Month: November 2014

This story is part of our ongoing coverage in the wake of the Rolling Stone story on rape at UVA. There’s more: An in-depth look at the University’s sexual assault policy, a Q&A with Board of Visitors member Helen Dragas on her reaction to the story, responses from the Rolling Stone reporter and women she interviewed as well as two women who reported their own rapes while students, and information on victims coming forward from a Charlottesville prosecutor. 

Lisa Richey was a recent UVA graduate in 2004 when a story titled “How UVA Turns its Back on Rape” came out. Richey, who was 23 at the time, said she was glad the topic had been written about and believed administrators when they promised to address the problem in the wake of that outrage. Fast forward 10 years, and like many UVA alums, Richey was sickened by the Rolling Stone story. This time, however, Richey didn’t trust that change would happen on its own. Within hours of the article’s publication, she had taken action, launching a Facebook page and an online fundraiser to provide independent legal counsel to victims of sexual assault at UVA.

“I can’t stop rape. I don’ t know how to change rape culture. I don’t really know how to make the policy changes make that much of an impact,” she said. “But I can probably find an attorney somebody can call when they get home and just talk through this with.”

On the Wednesday morning the article published, Richey had typical tasks on her to-do list: Change some software on the home computer, go grocery shopping, get ready for Thanksgiving guests. “It was not ‘Start a small social movement,’” she said.

That’s what she’s done, however, and in the days that followed, she has raised more than $22,000, including the largest donation of $5,000 from Board of Visitors member Helen Dragas, who cited her role as a female board member and alumna whose own daughter is a current student at the school as the basis for her concern and outrage.

Richey said the idea for the legal fund came from her belief that University administrators are not the best—or even appropriate—people to advise students who have been the victims of sexual assault.

“You become a dean because you’re this amazing academic and you get into the administrative side of it, and you want to help students negotiate academia,” said Richey, who believes an attorney who is not affiliated with the school and whose career is navigating the legal system will be better able to guide traumatized students.

Respecting a victim’s wishes is important, said Richey, but “you also have to arm somebody with the facts.”

Richey said 100 percent of the money raised will go to the legal fund, and she’s in the process of organizing the details. She hopes to raise at least $50,000.

“If this is really going to work, it needs to be something that’s set up that’s going to be around at minimum for five years,” she said. “That’s how long you need a proof of concept for something like this. It wouldn’t be real until next year’s first years arrive and that person is there through their full four-year experience.”

Ultimately, Richey believes alumni must put pressure on the administration to deal with the problem of sexual assault at UVA.

“It’s our University that failed the students” said Richey. “We can’t unrape anybody. We can’t fix the culture necessarily. We’re not there. But we can set something up to right the wrong that the administration did. It’s our donations that pay those paychecks.”

This story is part of our ongoing coverage in the wake of the Rolling Stone story on rape at UVA. There’s more: An in-depth look at the University’s sexual assault policy, a Q&A with Board of Visitors member Helen Dragas on her reaction to the story, responses from the Rolling Stone reporter and women she interviewed as well as two women who reported their own rapes while students and a look at an alumna’s success raising money for a victims’ defense fund. 

The intense publicity and debate over the issue of sexual assault that has enveloped UVA can trigger various responses in rape survivors, said Becky Weybright, executive director of the Sexual Assault Resource Agency (SARA).

“It can retraumatize people,” said Weybright. “It may also give added validation to people who haven’t felt like their stories were believed or honored.”

Weybright said it’s too early to tell if SARA is experiencing an uptick in rape reports or calls from survivors seeking support, but for those victims who did not report their assaults at the time they occurred or soon after, Charlottesville Commonwealth’s Attorney Dave Chapman said it’s not too late—even years after the fact when there is no forensic evidence available. Notifying law enforcement is valuable, he said, since law enforcement agencies keep a database of such reports and check to see if an alleged assailant is accused of similar offenses.

“That’s a reservoir of information that could later be of significance,” said Chapman. “Even a report that is not going to go forward as a prosecution has value.”

