On Sept. 3, I published “Duke lacrosse: A disturbing Chronicle story.”
On Mar. 27 Duke's student newspaper, The Chronicle, reported on statements made Mar. 25 by Duke’s President Richard H. Brodhead and Vice President for Student Affairs Larry Moneta.
Regarding Brodhead, The Chronicle said:
Brodhead released a statement Saturday urging individuals "to cooperate to the fullest with the police inquiry while we wait to learn the truth."By Mar. 25, Brodhead knew the lacrosse captains who rented the house on N. Buchanan Blvd. had voluntarily answered police questions, given them statements, gone to Duke Hospital and submitted to “rape kit” testing, and offered to take polygraph tests. What’s more, Brodhead knew all 46 players who could have contested the order to submit to DNA testing and mug photos, instead immediately complied with the order.
Yet The Chronicle said nothing about Brodhead mentioning the lacrosse team’s extraordinary cooperation with police.
Why not?
Because Brodhead decided to say nothing in his Mar. 25 statement about the players' cooperation.
He made that decision knowing that on Mar. 25 the public was unaware of the lacrosse team’s extraordinary cooperation.
In fact, Brodhead knew on Mar. 25 the public was being told just the opposite. See, for example, this Mar. 25 front-page Raleigh News & Observer story. (It’s the “interview story” with the anonymous accuser the N&O said was “the victim.”)
The N&O reported:
authorities vowed to crack the team's wall of solidarity.In such circumstances, why did Brodhead decide to tell the public nothing about the team’s cooperation?
"We're asking someone from the lacrosse team to step forward," Durham police Cpl. David Addison said. "We will be relentless in finding out who committed this crime."
Brodhead likes to tell alumni groups and others he's been "very fair" to the lacrosse players.
Really?
How was Brodhead's withholding important information concerning the players’ cooperation fair to them?
How was it fair to any of us seeking to learn as much truth as possible about the situation?
How was it fair to Duke University or the community?
Whose interests were served by Brodhead's and his top administrators' withholding of that information from the public on Mar. 25?
The Chronicle's story also reported that on Mar. 25 Vice President for Student Affairs Larry Moneta met with parents of the lacrosse players:
Parents of some members of the team met with University representatives Saturday afternoon.In my Sept 9 post I had this to say about The Chronicle report of the parents meeting:
"The meeting was about keeping the parents informed and focusing on the consequences for their kids and the way we will proceed pending the conclusion of the investigation," said Larry Moneta, vice president for student affairs.
He added that the parents were frightened and nervous for their children.
And look at what Moneta says about the parents: They “were frightened and nervous for their children.”Now Durham-in-Wonderland blogger KC Johnson, in a “must read” post, reports on an email he received from a parent who was at the Mar. 25 meeting. Here’s part of what the parent wrote :
No doubt they were. But is that all, Vice President Moneta?
Are we to believe there were no parents speaking out who were critical of the university? …
Are we to believe that no parent asked why Brodhead and other top university officials weren't speaking out and criticizing the bias, inaccuracies, omissions and inflammatory language in the N&O’s Mar. 24 and 25 stories, which cast the accuser as “the victim” and framed their sons as her victimizers among whom were three gang-rapists and their teammates who were remaining silent while police tried to identify the gang-rapists?
What Moneta is quoted as saying about the meeting amounts to what many parents of small children call "a night-night line."
Moneta also said "the parents were frightened and nervous for their children."There’s much more from the parent, and as usual KC provides illuminating commentary. To repeat: It’s a “don’t miss” post.
[Moneta’s] statement, like so many other statements put out by Duke officials, was misleading and false.
I was one of the 40 or 50 parents who were at that meeting that day. We were nervous for our sons, but we were also furious at Duke. That was the day we all realized that Duke was not on our side and was not going to do anything to protect its students. That was the day Brodhead turned his back on our sons. …
We were furious, and felt totally betrayed by Duke. We knew our sons were innocent of these outrageous allegations, and so did Duke. We had all grilled our sons about what happened, and so had Duke officials. No charges had been filed, and the Duke police had told university officials the allegations were not credible.
A university lawyer had told team parents there was nothing to the allegations and they would go away. Top university officials, including the number two man [ Executive Vice President] Tallman Trask, [Athletic Director Joe] Alleva, and [Dean of Students Sue] Wasiolek, had met with the four team captains the previous afternoon, learned exactly what had and had not happened, including the extent of their cooperation with the police, and had told them they believed they were innocent.
