美国国家公共电台 NPR Title IX Protects Identities But Can Complicate Justice

 

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: 

When sexual assault is reported to law enforcement, a majority of cases never make it to trial. But student victims have another option. They can report it to their universities under Title IX, the federal law that prohibits gender¹ discrimination on campus. Public schools are obligated to investigate these crimes, and these campus investigations³ come with an advantage for both the accused and the accuser's confidentiality⁵. But there are plenty of disadvantages, as we'll hear from NPR's Ashley Westerman

ASHLEY WESTERMAN, BYLINE⁶: A court case involving the University of Kentucky has highlighted how confidentiality can complicate⁷ justice. Full disclosure - I'm a graduate of that university. But for the purposes of this story, we're going to withhold⁸ names of the accusers and the accused because we're not talking about guilt⁹ or innocence¹⁰ here. We're talking about the system.

The two women at the center of this case were graduate students in the UK entomology department. They each say their adviser¹¹ sexually assaulted them. Let's call them Jane Doe One and Two. They say the professor groped them and said sexually suggestive things to them, so they went to the university Title IX office. We obtained a report prepared by the office outlining their allegations. When I spoke¹² with Jane Doe Two, she told me they never wanted to go through the courts because they couldn't afford to be named.

JANE DOE TWO: I just spent a good portion of my life in grad school trying to further my career, and if I'm labeled as someone who followed a sexual assault complaint against a professor that could very easily backfire against me. There's a lot of people in academia who think that there are women who make up stuff like this.

WESTERMAN: The school launched an investigation² and found enough evidence to move to the next step, an official hearing. If it found him guilty, the professor could have been fired, and everything would go on his employment record. But he resigned before a hearing could take place, highlighting what Jane Doe Two calls a loophole in the Title IX system.

JANE DOE TWO: Not just at UK, but at every single university. If a professor resigns before there's a hearing, then he's allowed to move on to another university, potentially victimizing more students.

WESTERMAN: In a statement to NPR, the professor says there is no truth to the allegations and that he resigned to protect his family from the publicity¹³ and stress of a hearing.

This gets to the heart of why letting universities handle sexual assault investigations can be problematic. In a criminal case, you can't remain anonymous¹⁴. Our Constitution guarantees the right to face our accusers. On campus, the focus is on protecting the accusers. Their names are kept confidential⁴, and there's a lower burden of proof. The Jane Does we're frustrated¹⁵ that their case never went to a hearing. So they reached out to the University of Kentucky independent student newspaper, the Kentucky Kernel¹⁶.

MARJORIE KIRK: In March, a person walked in asking for someone to talk to and I said I can talk, and they basically unloaded this huge story on me.

WESTERMAN: That's Marjorie Kirk a journalism¹⁷ major who had made a name for herself as an investigative reporter. The person who came to see her that day at the paper was a representative sent by the Jane Does, and their story was enough to get Kirk digging deeper.

KIRK: I felt an obligation to the safety of other people to try and report this, and that's why we started this battle for open records.

WESTERMAN: The newspaper filed two Freedom of Information Act requests to get all the documents related to the investigation. The university turned over some, but not all of them. So the paper appealed to the Kentucky attorney general who took their side. But the university still wouldn't give up the documents, citing a federal law called FERPA.

JAY BLANTON: Which specifically mandates¹⁸ the protection of privacy of a student's personally identifiable records.

WESTERMAN: Jay Blanton is a spokesman for the university.

BLANTON: And this institution, the University of Kentucky, has consistently held that student information, particularly in cases that might identify in a student in the case of a sexual assault, sexual misconduct, must be held confidential.

WESTERMAN: And because of a quirk¹⁹ in Kentucky law, the university ended up suing its own student newspaper to block the documents from being released. Marjorie Kirk who is now editor-in-chief says if confidentiality was a problem, the university could have simply redacted names and other identifying details. She says at stake is a lot more than allowing one professor to leave campus without a hearing.

KIRK: A decision would be for all the marbles. It would affect any decision that a judge anywhere was trying to come up with for similar documents. They would see this decision and likely follow the precedent²⁰.

WESTERMAN: Then, just two days after the university sued the newspaper to prevent release of the documents, representatives of the Jane Does showed up at Kirk's office and handed over the full investigation - over 100 pages. In it were interviews with witnesses and emails where one of the women confronted the professor about his behavior. It also had the professor's version of events. And so Kirk started writing about the specifics of the case, but also about the lack of an open system.

KIRK: And as we dug into the system a little more, we saw there was much more to this than one professor. And so the scope definitely grew into a system that universities were enabling.

WESTERMAN: While Marjorie Kirk was on a crusade, the Jane Does watched. They were happy with the first few articles. They maintained their anonymity²¹. The professor didn't. But then, their personal story mushroomed into something they hadn't signed on for - dozens of articles in an open records fight.

In an effort to spotlight²² the broken university system, the Jane Does discovered another imperfect system. Journalists can play a big role in exposing wrongdoing, but media outlets²³ ultimately have the say on how they pursue stories. They're not subject to the same rules as courts or universities, so it's not surprising the newspaper took the story and tried to expose as much as they could. In November, the Jane Does filed a brief supporting the university. Yes, that's right. They sided with the university. Here's Jane Doe Two.

JANE DOE TWO: There needs to be some sort of reporting system for professors accused of sexual misconduct. while still protecting the privacy of victims like me and Jane Doe One. And the records that Marjorie is calling for - those hundreds of pages of documents aren't necessary for that reporting system.

