<p>Did you watch/see this? It's a clip from the today show.</p>
<p>WATCH:</a> Colleges Victim Blame, Turn A Blind Eye To Sexual Assault</p>
<p>What did you think about it?</p>
<p>I watched. My opinion: no case involving a potential felony should be handled “in-house” by a college/university. There’s an inherent conflict-of-interest that doesn’t bode well for student(s) OR for the school.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/221153.pdf[/url]”>http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/221153.pdf</a></p>
<p>Every student should be repeatedly told that if you are the victim of a crime, call the local police, not the college (campus police or Dean).</p>
<p>I totally agree. Rape and assault cases should not be handled by the school administration. I have no idea why they are even allowed to.</p>
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<p>this. this. this.</p>
<p>Based on the study above, if folks called the local police for every crime, the local criminal justice system wouldn’t be able to do anything else. The division of labor has evolved over time, and pretty much depends on victims not coming forward.</p>
<p>It may depend on where your college is located.</p>
<p>In some areas, the local police are already overwhelmed. It’s true that they don’t have the college’s motivation to downplay sexual assaults on campus, but they also may not have the resources to give these situations the attention they deserve.</p>
<p>At my son’s school, the campus police are police officers and can arrest and investigate, on or off campus. They regulary assist city police in emergencies too.</p>
<p>[TheDartmouth.com:</a> Sororities announce new policy](<a href=“http://thedartmouth.com/2011/05/12/news/sororities]TheDartmouth.com:”>http://thedartmouth.com/2011/05/12/news/sororities)</p>
<p>Mini, RAPE should never.never be reported to campus police.</p>
<p>It should be reported to real police.</p>
<p>Its appalling to me that campus’ want to deal out heavy penalties for drinking, yet ignore sexual assaults.</p>
<p>I applaud the Dartmouth soroties.</p>
<p>Not sure the Dartmouth sororities go far enough, since they seem to expect the fraternities to adjudicate claims of assault by their members. If the college turns a blind eye to assault against women, what makes us think that a fraternity would behave any differently? Agree with the posters who say that serious crime should be reported to the local police.</p>
<p>^^“I applaud the Dartmouth sororities.”</p>
<p>Well, it’s an attempt to send a message, but I have trouble believing that a fraternity would conduct an impartial investigation of one of its own members.</p>
<p>Well I can only hope that the frats will be less willing to tolerate behaivor that results in girls not showing up. Investigation? Maybe no. Change of behaivor? I can only hope.</p>
<p>If the tens of thousands of offenses committed against women on campus (according to the NCJRS study) occurred off campus and were reported, there would be tens of thousands of additional (mostly white, higher income) convicted sex offenders in our criminal justice system, and registered as sex offenders in our communities. </p>
<p>Never happen.</p>
<p>Yeah, I can’t understand why people think letting rapists off the hook in college (an enforced leave of absence is not really the same thing as jail time) is perfectly okay. Just because the rape was committed on a college campus doesn’t mean it was any less of a crime.</p>
<p>These stories are terrible. Of course the schools are going to try and protect their image and their major incomes. These girls really needed to go to local police as soon as possible.</p>
<p>It must be said that local police might not have done a better job than the colleges. Going to the police is still the course I would recommend, but plenty of sexual assault victims who go to the real police end up in the same situation. They are accused of being sluts; the offenders walk free. These cases are very hard to prove. Victims don’t really have good options.</p>
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<p>I think it’s a good thing that the sororities are stepping up and FINALLY stating that they will withdraw their presence if the fraternities don’t police themselves. I’ve thought for a long time that women at Dartmouth needed to asset themselves in this way rather than endlessly complaining about “male dominated spaces” and so forth.</p>
<p>Calling in the police in the case that prompted this step might actually have resulted in the girl being charged with assault, though. I would have a very hard time classifying the altercation, at least as described by witnesses commenting in the school newspaper, as a “sexual assault.” From what I’ve read, words were exchanged between the two. I have no idea what he said to provoke her, but she responded by throwing her drink in his face. He then lunged in her direction and was restrained by his fraternity brothers, before or after backing her up against a wall–it’s not clear. He may or may not have thrown what was in his hand–a bottle of some kind–at her when she threw the drink at him, but apparently it didn’t connect. Sounds like both of them were drunk and behaving badly. Doesn’t sound to me like a case in which calling in the police would have a positive result for either party.</p>
<p>There are plenty of cases of genuine sexual assault at most schools to be concerned about, unfortunately. I have the feeling that a lot of it–obviously not all-- is associated with binge drinking.</p>
<p>You better check the law.</p>