In fact, Trask told the four captains as they left the meeting to "Beat Georgetown."
It’a easy to understand why Brodhead and his top administrators don’t want us to look carefully at what they did and ask for more background information.
And it’s easy to understand why confidence in the Brodhead administration remains strong among Duke's faculty Group of 88 and DA Mike Nifong's supporters.
What’s hard to understand is why Duke trustees have failed to undertake a full, public investigation of all aspects of Brodhead and his top administrators’ statements and decisions regarding the Duke lacrosse matter.
4 comments:
um, because Steel brought in Brodhead??
Belief of it oppresses me already, you know?
Profile in Courage
Kerstin Kimel
Last time I wrote about Dave Evans’s speech to remind us not to forget that amid the darkness of the Duke Lacrosse Case, there have been some true heroes. Duke’s women’s lacrosse coach, Kerstin Kimel, is such a hero. While other members of Duke’s faculty and administration chose to sacrifice the lacrosse players to advance themselves and say what the media wanted to hear, Coach Kimel stood alone as the only Duke representative to make any public statement supporting the lacrosse players until law Professor James Coleman joined her in May. Heroes rise to the occasion, lead by example, and bring out the best in us. Coach Kimel did all three.
With media staked out all over campus echoing every word of the District Attorney and trumpeting every negative statement about Duke and its lacrosse team, one might have expected more Duke representatives to speak up and defend their students and their institution. Instead, 88 Duke professors signed a divisive letter placed as an advertisement in the student newspaper publicly thanking protestors for making “collective noise” and "for not waiting and for making yourselves heard." Professors reportedly did not hesitate to express their condemnation of the lacrosse players to their students with the lacrosse players present. In face of all of this scrutiny, Kimel not only continued to coach and inspire her team, but she demonstrated the type of leadership coaches are hired to instill in their athletes. When Duke administration officials turned their backs on the Duke lacrosse players, Kimel was a shining voice in the collective silence.
She had the courage to tell Stuart Taylor of the National Journal that her players ‘were shocked, disillusioned, and disappointed that their professors and the university community were so one-sided in their condemnation of the lacrosse players.’ She personally wrote to Duke administration officers asking them to intervene when some lacrosse players were blatantly targeted in class and subjected to unprofessional conduct by Duke professors. Finally, she stood behind her players as they wore wristbands with the accused players’ numbers on them as an expression of support during their national semi-final match with Northwestern.
Interviewed by the press immediately following the game, Kimel broke into tears when describing what her players had been through. Her tears were not tears of weakness, but tears of courage--the pressures of a grueling, emotional season finally ended. In contrast to the words of others from Duke, Kimel's comments to the media were never opportunistic, but honest and genuine:
"I can't express how proud I am of our team for what they've endured. For 31 18 to 22 year-olds to witness real life and real world in very real ways."
"Any attention we got for the wristbands paled in comparison to having the media staked outside of our practice and the girls' dorms, of watching your friends arrested, of watching your fellow students not support fellow students, watching professors not support students."
Those words express the deep commitment that Kimel has for her players and Duke as a coach, educator, role model, mentor and friend. She received vicious criticism for standing up for the truth and honoring her commitment to her players and the university. Stephen Smith cited her team as evidence of racism at Duke in an article for the Philadelphia Inquirer. Katherine Redmond called the team ‘stupid, spoiled little girls’ in the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Coach Kimel never backed down and never backed away from her promise that "You're not joining a team you're joining the Duke family."
Despite the difficult circumstances of this past season, Kimel led the women’s team to a school record of 18 wins and their third Final Four. During that Final Four, the team adopted the men's motto of ‘No Excuses, No Regrets.’ In the shadows of a university's lack of leadership during a time of crisis, perhaps best described as ‘all excuses, no regrets’ Coach Kimel led her team honorably and courageously. She epitomizes leadership by example and courage in action. In a sea of darkness, she has been a beacon of light showing us the way.
Kerstin Kimel is a true hero.
Joan Collins
Garden City, NY
In most organizations, the CEO reports to a Board of Directors/Trustees. It appears to be reversed at Duke. The Board appears to be reporting to Brodhead. It's past time for the alumni and supporters of Duke to speak with their pocketbooks. The Board will certainly understand that language.
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