WESTERMAN: So here's what we're left with - a university struggling to protect students and hold employees accountable, a crusading journalist sued by her own school and two women still searching for a more perfect form of justice. The judge in the case says he plans to issue an opinion sometime in the next two weeks. Ashley Westerman, NPR News.

1 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。

2 investigation   

n.调查，调查研究

参考例句：

• In an investigation,a new fact became known, which told against him.在调查中新发现了一件对他不利的事实。
• He drew the conclusion by building on his own investigation.他根据自己的调查研究作出结论。

3 investigations   

（正式的）调查( investigation的名词复数 )； 侦查； 科学研究； 学术研究

参考例句：

• His investigations were intensive and thorough but revealed nothing. 他进行了深入彻底的调查，但没有发现什么。
• He often sent them out to make investigations. 他常常派他们出去作调查。

4 confidential   

adj.秘（机）密的，表示信任的，担任机密工作的

参考例句：

• He refused to allow his secretary to handle confidential letters.他不让秘书处理机密文件。
• We have a confidential exchange of views.我们推心置腹地交换意见。

5 confidentiality   

n.秘而不宣，保密

参考例句：

• They signed a confidentiality agreement. 他们签署了一份保守机密的协议。
• Cryptography is the foundation of supporting authentication, integrality and confidentiality. 而密码学是支持认证、完整性和机密性机制的基础。

6 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

7 complicate   

vt.使复杂化，使混乱，使难懂

参考例句：

• There is no need to complicate matters.没有必要使问题复杂化。
• These events will greatly complicate the situation.这些事件将使局势变得极其复杂。

8 withhold   

v.拒绝，不给；使停止，阻挡

参考例句：

• It was unscrupulous of their lawyer to withhold evidence.他们的律师隐瞒证据是不道德的。
• I couldn't withhold giving some loose to my indignation.我忍不住要发泄一点我的愤怒。

9 guilt   

n.犯罪；内疚；过失，罪责

参考例句：

• She tried to cover up her guilt by lying.她企图用谎言掩饰自己的罪行。
• Don't lay a guilt trip on your child about schoolwork.别因为功课责备孩子而使他觉得很内疚。

10 innocence   

n.无罪；天真；无害

参考例句：

• There was a touching air of innocence about the boy.这个男孩有一种令人感动的天真神情。
• The accused man proved his innocence of the crime.被告人经证实无罪。

11 adviser   

n.劝告者，顾问

参考例句：

• They employed me as an adviser.他们聘请我当顾问。
• Our department has engaged a foreign teacher as phonetic adviser.我们系已经聘请了一位外籍老师作为语音顾问。

12 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

13 publicity   

n.众所周知，闻名；宣传，广告

参考例句：

• The singer star's marriage got a lot of publicity.这位歌星的婚事引起了公众的关注。
• He dismissed the event as just a publicity gimmick.他不理会这件事，只当它是一种宣传手法。

14 anonymous   

adj.无名的；匿名的；无特色的

参考例句：

• Sending anonymous letters is a cowardly act.寄匿名信是懦夫的行为。
• The author wishes to remain anonymous.作者希望姓名不公开。

15 frustrated   

adj.挫败的，失意的，泄气的v.使不成功( frustrate的过去式和过去分词 )；挫败；使受挫折；令人沮丧

参考例句：

• It's very easy to get frustrated in this job. 这个工作很容易令人懊恼。
• The bad weather frustrated all our hopes of going out. 恶劣的天气破坏了我们出行的愿望。 来自《简明英汉词典》

16 kernel   

n.(果实的)核，仁；(问题)的中心，核心

参考例句：

• The kernel of his problem is lack of money.他的问题的核心是缺钱。
• The nutshell includes the kernel.果壳裹住果仁。

17 journalism   

n.新闻工作，报业

参考例句：

• He's a teacher but he does some journalism on the side.他是教师，可还兼职做一些新闻工作。
• He had an aptitude for journalism.他有从事新闻工作的才能。

18 mandates   

托管（mandate的第三人称单数形式）

参考例句：

• Individual mandates would require all people to purchase health insurance. 个人托管要求所有人都要购买健康保险。
• While I agree with those benefits, I'm not a supporter of mandates. 我同意上述好处，我不是授权软件的支持者。

19 quirk   

n.奇事，巧合；古怪的举动

参考例句：

• He had a strange quirk of addressing his wife as Mrs Smith.他很怪，把自己的妻子称作史密斯夫人。
• The most annoying quirk of his is wearing a cap all the time.他最令人感到厌恶的怪癖就是无论何时都戴著帽子。

20 precedent   

n.先例，前例；惯例；adj.在前的，在先的

参考例句：

• Is there a precedent for what you want me to do?你要我做的事有前例可援吗？
• This is a wonderful achievement without precedent in Chinese history.这是中国历史上亘古未有的奇绩。

21 anonymity   

n.the condition of being anonymous

参考例句：

• Names of people in the book were changed to preserve anonymity. 为了姓名保密，书中的人用的都是化名。
• Our company promises to preserve the anonymity of all its clients. 我们公司承诺不公开客户的姓名。

22 spotlight   

n.公众注意的中心，聚光灯，探照灯，视听，注意，醒目

参考例句：

• This week the spotlight is on the world of fashion.本周引人瞩目的是时装界。
• The spotlight followed her round the stage.聚光灯的光圈随着她在舞台上转。

23 outlets   

n.出口( outlet的名词复数 )；经销店；插座；廉价经销店

参考例句：

• The dumping of foreign cotton blocked outlets for locally grown cotton. 外国棉花的倾销阻滞了当地生产的棉花的销路。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They must find outlets for their products. 他们必须为自己的产品寻找出路。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》