The point is another futile attempt to get you to answer the simple question. You’ve done your investigation. It has produced the “mystery” you talk about. The accuser is demanding expulsion and criminal prosecution. The accused maintains his innocence.
What do you, as the responsible party do once you cannot ascertain who is telling the truth? There is no gotcha. If the answer is “We do nothing to the accused as we do not have enough evidence” then great, if not, then I guess things are worse than I thought.
That makes it easy, then – report it to local law enforcement and the local district attorney. They will conduct an investigation and determine if a legal case against criminal conduct is feasible. Sometimes they make mistakes, but that’s certainly the right course of action in this scenario.
Presuming this oddly worded sentence means “what should I do if I conclude that there is no possible way to determine the truth of the matter?”, then I would refer it to more capable investigators (if the accuser agrees); if the accuser doesn’t want it referred, then there’s no more action I could take. If you’re asking “do I punish student A solely because student B wants student A to be punished”, then the answer is “no”.
I would realize that as a university president I lack the skills to address this situation. As others have said, the university should call in some professional investigators like the police. That should be the policy for all accusations of serious crimes.
That’s not an option. The police are conducting a criminal investigation while the school is conducting an investigation to see if anyone has violated their policy. The police may investigation and the prosecuting attorney might decide to take no action because a trial will not likely lead to a guilty verdict. The school might investigation and finding that the preponderance of evidence support’s the woman’s claim take action against the male student even if no criminal charges were filed.
Assuming any investigation by the university and/or law enforcement is fruitless, the best course of action is to make sure the two students are separated and they won’t share any of the same classes nor will they speak to one another.
I’m hoping you’ll flesh this out. That sounds like, effectively, a restraining order on one party or another. Or both. It could force one to drop a class or vacate a dorm. Or prevent one from registering for necessary classes.
It would really suck to have someone who raped you in your classes. It would also suck to have someone who you didn’t rape prevent you from taking classes. I’m not seeing a clear best course of action here, but maybe you feel otherwise.
The school has conducted it’s investigation and found nothing. Read the OP, there is no other policy or procedure for them to follow. There is an accusation of a serious crime though, and the administrator has an obligation to report that to the police so that the school is not participating in obstruction of justice.
If the woman doesn’t want to go to the police, the university will have to investigate as best it can, I suppose. What stories do the respective parties tell? Does the man say “yes we had sex but it was consensual” or “no, we never had sex”? Did the woman mention it to anyone else at the time?
If the investigation truly doesn’t come up with anything, or if the woman doesn’t want to cooperate with the investigation, then nothing can be done.
And, no offense, but this -
isn’t necessarily realistic. If the university takes any adverse action, against either party, it’s not necessarily going to be a slam dunk for either - the courts have ruled both ways.
“They should be separated” doesn’t tell us the mechanism. The school hasn’t made a determination that either party has done anything wrong. So who is forced to drop the class? That’s not me JAQing; I want to understand precisely how a proposed (or actual) policy is supposed to operate, because I’m struggling to construct one on my own.
If I get the scenario police have investigated and no charges brought due to lack of corroborating evidence or she refuses to cooperate with an investigation.
When class conflict exists she gets schedule precedence. He should get accommodations so that he is not excessively impacted.
For upper-level courses it’s common for only one section to be available, once per year. I don’t know what accomodations you can offer that don’t delay graduation a year. Based on an accusation with either no corroborating evidence or not enough to make any determination of a crime or a policy violation.
Most universities should be able to work around those restrictions without having a significant impact on the student. Alternative class assignments, alternative means of accessing learning material like lectures, etc., etc.
Best course of action doesn’t always leave everyone perfectly happy. In an employment situation, best practice is to separate the parties immediately with the bulk of any inconvenience shouldered by the accused.
If no creative accommodating can be done then one or the other needs to have negative impact. I’d err on avoiding negative impact to her as in the statistical universe she is more likely the truthful one. Not beyond benefit of doubt legally true but enough to tip the scale on this.