Men fight back against sex assault charges

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741

I was not focusing on his return to campus for his brothers graduation. However, I do think they could have given her notice that the University had approved his request to return . Although they only did so with the proviso that he remain with his parents for the event. I do not know why you are referencing “satisfy some activists’ wishes” – it was the victim that felt she should have been notified and given a chance to respond.

The dorm supervisor had to call the police as that is MSU’s policy once they become aware of sexual assault allegations. Hence the arrival of the “train” of police cars may have been something she had not yet prepared herself for.

742

I believe MSU did notify her…but she wanted them to turn his request down and she was upset that they didn’t ask her opinion. I like that some colleges in Michigan do call the police right away, but I don’t agree that it would take “multiple” police cars. Perhaps one officer in plainclothes would have been enough.

743

@HarvestMoon1, and what special knowledge or training does she have to decide what “should be” the appropriate police response? Are we now saying that not only are the police supposed to be more aggressive when faced with these situations, but that a teenager is going to be the arbiter on how they go about their job?

Had she done what I and others have suggested, gone to the police to report the incident, then I don’t see why she would need to be escorted from her dorm by uniformed officers, either. So I don’t really accept your premise.

744

It was only approximately 48 hours after the alleged assault and she was assessing her options @Ohiodad. She started with the dorm supervisor for some guidance. Is it too much to ask that she has a few days to collect her thoughts and perhaps consult with her parents and the school?

And I would ask you to think about how a young woman who is grappling with the reality that she may have been sexually assaulted would feel about being publicly escorted into a police car in full public view.

745

Since MSU will call the police then the kids need to know where they can turn confidentially and that should be drummed into their heads at orientation. She does have the right, in my opinion, to do nothing if she chooses. As most know I am in favor of mandatory reporting, but understand that some may not want to report and I think it’s important that students know who to call for immediately police assistance as well as who they can call for confidential help if they don’t want to report (at that time). Too many kids sleep through orientation. I’ve been on the campus enough to know that the police station is within walking distance of most students even the ones that live in the fringe non-campus housing f they want to walk in. The entire campus is walkable. In this woman’s case 48 hours was an important gap, perhaps her tox screen could have supported her accusation had it been done that morning when she woke up…it does make a difference when women wait.

746

@HarvestMoon1, there are obvious issues with a young woman reporting a sexual assault. I have never said there wasn’t. I also did not say I do not understand that this was a traumatic experience for her. What I said was, there is a problem when kids decide how the police should act, and that the campus tribunal system contributes to that sense. The greater this sense that the police “should” act in some way, the greater the chance, in my opinion, that we will see situations similar to what Emma claimed, that dealing with the police and prosecutor was “too tiring”.

I would ask you to consider that being a college student does not qualify someone to decide what is appropriate police procedure. I would also ask you to think about whether, no matter how understandable it is that a young woman may not report a sexual assault immediately, the delay in doing so makes the police’s ability to investigate and eventually prosecute harder. This problem is far more complex than many here wish it to be.

747

Well as an adult I also do not see what sending multiple police cars under those circumstances accomplishes. They were coming to take her statement after the University fulfilled their legal obligation to report. And I question whether this is established police procedure.

748

And you know this how?

749

See my post #730. It was not reported to them that there was an assault in progress.

750

So? Do you feel like you have some specialized knowledge or training that tells you what appropriate police procedure is in the case at hand, or what they were there to accomplish? Is it conceivable that it is not always the best option to have detectives (plain clothes) officers come out to take an initial statement? Wasn’t it your opinion earlier that the police should do campus wide broadcast messages asking about a potential use of a date rape drug? Wouldn’t it therefore be ok for them to come and interview other people in a dorm where a sexual assault was reported? Why would you just (assumedly) believe that the police are actively trying to embarrass her or are incompetent?

751

My original point, if you review my posts, was that this scenario illustrates exactly why women are reluctant to report. If I had prior knowledge that a squadron of police cars would pull up to my dorm and escort me out in full public view when I reported a rape, I would think twice as well. And I just do not see what purpose something like that serves. If you can discern some legitimate purpose to this, then enlighten me.

And I did not say that the police were actively trying to embarrass her – this case simply illustrates my belief that the way these cases are handled discourages women from reporting. A sentiment expressed throughout these threads.

752

Coming with a phalanx of cop cars is definite overkill unless the caller made it sound like an ongoing assault, which I do not think was the case.

753

And my original point, which is what I assume you are disagreeing with, since it is what you quoted, is that there is a problem with a teenager deciding what the police “should” do.

There is no information as to how many cars arrived. We know she called it “like a train”, which at least implies more than one or two, and that in her expert opinion, it should have been handled by a couple plain clothes officers. In my opinion, it is not terribly productive to imply more information than is present.

754

O.K. but a teenager did not as far as I know decide what the police “should” do. They did what they wanted. A teenager wrote a letter to the press about how she felt after it happened. And I and a few other posters could understand her point of view even as adults.

