@dstark, I agree I should try not to quote editorial or opinion pieces from pro-male sites, as it seems to be counter-productive on CC. But I don’t know of a better source for the actual complaints. I haven’t seen a hearing transcript in any other context.
I understand that the complaints are written from the plaintiffs’ point of view and that the language can be exaggerated. That’s why we have to wait for the outcomes to know what the judge, who will have heard both sides, rules. In the meantime these complaints though dealing with different specifics give an overview of the types of issues that accuseds are facing with college Title IX hearings. Some may be left-fleld exceptions, but the over-arching and much repeated threads run through all of them.
@momrath, I like reading the links you provide. I appreciate reading about the cases. I like reading the complaints. I wish there was even more info out there so we could read both sides of a case. So thanks. Really.
By the way, your sites aren’t pro male. Males are victims of assault too. Many of your ideas would screw male victims too.
Can it possibly be that we mostly agree here? Oh, horrors
Sounds like most people agree
(1) colleges should continue to handle sexual assault cases, of course urging accusers to report their accusations to police
(2) for cases involving possible expulsion (or suspension?) students should be able to have lawyers, and the lawyers should be allowed to question witnesses
(3) the standard of proof should be “clear and convincing”
(4) that new study from Canada looks promising. Other colleges should seriously consider adopting a similar program.
I honestly think, though, that the most improvement which can be made would lie in rape prevention and treatment, and education. We can optimize the judicial process by removing a lot of the inefficiencies and social stigmas holding back these investigations, but then you hit the wall that, quite frankly, the majority of sexual assaults are probably impossible to prove, and barring some major advancement in forensics we’re never going to get the conviction rate as high as we want to get it, not while maintaining a reasonable degree of due process.
@“Cardinal Fang” , I can see what you’re trying to reason out, but it’s hard to group by penalty or by charge as these vary so widely from college to college and state to state. We’ve seen cases where the student found responsible was suspended for multiple years or in which diplomas were withheld for multiple years. These penalties are to me as problematic as expulsion, especially under preponderance-of-evidence and in murky cases.
My thinking is that I would like the accused to have hands-on lawyers if the charge is one that would give them significant prison time were they convicted by a court of law.
CF - Not to argue for the sake of arguing, but although I like what you wrote I’m not 100% on board. Here’s what I think (I’m only talking about cases involving expulsion here):
A. What process do I think is best if my sole goal is finding the truth and I’m in a world where time and money aren’t very constrained? It would be one with civil court-lite procedures; i.e. have lawyers who can participate, cross-examine, introduce evidence to impartial, professionally qualified judges who are not college employees with an inherent conflict of interest (certainly not a bunch of college administrators / faculty). But use preponderance of the evidence as the proof standard, not clear and convincing. There’s enough other due process to ensure a just outcome even with expulsion at stake, and the accuser still bears the burden.
B. What process do I think is the best pragmatic solution given that colleges have limited resources, are rank amateurs at this, and all this has to take place in a residential living environment? I’d use a clear and convincing standard, allow attorneys as advisers only but give students the right to introduce evidence and limited but sufficient ability to cross examine. Keep college panels. I’d also use mediation for a lot of the cases - for these gray area cases it seems to me that the women actually have better outcomes with mediation and are better able to continue their college careers successfully.
If I were king I’d institute process B. If DCL is in effect, I’m picking A.
And I agree that we should work harder on prevention rather than adjudication.
@momrath, did you read the BC complaint? Assuming John’s complaint is true, if BC followed title ix, OCR and BC’s own rules and regulations, BC would have found John not responsible.
This was a BC problem. This wasn’t a title ix, OCR, Dear Colleague letter problem. BC ignored its own rules.
What are some examples of cases where you think mediation would be the right solution? The Occidental case is one-- the accuser according to all accounts “consented” at the time, and subsequently said she was too drunk to consent. That case didn’t end well for anybody. What other kinds of cases would you think of?
