wifeisafurd said:
BearlyCareAnymore said:
wifeisafurd said:
BearlyCareAnymore said:
BearGoggles said:
Unit2Sucks said:
tequila4kapp said:
calumnus said:
oski003 said:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/family-sues-stanford-after-student-who-spilled-coffee-on-friend-s-alleged-rapist-is-found-dead/ar-AA14EFTB?cvid=49f6b1bd24e343bfae90311f546eb412
The alleged rapist was a football player.
I read another article where they said the football player was "only" accused of sexual assault (forcibly kissing the soccer player on the field against her will). If it was rape there has been A LOT of covering up going on (again) on the Farm.
This coming out could definitely be a factor in Shaw leaving.
Contrast with Cal where we publicly announced an investigation of Hufnagel and Martin for sexual harassment and assault (that allegedly happened 6 months earlier) 2 days before our first game of the NCAA Tournament as a #4 seed, our highest seed ever.
Notice the language of the complaint, which is being parroted in the media - the deceased "spilled" coffee on the alleged rapist. Seems pretty obvious she threw it on him, which is an assault type offense that would trigger the university's code of conduct inquiry and not an accident like "spill" implies.
He said/she said. How do you know that the coffee spill was unwanted? Perhaps the alleged victim of the spill was a masochist who enjoyed scalding. Or perhaps it was a genuine surprise spill. When accosted by the rapist, she had a freakout and spilled her coffee. Accidents happen, and the university shouldn't have started disciplinary action in something like this.
I'm mostly making light of an awful situation and I feel horribly for this girl's family and friends, but it's pretty obvious that too many people have taken similar approaches to sexual assault allegations, particularly on college campuses. Some people bend over backwards to protect assaulters and assume that their actions were reasonable but when it's something that is relatively obvious (but quite minor) like throwing coffee at someone, people don't feel the need to reflexively defend the accused.
I don't recall anyone characterizing an alleged rape or grope/kiss as an "accidental insertion" or "inadvertent use of lips/hands." We say "alleged rape" or "alleged sexual assault" and the press reports it that way.
"Spilling coffee" implies the alleged action was accidental or at least not intentional. If that was the allegation here - an accident - she would not be subject to discipline. Clearly the allegation was an intentional targeted assault or battery with coffee. So its bizarre to whitewash an alleged assault/battery by referring to it as "spilling." In virtually any other scenario, we'd see the report as " [XXXX] was in disciplinary proceedings for allegedly assaulting/battering another student with coffee." Why is that not the case here?
I'm surprised you think throwing coffee at someone is quite minor. I've personally seen a family member severely burned by accidentally spilled coffee. I doubt that happened here (maybe it was ice coffee??), but I'm pretty sure most schools would discipline students who intentionally attack other students by throwing things at them.
I feel bad for the family, but this seems like a sad attempt by grieving parents to find meaning in (and shift blame for) their daughters suicide by filing a weak lawsuit. Katie was an adult with agency and she sadly decided to take her own life.
She claimed it was accidental. I suspect it wasn't, but that is why it is characterized in the complaint as accidental.
The guy was not hurt. That and the circumstances imply that this was not scalding hot coffee straight from the barista.
The guy specifically said he didn't want action taken against her and he wanted the issue dropped. Some administrative weenie insisted on making a federal case out of it and charging it through an official process.
They threatened to expel her 3 months from graduation and hold up her transcript over at worst throwing a cup of coffee on someone they were ticked off at. That is massive overkill. Should never have even been in the equation. I have no idea if this was to protect a football player, if it was to cover up a cover up of a sexual assault charge, or if it just some Barney Fife trying to feel important and an impersonal one size fits all administrative process - I suspect it is the latter - but Stanford effed this up, IMO.
Take away the charged atmosphere that it is a football player and that there was an allegation of sexual assault that was investigated, you really think when you were at Cal a woman throwing a drink on a guy she thought was an ass would have lead to an administrative action and threats of expulsion? Especially when the guy didn't want anything done about it? There would be a lot of women who wouldn't have seen graduation. Discipline her? Sure. I can see that. Threatening an academic death penalty? Shouldn't have happened.
Whether they are legally or in any way responsible for her suicide is a different question, but threatening to take action that frankly most people in her situation would have viewed as ruining her life over a thrown cup of coffee where no one is hurt is not appropriate and I hope they have learned from this that maybe they need to be a little more careful how they communicate their disciplinary proceedings.
Uh, you think that is why the university was trying to have her testify? Spilling coffee is not a expulsion offense, even at Stanford. They had an active investigation of a football player for sexual allegations agains a minor and she refused to testify. You waive that right under Title 9 rules.
