ACLU Sells Out

[Bob001]

If my college student suffers sexual violence why in the hell would I want the university to investigate it under Title IX? I would want the police to investigate it under the criminal statutes of that jurisdiction. If the school also wants to hand out discipline, they should defer to the police investigation.

There are a lot of well-documented reasons why many -- maybe a majority -- of women don't report sexual assault to the police. And what happens if a police investigation reveals that whatever happened doesn't merit criminal prosecution? That doesn't mean that nothing happened, or that a student shouldn't be punished for violating the college's own rules of conduct.

And "sexual assault" doesn't have to mean rape at gunpoint in an alley. There are many levels of sexual misconduct, and on a college campus a lot of them involve abuse of alcohol by all parties. Administrative proceedings might be more appropriate than local law enforcement.

 

[Giordano]

Well, you know their actual position, because they released a statement via twitter which is what they do nowadays.

But you want to wait to post more about it when you learn more details.

Cool, cool, oddly enough that didn't stop you from posting already, but I look forward to your regaling us with "details."

So all of their position statements on their websites, their briefs submitted in court cases, their arguments in court, etc. will now be limited to 140 characters? Cool! That will really speed up the justice system!

More generally I will mention that I do not appreciate the belittling tone of your posts. In fact the tone of your posts has made me far less inclined to participate in many threads at this Forum. Primarily I see it as a distraction from the actual topics. But further I don't feel any obligation to subject myself to this type of thing. So although I gather it works for you I will await a more polite and fact-filled part of this thread with which to engage. And maybe surprisingly to you, I would be pleased if you are there participating in that context.

 

[lomiller]

Sure. The regulations themselves. I'm not sure what further evidence you think is necessary.

You made the assertion that the regulations don’t inappropriately favor the accuses. Do you have anything to support this claim or not?

 

[The Big Dog]

So all of their position statements on their websites, their briefs submitted in court cases, their arguments in court, etc. will now be limited to 140 characters? Cool! That will really speed up the justice system!

Rule of So right out of the box. Oh man, that is the good stuff.

By the way, the word limit on tweets is now 250 words AND the ACLU strung several of them together.

More generally I will note that your repeated statement that the ACLU's statement is not their actual position because you would prefer to have more details is specious.

Thanks for posting.

 

[Giordano]

I think the situation is not simple. I believe that accusations of violence or crimes of any kind should be handled by the court system and the police, and required to meet the standards laid out in the criminal justice system, with all the associated protections for the accused and the accuser. No one should be punished or have their reputation destroyed by implementation of any lesser standards.

Yet in a University setting one might easily have a situation where the person who believes they are the victim of an assault will find themselves seated a few desks away from the person they see as their attacker. Day after day. Or sleeping in the next dorm room down the hall. Or seeing their accused assaulter walking past them in the quad twice a day. I believe that some accommodations have to be made to recognize these concerns prior to any official judgement as to guilt or innocence.

Complicated? Yes. Hard to make it fair and just for everyone? Certainly, to do so requires a lot of smarts, understanding, and some compromise, with the best solution probably varying with each circumstance.

Probably too complex to solve with a single tweet. Or even a series.

 

[The Big Dog]

By the way, also hilarious is the contention that challenging the ACLU's assertion that the regs "inappropriately favoring the accused" is a right wing nut bar position fills me with pure joy.

Gideon, Miranda, also right wing nut bar positions I reckon!

 

[casebro]

"apply basic due process protections for students, including a presumption of innocence throughout the grievance process; written notice of allegations and an equal opportunity to review all evidence collected; and the right to cross-examination"

The ACLU claims that these basic principles of due process "inappropriately" favor the accused.

Unbelievable.

Cite please?

 

[crescent]

I think the situation is not simple. I believe that accusations of violence or crimes of any kind should be handled by the court system and the police, and required to meet the standards laid out in the criminal justice system, with all the associated protections for the accused and the accuser. No one should be punished or have their reputation destroyed by implementation of any lesser standards.

Court system yest - police, not necessarily.

Civil courts hand out punishments all the time with no police involvement. Fines for millions, hundreds of millions, of even billions (Cobell. v Salazar) of dollars go through the civil court system all the time, no police. People get fired, evicted, lose custody of children, assets forfeited, - all with no police and more or less "lower" standards of proof.

The Universities absolutely ought to be able to do the same. Expelling a student, removing a student from housing, rejiggering a student's schedule to avoid contact with a person victimized by that student - all that is equivalent to things that are routinely handled through civil court with no police involvement required, without the "reasonable doubt" standard applied.

 

[The Big Dog]

Cite please?

it is in the link in the op....

 

[PhantomWolf]

Court system yest - police, not necessarily.

