<p>Two weeks into winter semester, and my son--a new transfer student at the University of Colorado-Boulder--was blindsided by character assassination and subsequent ostracization, including a very swift and very public eviction from his on-campus residence. </p>
<p>Gone was my freshman's opportunity to connect to other students. As any parent of a college freshman knows, connection is what provides support, purpose, and comfort to a student--especially an out-of-state student, living away from home for the first time. </p>
<p>Falsely accused of criminal behavior, my son was soon the victim of a mishandled criminal investigation. The case was eventually dismissed, but only after my son had paid an attorney, a therapist, and wasted more than $30,000 in out-of-state college tuition and housing fees for a semester of torment. </p>
<p>A victim of a vicious lie, my son was forced to hire a lawyer, meet with the CU-Boulder's Office of Student Conduct, and visit the Boulder Police Department--all while simultaneously struggling to move forward with his schoolwork on an unfamiliar campus that suddenly felt hostile. </p>
<p>What happened is a student, whom my son had never met, accused his roommate of stealing $200. The roommate, whom my son barely knew, claimed he had seen my son in their room going through their belongings. </p>
<p>Soon after, a criminal case was brought against my son. Not a shred of evidence placed him at the crime scene, yet he--a person with no history whatsoever of theft or dishonesty--was very swiftly and very publicly moved to an off-campus "pretty ghetto" motel.
His saving grace was his character and the fact he was innocent. He knew it, his family knew it, and anyone who knew him well knew it. No one in Boulder, however, knew him well. </p>
<p>According to the UC-Boulder's Student Conduct Policies and Procedures, the Office of Student Conduct reserves the right to exclude (prohibit entry to a specific area or hall) to those persons whose behavior they deem to be detrimental to the well-being of the residence hall community. For inscrutable reasons, the deciders of campus justice chose to believe a rumored pill addict who lived in the room where the crime was committed, rather than believe my son's plea of innocent. (Among other things, my son requested a polygraph test for himself and his accuser, to no avail.)</p>
<p>All we really knew about the accuser, besides he's a pathological liar, is he shares the exact same (and very unusual) name as a prominent, seemingly wealthy Boulder citizen.</p>
<p>After the better part of the semester, it was determined that my son's accuser was guilty of lying and of convincing another student to do the same. Due, apparently, to student privacy policies, all we were told about the investigation was that it was a matter for the Boulder Police. Later, after the case was dismissed, a Boulder District Attorney told us the investigation was a matter for the campus police. From what we know, not much investigating took place. Nobody bothered so much as to interview my son's roommate. </p>
<p>After nearly six weeks of living in a lousy situation, my son was allowed to move back into his residence hall. While UC-Boulder was quick to cast a dark light on my son while swiftly evicting him from his campus residence, the responsibility of clearing his name was his alone. Still overwhelmed by what had been said about him and by how little had been done by anyone but himself to prove his innocence, he finished up the 2013 Winter Semester, then moved back to Utah, leaving his plan to graduate from UC-Boulder behind.</p>
<p>Given far worse injustices are faced by countless people, each day, one may dismiss the contents of this account as easily as the UC-Boulder did the contents of my son's plea for justice. Yet, when you think about it, if this had happened to your child or any student, really, whose well-being you cared about, you too would see a rogue miscarriage of justice.</p>