I could be wrong, but what I heard reported was that the investigation of the sexual allegations had concluded with no charges to be forthcoming. And I hadn't heard about the testimony angle, but in any case, the letter threatening expulsion was over the coffee. If you are saying that was an attempt to push her to testify, that is still effed up. And in any case, threatening expulsion over not being willing to testify would still not have been cool even if they were within their rights to do so. I really don't think forcing women to testify about sexual allegations is the way to go here. Especially when those actions often have ramifications for that person.
But again, the disciplinary action was over coffee. That is the relevant action. The sexual allegation has nothing to do with THAT case.
Apparently I'm wrong. It was about her attack on the player who was alleged to have kissed another soccer player. The parents indicated in previous articles which I can post that the conduct was related to the investigation where she was supposed to defend her fellow player. That changed in the complaint they filed. Stanford said that it was false and misleading that it was over throwing coffee, but I just read their latest statement (see below) and the misconduct at issue involved something she did the football player. There may be some other or additional conduct at play that "resulted in physical injury". Otherwise I don't understand the false and misleading comment made by Stanford. Discovery on this will no doubt be interesting.
I want to share this news story from Stanford University with you: https://news.stanford.edu/?p=45916
Obviously, both sides' lawyers are going to play to their strengths. Stanford's statement implies that she was withholding information by saying she was given the chance to provide more information at the end of the process and didn't, when after 6 months I'm not sure what else there is to say. "I was riding my bike and accidentally spilled coffee on him." "He says it was on purpose." "It wasn't". "Really? You happened to 'accidentally' spill coffee on the guy you think assaulted your teammate?" "Yes." After 6 months of investigation, I think they had all the information. She has no incentive not to clear it up if she had anything else to provide.
Obviously, her lawyers are dragging the sexual allegations into it to put Stanford in a bad light, make them look like they are protecting the football team, and care more about spilled coffee than a sexual assault. I get what they are doing, but honestly, I think it is a mistake. I think they are muddying the waters. I think their best case is "Really, Stanford? All this over a cup of coffee?" I'm just thinking of the reaction I would get if I walked up to an Oakland police officer and said "that chick just threw a cup of coffee on me. I want to file a complaint"
I don't really care too much about the legal issues, honestly. This shouldn't have been handled this way and I hope they are privately taking a look at how they handled this. I can't fathom why anyone thought this was worth the time and stress for the student, for the football player, or why the employee(s) at Stanford didn't have anything better to do with their time when the victim didn't want to pursue the issue. This has all the earmarks of a bureaucratic process that is moving for its own sake instead of for the purpose it was intended. The bottom line is that process and/or that email pushed this student over the edge. I mean she is found lying dead in her room with the email open on her computer. Which isn't to say that they are legally or morally culpable. Maybe she had mental issues that couldn't be predicted. Maybe this was the last of many things leading up to this. But Stanford has a duty to all of its students and parents pay a whole lot for that (though I'm sure she was on schollie, that isn't the point). From a biological perspective young people do not have fully formed executive functioning and they don't always see that they can get through stuff. (I read one story about a Mom who sent a perfectly happy teenager to bed and by morning he had killed himself. He had been conned into sending a d**k pick to someone posing as a girl and then blackmailed with threats that they would send it to his parents. He killed himself because he couldn't face his Mom.) You pump up that the Stanford degree is the greatest thing you are ever going to get in your life. You don't then, after a six month investigation, send an email on the last day to beat a deadline threatening to take that away. (plus all of the humiliation that goes with it) If you are going to threaten expulsion, you set a meeting, in person, you bring a counselor, and you walk it through the charges and the process with them. You make sure they understand the situation. You don't just drop an email with a "call this number if you are upset". Even if you have met with them before. The letter is the bad news that you need to address in person. Everything up to that point was what "may" happen.
I suspect that Stanford never had any intention of expelling her or withholding her degree. My guess is that at most they thought they would give her probation. I suspect it never occurred to them that she thought her degree was threatened even though that is what the letter directly said. I suspect that this was a stupid form letter that they use to cover absolutely every contingency when they have a hearing. And honestly, this is about the best possible light I can put on it for Stanford, because if they spent 6 months investigating an alleged coffee throwing and they were still actually thinking about having a hearing where expulsion was on the table...just Wow. Yeah, she should have been able to just roll with it and deal with the consequences that came instead of turning them into a huge monster in her imagination, but you have thousands of different people with different tolerances.
Stanford should know full well that many if not most kids that go to elite universities have put tons of pressure on themselves, often from even before high school and if they are faced with the thing they have worked for all of their life being taken from them, some of them are going to break. Any adolescent psychologist is going to tell you that.