But I’d be reluctant-- in fact, refuse-- to use mediation in any case where penetration occurred and she alleges that she explicitly said no, pushed him away, or was physically unable to indicate lack of consent.
Edited to add: I’m having trouble figuring out which cases would merit expulsion for which mediation would be a solution. I don’t think those are the same cases. But maybe that’s what you meant too.
Of course you’d only use mediation if both parties agreed to it; moreover, both parties have to be happy (enough) with the outcome.
Like you said, the Occidental case is a good example - and the guy was expelled in that case. The Yale case that was referenced several months ago is another. Basically, the prototypical case I’d try to use it for is one where both people agree they both willingly and actively participated at the time, but later there’s a dispute over which side of the intoxicated / incapacitated line someone was. I believe expulsion is almost always on the table if it’s determined that the accuser was incapacitated.
Also, in the Occidental case I believe the girl ended up dropping out despite “winning”. In the Yale case the girl also ended up leaving school, though she may have returned. Frankly, I’d love to see statistics about what processes resulted in the best long-term outcome for the women. I have a suspicion that women are ending up with worse long-term outcomes despite all the changes that have been made that are supposedly designed to help them. But that’s a pure guess.
Another related question is - when should suspension be the penalty?
For sexual assaults not involving penetration. For cases like the Occidental case, when it is determined that the accuser was incapacitated but seemingly willing participated, if one of the people refuses mediation.
@momrath, so here I am complaining about the one sided links and there is a transcript of the Amherst case in one of the links. Great.
I read the transcript. John did not have a defense. Look at his closing statement along with the rest of the transcript. John doesn’t have a clue what happened. John put himself into a defenseless position.
We can’t see all the written evidence which kind of sucks.
I don’t think colleges should “urge” kids to contact the police, I think the colleges should be required to report. If a college suspends or expels a student prior to any kind of investigation or evidential hearing the money sunk costs ought to be escrowed pending the outcome. I’d probably do exactly what the parents did in the BU case and for all the counts the lawyers are pursing. Breach of contract and negligence. Accusers need to understand that an accusation is a very serious charge and families need to feel that colleges and universities are going to approach this in a fair and equitable manner.
It would have been very easy for BC to reverse the suspension, use escrowed dollars against future tuition, apologize, clean up the kids record and welcome the kid and the alumni parents back to the BC family. But BC didn’t so we’ll see what the court rules on.
This is an excellent plan. Excellent for rapists, I mean, and excellent for mothers of boys. Most women who were raped won’t want to report to the police, so that will drive reports way down. And then the brave women who do report are overwhelmingly likely to be blown off by the justice system, because of all rapes reported to police, only a small fraction (considerably less than 10%) result in prison time for anyone. So most rapists will go free!
I’m the mother of a son and no daughters. So I should be in favor of this plan. Somehow I can’t warm up to it, though.
re: 1574. If our criminal justice system is not working in a fair and equitable manner then that is a problem with the judicial system and should have no bearing on colleges and universities - there should be no obligation for colleges and universities to rectify perceived deficiencies in the criminal justice system. I do not care if “women choose not to report”…that is their decision, but I do not feel obligated as a citizen of this country to rectify their lack of desire to have their accusation scrutinized through a less rigorous avenue simply “because” it seems more convenient or less rigorous.
“(4) that new study from Canada looks promising. Other colleges should seriously consider adopting a similar program.”
Yes. And in order to achieve that, we need to stop labeling all victim-side harm reduction tactics as victim-blaming. There’s a world of difference between “You’re just asking for it with that short skirt” and “Here’s the best way to kick a rapist in the nuts.”
I see a parallel to another controversial harm reduction technique: needle exchange programs. Yeah, ideally, people should stop using heroin, just like rapists should stop raping. That would be the best outcome and bring harm down to zero. In the meantime, people keep shooting heroin and people keep raping, and we have to live in the same world with them. If we can stop the spread of AIDS or foil some attempted rapes, then we should.
I agree with @momofthreeboys. By circumventing our legal system and setting up a parallel administrative system, we now have two problems instead of one.