The situation is that a crime is being reported, the only thing that the schools should be allowed to do is call the police and then support the claimant if he or she asks for that support during the police interview process. As a society we have established law enforcement and justice systems to deal with criminal behaviour. Schools have no place in trying to replace them.

 

[The Big Dog]

Full disclosure: Title IX applies to sexual harassment which has been included within the definition of sexual discrimination.

As such, we are not necessarily talking about accusations covered by the criminal law.

 

[Ziggurat]

The Universities absolutely ought to be able to do the same. Expelling a student, removing a student from housing, rejiggering a student's schedule to avoid contact with a person victimized by that student - all that is equivalent to things that are routinely handled through civil court with no police involvement required, without the "reasonable doubt" standard applied.

And guess what? They can! The new standards don't require schools to use "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard. In fact, under the new rules schools can choose between the "preponderance of evidence" standard that the Obama administration rules required and the "clear and convincing" standard, which is a higher burden. But both these standards are more relaxed than "beyond a reasonable doubt". The only restriction on using the lower "preponderance of evidence" standard is that schools can't use this standard only for students and they can't use it only for sexual harassment/assault claims.

But what schools ought not to be able to do but were sometimes doing anyways, and which civil courts do not do, is stuff like deny the accused the right to council, deny the opportunity for cross-examination of the accuser, and run a "single investigator" system where essentially the school's prosecutor is also the judge.

 

[crescent]

The situation is that a crime is being reported, the only thing that the schools should be allowed to do is call the police and then support the claimant if he or she asks for that support during the police interview process. As a society we have established law enforcement and justice systems to deal with criminal behaviour. Schools have no place in trying to replace them.

In many cases, the schools are the police - Universities often have their own police departments.

Civil court action can occur in addition to criminal court action. It does not need to be a question of either criminal or civil, it can be both.

So use the University Police Department to look into the allegations, if the allegations are of criminal activity. If the evidence is not strong enough to support criminal charges, or if the allegations are not criminal, use civil court. Even if it does go to criminal court, civil action can still be used to expel the or rehouse the suspect.

And, much like the broken clock, TBD brings up a good point about Title IX including non-criminal infractions such as harassment.

 

[Beeyon]

Does the ACLU support Blackstone's formulation: "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer"?

I mean this as a serious question. I previously assumed that this would be organizational dogma for the ACLU, but a quick google search doesn't seem to produce anything supporting that assumption.

 

[Lambchops]

Rule of So right out of the box. Oh man, that is the good stuff.

By the way, the word limit on tweets is now 250 words AND the ACLU strung several of them together.

More generally I will note that your repeated statement that the ACLU's statement is not their actual position because you would prefer to have more details is specious.

Thanks for posting.

We've already been over this. There is no "rule of so".

 

[BobTheCoward]

By the way, also hilarious is the contention that challenging the ACLU's assertion that the regs "inappropriately favoring the accused" is a right wing nut bar position fills me with pure joy.

Gideon, Miranda, also right wing nut bar positions I reckon!

Miranda applies to people arrested. People are not being arrested in this scenario

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I believe it is DeVos' policy that one should be outraged by, not the ACLU sticking up for assaulted women.

The Most Terrifying Parts of Betsy DeVos’s New Sexual-Assault Policy

Disguised as protecting assaulted students it smacks of the typical dishonest titling of legislation. This sounds rosy:

On Friday, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos officially proposed her long-held plan to protect students accused of sexual assault on college campuses. The new regulations would mark a major shift in how colleges and universities approach accusations of sexual misconduct, not only adding protections for accused students, but also significantly narrowing the definition of sexual harassment.

This doesn't:

Under DeVos’s new plan, colleges would only be required to investigate allegations that occur on campus, somewhere owned by the school, or at a school-funded event. This could mean that assaults at off-campus house parties, for example, would not be properly investigated by the administration. The cases would also need to be reported to certain campus authorities with the authority to take action.

 

[Ziggurat]

This doesn't:

First, that doesn't prohibit schools from taking action, so they likely will.

Second, and more importantly, why should the school be responsible for handling cases that don't occur on school property or at school events? Non-students don't get this extra justice system to handle assaults. What makes students so special?

This complaint stinks of classism.

 

[Ziggurat]

Miranda applies to people arrested. People are not being arrested in this scenario

You're missing the point, Bob. He's not saying that Miranda applies here. He's saying that the principle of protecting the rights of the accused, which Miranda is but one example of, applies here. So if protecting the rights of the accused is a right wing principle, that makes Miranda right wing as well because of that common principle, not because it applies directly here.

 

[BobTheCoward]

You're missing the point, Bob. He's not saying that Miranda applies here. He's saying that the principle of protecting the rights of the accused, which Miranda is but one example of, applies here. So if protecting the rights of the accused is a right wing principle, that makes Miranda right wing as well because of that common principle, not because it applies directly here.

It isn't given that what is at stake here is a right of the accused.