Contact: Rebecca Stewart
Telephone: 513-479-3335
Email: info@saveservices.org
Historic Advance for Fairness on Campus: Due Process Statement Signed by Nearly 300 Legal Experts and Scholars is Released
WASHINGTON / December 4, 2018 – Today, 294 law professors, other legal experts, and scholars from across the country are releasing a Due Process Statement that enunciates key principles for the investigation and adjudication of campus sexual assault cases. The Statement is designed to correct the erosion of due process protections that has plagued college campuses in recent years.
The Due Process Statement notes strong public support for campus due process, calls for balanced and objective investigations, highlights the fact that false allegations undermine the credibility of future victims, and urges lawmakers to speak out publicly in support of due process. The Statement cites the statement by Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg who said about campus procedures, “The person who is accused has a right to defend herself or himself…everyone deserves a fair hearing.”
For years, campus disciplinary committees have given short shrift to fair procedures, giving rise to terms like campus “kangaroo courts.” In 2011 the Office for Civil Rights issued a Dear Colleague Letter on sexual violence that attempted to remedy these procedural deficiencies, but the federal policy only served to make matters worse.
The SAVE Special Report, Six-Year Experiment in Campus Jurisprudence, documents how the system of campus adjudications created by the federal mandate has shortchanged both sexual assault complainants and accused students (1). As a result, hundreds of identified victims and accused students filed lawsuits and OCR complaints (2).
The Due Process Statement is available online (3).
Citations:
- http://www.saveservices.org/wp-content/uploads/Six-Year-Experiment-Fails-to-Make-the-Grade.pdf
- http://counsel.cua.edu/res/docs/titleixlitigation.pdf
- http://www.saveservices.org/wp-content/uploads/Due-Process-Statement-11.29.2018.pdf
SAVE — Stop Abusive and Violent Environments — is working for effective and fair solutions to campus sexual assault: www.saveservices.org