Tuesday, April 03, 2007

GoDuke.com & “Vigilante” Questions

CORRECTION: In my letter below to Duke University's Vice President for Student Affairs Larry Moneta, I identify him has the highest ranking Duke administrator present at a March 25, 2006 meeting with the lacrosse parents. In fact, Executive Vice President Tallman Trask III was the senior administrator present.

I apologize for my error and thank John Burness, Vice President for Student Affairs and Government Relations, for calling it to my attention.

John
__________________________________________

Readers Note: For background to the letter below, see these posts and other posts to which they link:

"Duke's Silence on 'Vigilante' and 'Wanted' posters"

"Letter to DUPD Director Dean"

"To DUPD Director Dean - 3/28/07"

DUPD and "Vigilante" Questions

John
__________________________________

Larry Moneta, Ed.D.
Vice President for Students Affairs
Duke University

Dear Dr. Moneta:

I’m a Duke alum who blogs as John in Carolina. I’ve published often on aspects of the Hoax and frame-up, including the “Vigilante” poster.

Those who created and distributed the “Vigilante” poster perniciously targeted students who were members of Duke’s 2006 Men’s lacrosse team, as evidenced by the poster’s prominent display of the 43 face photos of lacrosse players which were pulled from GoDuke.com.

The “Vigilante” poster also placed at risk the safety of every other Duke student who might be an unintended victim of unstable individuals and hate groups incited by the poster and the praise its “activist” creator(s) and distributors received from many, including some in leadership positions at Duke.

I want to ask you questions relating to the poster. I’ll publish your answers in full at JinC and leave your answers there free of my commentary for at least a day so the alums, parents and students, Duke staffers, journalists, and others reading the blog can read your response free of my commentary.

It’s my understanding you were the senior Duke administrator present at the lax parents’ meeting on Saturday, March 25, 2006; and that a parent request was made that the University remove from GoDuke.com the face photos of all the lacrosse players.

Was such a parent request made? If it was, what did the University do in response?

If you or another administrator responded positively to the parent request, when were the photos removed from GoDuke.com?

As you know, it’s been reported that Duke only began to remove the students’ photos when it realized they were actually being pulled from GoDuke.com. A USA Today report puts the date as Monday, March 27.

Some months back sports information director Jon Jackson confirmed in a phone interview that, out of concern for the students’ safety, Duke did pull all the lacrosse players’ photos from GoDuke.com before the poster creator(s) got the last 4 players photos, but obviously not before the creator(s) had already gotten 43 photos.

Do you know when Duke removed the students’ photos? Or should I direct that question to someone in IT?

If the question should be asked of someone in IT, please direct me to that person.

Have you or anyone in student affairs or elsewhere at Duke sought to identify the individual(s) who pulled the students’ photos that wound up on the “Vigilante” poster?

If yes, what have you learned?

If not, why not?

There are other questions I want to ask concerning student affairs' response to the “Vigilante” poster’s circulation on campus but this letter is getting long.

I’ll hold those questions for another day.

The post title containing this letter is: GoDuke.com & “Vigilante” Questions.

I’m cc’ing to other University officers because I plan to contact them concerning aspects of the “Vigilante” poster.

Thank you for your attention to this letter.

Sincerely,

John in Carolina

Cc: Robert Steel, chair, board of trustees, DU
Richard Brodhead, president, DU
John Burness, senior vice president for public affairs and government relations, DU
Aaron Graves, associate vice president for campus safety and security, DU
David Jarmul, associate vice president of news and communications
Robert Dean, director, DUPD

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I would like to know the exact time the pictures were pulled. Not morning or afternoon the exact time.

Anonymous said...

Thanks John!

Even though this case is a year old, we still encounter quite a bit of waiting on every matter associated with this case.

Anonymous said...

Your letters to officials are wonderful. I can imagine them squirming as they read them. Thanks for your persistant probing.
Alum

Anonymous said...

How long before Larry lawyers up? And when he does, will someone ask "why does he have a lawyer if he's innocent?"

Anonymous said...

John,

Great post! You can bet that Moneta will not answer any of your questions because they are too reasonable. This man had a duty to fulfill to the LAX families and the students, and he refused -- refused -- to do what he was supposed to do.

We need to keep the heat on these people and make them accountable for what they did.

Anonymous said...

MacD says...
Gottlieb used team photos to create the first two line ups. Did he pull them off GoDuke.com or did he get them directly from Duke?

AMac said...

Comment added 4/9/07, also posted at LieStoppers:

Here are two questions for the Duke Administration to have gotten answers to.

1. An employee (at the time) of Duke's Environmental Sustainability Program may have been involved in the creation or distribution of the Vigilante Poster. Did the electronic records kept for billing purposes by the copying machines in the Program's offices show that a burst of photocopying took place on the day before the Vigilante Poster was distributed on campus?

2. If such a burst of copying did take place, was 11" x 17" paper used? Most organizations have little use for copies that big--but note the size of the Vigilante Poster.

Is it possible that the management of the Environmental Sustainability Program and the Duke Administration lack curiosity about such boring matters? Will Discovery show that, gee whiz, the billing records that would have answered these questions are nowhere to be found?