And I don’t mean to suggest it was purposeful on their part or that they were incompetent. I just think perhaps the system is not really geared to take this sort of thing into consideration. I think where we both agree is that the goal is getting more women to report. So if women are expressing that responses like what occurred in this case are not helpful in achieving that goal, could you not be persuaded that perhaps another approach might be more helpful?

755

I’m not entirely clear on why the police picked up Ashley at her dorm. There seems to be something missing from the chain of events – or maybe just bad journalism. This from the Detroit Free Press article which I believe is the same one posted by @harvestmoon. (I wasn’t able to open that link.)

http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2015/06/06/college-sexual-assault-broken-system/28628363/

The article mentions the “building director” and “staff member” but does not imply that anyone from the MSU’s Title IX office was involved at that point. So, who actually called the police? Are all “staff” required to report and does that automatically trigger a trip to the police station?

I thought that the OCR/DCL stipulates that accusers have the right NOT to report to the police. How does that square with mandatory reporting rules such as happens to be the case at MSU?

@harvestmoon, where did you see the information about the accused shopping for roofies? And @momofthreeboys, where did the water pong reference come from?

756

On the topic of respondents choosing to “stay silent” during college proceedings when there is a criminal investigation going on at the same time, this is an article about Auburn University’s proceedings against Joshua Strange.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303615304579157900127017212

Strange didn’t sue Auburn, but he and his mother have become advocates for men’s rights and Title IX violations. Ultimately Auburn expunged his record, even though he never filed a lawsuit. This is good news for Strange, but a contradiction on the college’s part. His transcript is clean, but the decision finding him responsible for sexual assault has not been reversed, he’s barred from the campus for life, and his Google trail will follow him forever.

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/student-accused-of-sexual-assault-like-being-at-the-bottom-of-this-pit/article/2561901

757

@HarvestMoon1, I must be being unclear, so I will be as specific as possible. I am directing all of my comments at a specific quote attributed to the accuser from the article you (I think) cited. That quote, in full, is

As I understand the sentence “It should have been a couple officers in plainclothes”, the accuser is stating that the initial police response was inappropriate. I am not sure how to interpret that sentence to mean anything else.

My premise is that this individual has either A) some background in law enforcement which allows her to judge how manpower is best allocated by a police department or B) a preconceived notion of how the police should respond when faced with an allegation of rape. My assumption is that since she is a college student, she has no such specialized background and that therefore option B, a preconceived notion of what is appropriate, is the reason for her criticism.

From this premise, I am positing two things.

One, that the college tribunal system as it is reported to be run feeds into this preconception of how the police are supposed to do their job. There are dozens of stories of the great lengths gone to by colleges to shield the accuser from stress in the tribunal system (sitting behind a curtain so they don’t have to see the accused, the accused not being allowed to speak, witnesses testimony not being read, etc) which simply will not work and can not apply in any law enforcement proceeding subject to our constitutional system.

Two, that this preconception of what is or is not appropriate behavior by the police makes it more difficult for women to report violent crime to law enforcement. In other words, that an assumption that the police operate like Women’s Studies department members, or Sexual Assault advocates makes an already difficult situation worse.

I am not, nor have I ever, done the following:

  1. Try and determine how many police vehicles were involved based on her quote that it was “like a train”

  2. Assumed that the words “all kinds of people” referred specifically to law enforcement officers

  3. Stated that there were not issues inherent with a woman, especially a young woman, reporting an allegation of sexual assault.

It appears to me that you have not addressed any of the points I have raised, but instead seem to be proceeding from the assumption that I want to argue that there are no special challenges inherent in a woman reporting an alleged rape. I am not prepared to either take or defend that position.

758

@Ohiodad51: I think you are overlooking option C, which I think is really what she means: that officers in plainclothes would have made her feel better. She’s not assigning police norms based on her conception of a proper investigation, she’s assigning norms based on her emotional state. “It should have been a couple of officers in plainclothes” really means “I would have preferred a couple of officers in plainclothes,” probably due to less of a spectacle. I have no idea, and I similarly doubt she does, the extent to which her preferences coincide with police best practices.

759

@demosthenes49, I do think I understand that the accuser would have been more comfortable with a lower key initial response. I think the emotional state of the accuser is a large part of why these types of investigations are difficult to deal with, no matter what procedures are put in place.

My point is really that I am concerned that a false expectation of what the police “should” do makes the entire process much harder. If you take a look at the two articles that have been cited about this particular accuser, it seems clear that she is in an emotional state where she has some pretty fixed ideas of how the process (both on campus and in the courts) is supposed to work, and more fundamentally, an assumption that the legal system is designed to benefit the accuser.

I happen to think that the best way forward to make reporting sexual assaults to the police less traumatic is educating the accusers in what they should be prepared to expect, as well as educating police in how to handle accusers in this realm. In my opinion, talking about surveys like the LAPD survey where cops are called out for not “enlisting the victim as an ally” or other things that are more likely to occur on campus than in a police station are counterproductive to that goal.

760

@Ohiodad51, "enlisting the victim as an ally"works. :slight_smile:

Have you read “Missoula”?