Civil Rights for Me, Not for Thee

Justice-free zone?

Justice-free zone?

A former University of Virginia law student filed a federal lawsuit yesterday alleging that the university, following guidelines issued by the federal Office of Civil Rights, violated his due process when finding him responsible for sexual misconduct with an intoxicated student and banned him from the university.

According to the suit, a retired judge serving as fact-finder in the U.Va proceeding found that the plaintiff, identified only as “John Doe,” did not have “effective consent” when he had sex in August 2013 with a fellow law student, “Jane Doe” on the grounds of her alcohol consumption. The judge, who called the decision “very close,” was required by the Office of Civil Rights to use the “preponderance of the evidence” standard of proof rather than the stronger “clear and convincing” standard.

John Doe was found responsible for the incident and sanctioned with a life-time ban and four months of counseling. He received his degree but has not yet been admitted to the bar and cannot practice law, reports the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

Bacon’s bottom line: Details from the news account, and presumably the lawsuit itself, are so meager that it is impossible for a reader to draw strong conclusions about the incident itself. We don’t know how drunk the woman was, how drunk the man was, or what communication may have transpired between the two. If the woman passed out and John Doe had sex with her, he should be charged with rape and, if convicted, sent to prison to serve a sentence between five years and life as called for in the Virginia penal code. If they had both been drinking heavily, engaged in sex and the woman later regretted the act, he shouldn’t suffer punishment at all.

Most likely, the circumstances were more ambiguous that those two examples. Regardless, it seems that the system of administrative justice imposed by the Office of Civil Rights likely led to a miscarriage of justice. If a real rape occurred, John Doe got off easy. If the incident was a case of mutually agreeable drunken sex, he shouldn’t be punished at all. Because the incident occurred in a university environment, the normal rules of criminal procedure were suspended in order to achieve a politically driven result dictated by Washington.

— JAB