Police She Forged The Report.

Olivia LeClerc has been arrested for filing a false report to law enforcement after she claimed she was drugged during an off-campus fraternity event at the University of New Hampshire.

In New Hampshire, 20-year-old Olivia LeClerc told police she was drugged. Durham Deputy Police Chief Rene Kelley said police found no evidence that would suggest anyone at the Kappa Sigma social drank a common-source beverage spiked with Xanax. Kelley said that the police department “put a lot of time and effort into this case which took my officers and detectives away from other cases that they were working on.” Adding: “To put forth the effort we did only to find that this never happened is troubling.”

LeClerc is accused of presenting police with a drug test which showed she had benzodiazepines (Xanax) in her system after a social at Kappa Sigma.  Later she recanted her story police said, admitting that she had forged the document. LeClerc was arrested for filing a false report to law enforcement, and will be arraigned on May 13.

unionleader.com-Haas  dailywire.com-Schow

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
PACE UNIVERSITY Sued By Male. Claims School Did Not Stop His Ex From Making Bogus Rape Accusations

, , /

PACE UNIVERSITY Sued By Male. Claims School Did Not Stop His Ex From Making Bogus Rape Accusations

A Pace University freshman was wrongly arrested in front of his classmates — largely because college admins didn’t do anything to stop his ex-girlfriend from making false rape claims against him, a new lawsuit alleges.

Ari Grossman and his ex got into the school’s acting program in 2016. Shortly afterward, Grossman’s ex, whom he had dated for several months when they were 15 – had her parents call him “threatening” to press rape charges if he attended. He decided to attend Pace despite the alleged threats — which she wound up honoring. A prosecutor in their native Southern California declined to pursue the woman’s criminal case. She then went for a temporary restraining order. The exes wound up settling and “mutually agreed to have no contact with each other” or talk about the case.

By the time they arrived at Pace in fall 2016, things changed. The female got college admins to issue a university “no contact order” against him — all the while telling classmates in their tight-knit acting program that Grossman, now 19, was a rapist. She continued to lie and made numerous bogus reports that he violated Pace’s restraining order against him.

nydailynews.com-Bekiempis

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
COVID-19 MUST Not Delay Enactment of New Title IX Regulations

, , /

COVID-19 MUST Not Delay Enactment of New Title IX Regulations

Sixteen months ago, the Department of Education proposed Title IX regulations that take seriously the rights of both victims and the accused in campus sexual misconduct proceedings.

Since then, the department has reviewed more than 100,000 public comments on those regulations, incorporating feedback from diverse stakeholders.

Despite this opportunity for robust public comment, opponents of these regulations have made clear from day one that they will do everything they can to ensure they are never enacted — including, recently, sending four letters asking the department to defer the rulemaking until after the COVID-19 crisis has passed.

The department must not give in to these opportunistic and disingenuous efforts to thwart regulations that would bring desperately needed balance to campus sexual misconduct adjudications.

insidesources.com– Hamill and Harris

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
THE MEDIA Had a Formula for Reporting Sexual Misconduct. Then Joe Biden Was Accused.

, , , /

THE MEDIA Had a Formula for Reporting Sexual Misconduct. Then Joe Biden Was Accused.

For nearly three weeks after it surfaced, Tara Reade’s sexual assault allegation against Joe Biden was ignored or downplayed in the media. An analysis shows that she’s been covered unlike any other accuser in the #Me Too era…

A Deafening Silence

The mainstream media silence around Reade was abruptly broken on Sunday, when the New York Times reported on her allegation, leading to a flood of stories from other mainstream outlets.

The Standard Last Year

MSNBC’s silence particularly stands out…It’s difficult to comport the lack of Reade’s coverage with how the stories of other accusers of powerful men have been treated in the media.

The NY Times Weighs In

The treatment of Reade’s story by the New York Times, the first major paper to even acknowledge the existence of Reade or her allegation, is particularly difficult to square with its coverage of other accusers.

Doubt From Unexpected Quarters

While most outlets chose to simply ignore Reade, others took a different tack: playing down or even attempting to discredit her allegation. In an added twist, it’s some of the most vocal forums of liberal feminism who took on this task.

The Wages of Silence

It’s fair to say that Tara Reade has been treated unlike any high-profile accuser of the past three years. While previous accusers of powerful men were widely covered in mainstream print, digital, and TV media, only a handful of outlets trickled out stories on Reade’s allegation. While widespread coverage greeted past accusers almost instantly, it has taken nearly three weeks for Reade’s mere existence to be acknowledged by a single major newspaper. jacobinmag.com-Marcetic 

More Articles:

Joe Biden’s Double Standard city-journal.org-KC Johnson

The Media Floodgates Finally Open On Biden Sexual Assault Allegation  vanityfair.com-Ecarma

Joe Biden Sexual Assault Accuser Tara Reade Files Criminal Complaint newsweek.com-Palmer

Why Are the Mainstream Media Ignoring Tara Reade’s Sexual Assault Accusation Against Joe Biden? reason.com-Soave

Share this:Tweet about this on Twitter
1 2 3