60 Minutes Story On University of Pacific Rape Case

[adam@section118]

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7363066n&tag=related;photovideo

The government sent out guidelines on how college judicial review boards should handle incidents of campus sex assault. Beckett Brennan says a university board bungled her case, spurring her to come forward to say she was sexually assaulted by three of the school's athletes. Katie Couric reports.

Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7363066n&tag=related;photovideo#ixzz1K61g5nvW

[zoony]

I saw this Sunday Night. I absolutely cannot believe that a board of 2 students, a faculty member, and an administrator were the arbiters of justice. Just unbelievable, really.

Both for the victim and the accused thats a travesty of justice.

BTW, the interview with Paul Allen was much more interesting.

[adam@section118]

I was actually on a board similar to that, and had to miss the 1 hour training session we had because of class. They simply said that was fine. Scary

Really weird case, (what I find weird is how they all 3 got diffrent punishments) and even sadder that the one kid got a full ride after he was expelled.

I did not post the Paul Allen video, but yeah, I found that story fascinating as well

[Mursilis]

I was on more than one of those student judicial boards, but we only dealt with minor violations of college rules - booze in the dorms, noise violations, and other petty stuff that wasn't criminal or at least wasn't worth the time of the campus police. I can't believe a RAPE case was given to a silly student board like that! That's just ridiculous!

[DjTj]

If she really wanted harsh punishment, she should have just pressed criminal charges.

Four days after the alleged assault, university police questioned the three basketball players Beckett had identified on the tape as her assailants: Michael Nunnally, Steffan Johnson and Michael Kirby. School officials urged Brennan to report the assault to Stockton Police.

A few weeks later she talked to a detective there, and after that conversation, she decided not to file criminal charges.

"He explained to me the system with cases that involve rape and kinda laid out the facts about it's a 'he said, she said' and kinda scared me," she said. "He used an example of a girl who was, like 16 or 17 who was on the stand for, like 16 hours. I can't even imagine."

The school suggested another option: testify before the university's judicial review board, an internal school disciplinary panel that would guarantee Brennan's identity wouldn't be revealed.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/04/17/60minutes/main20054339_page2.shtml

Once she decided to go with the campus panel, she had to expect a result like this. She (or her friends who knew) should have called the cops immediately, and they should have investigated the crime scene and interviewed witnesses on that night. It's weird that if she had been robbed or physically assaulted, there probably would have been no hesitation in going to the cops. But the way society thinks about rape is not quite like other crimes. That is a larger problem that can't really be laid at the feet of any individual in this story.

When she went to the police later, it's ridiculous that they encouraged her not to pursue her case. I can't really blame the school panel. This isn't really their job, and in a he-said she-said case, they had to make the best call that they could. The police should have handled this. Detectives and prosecutors should have been interviewing the witnesses. If you're going to rely on a kangaroo court, you're going to get a kangaroo result.