Virginia has no statute of limitations for felonies, which means that a crime can be prosecuted many years later, as happened in the attack on UVA graduate Liz Seccuro, who was raped in the Phi Kappa Psi house in 1984 and whose assailant, William N. Beebe, was convicted of sexual assault more than two decades later, after he wrote Seccuro a letter of apology. The Charlottesville Commonwealth’s Attorney’s office has successfully prosecuted several other cases in which the reports were made well after the fact, Chapman said.

Chapman said his office attempts to give victims as much control as possible over the process. “In the absence of a great risk that the suspect would re-offend, we would give the victim choice about whether a prosecutable offense goes forward,” said Chapman. But he acknowledges that there are times when a victim is ready to pursue a conviction and the Commonwealth declines to prosecute. “There are cases in which we reach a decision that it can’t be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. That’s a difficult place to be and conversation to have, and at the same time, that’s part of our responsibility in our niche of law enforcement.”

Victims wishing to report a sexual assault that occurred in Charlottesville at any time can contact his office or police directly or go through the Victim/Witness Assistance Program, which is housed in the office of the Commonwealth’s Attorney.

“They’d meet with an attorney who could listen to what they can describe,” said Chapman. “The attorney would talk to them about the options from here. Is it something for which services are important? Something for which an official report might be appropriate?”

Similar support is available for victims in Albemarle County.

Charlottesville Police Department: 970-3280

Charlottesville Commonwealth’s Attorney and Victim/Witness Program: 970-3176

Albemarle County Police Department and Victim/Witness Program: 296-5807

This story is part of our ongoing coverage in the wake of the Rolling Stone story on rape at UVA. There’s more: An in-depth look at the University’s sexual assault policy, a Q&A with Board of Visitors member Helen Dragas on her reaction to the story, responses from the Rolling Stone reporter and women she interviewed, a look at an alumna’s success raising money for a victims’ defense fund, and information on victims coming forward from a Charlottesville prosecutor. 

For at least two women who were sexually assaulted at UVA, the account in Rolling Stone of a student’s brutal assault in a fraternity house and her devastation in the aftermath is hauntingly familiar.

In November 2004, Annie McLaughlin, who then went by her maiden name, Hylton, did what few women at UVA or anywhere else had done: She went public with her story. In The Hook newspaper, under the headline “How UVA Turns Its Back on Rape,” McLaughlin used her real name and offered a blistering account of her assault in the Delta Tau Delta fraternity house and the school’s failure to take any action against her accused assailant, even after the Sexual Assault Board found him guilty. Then, as now, students protested and administrators promised change to outraged alumni and faculty, and yet, as recent stories attest, despite rewritten policies and increased focus on sexual assault prevention, violence against women at the school has continued.

“It’s heartbreaking,” said McLaughlin, now 31 and a married mother of two living in Maryland. “From what I’ve been able to tell online, there was a student protest. There was a student protest 10 years ago too. What is changing? What is going to change? Clearly this is still continuing to happen, and Jackie is clearly not the only person that this has happened to.”

Liz Seccuro, too, is horrified that years after her own 1984 assault at the school came to light, another woman is reporting being gang raped in Phi Kappa Psi, the same fraternity house where Seccuro was attacked. Seccuro’s case drew the national spotlight after her assailant wrote her a letter of apology, which authorities used as evidence to get a conviction against him in 2007, more than 22 years after the crime. Since that time, Seccuro, a 1988 UVA grad, has become an activist who has regularly and publicly prodded UVA to improve its approach to sexual assault.

“I don’t understand that along with tradition, excellence, beauty and honor, there can’t be common sense,” she said, days after the Rolling Stone article was posted online. “I don’t understand how something with a beautiful shell can have such a rotten core, that something so evil is lurking there.”

Both McLaughlin and Seccuro hope that the current uproar is large enough—and lasts long enough—to bring about the kind of change they’ve been demanding for years, and they believe that change must happen from the highest level of the administration down to the student body. Both women say one of the most troubling aspects of the Rolling Stone story was Jackie’s description of her friends’ response to her rape: They encouraged her to keep it quiet to avoid drawing negative attention.

“That to me is very upsetting,” said McLaughlin, who eventually sued her assailant and was awarded $150,000. “I always had every single teammate and friend support me. I’d have thought that in 10 years we would have come even further.”

Although both agree there is a significant problem at some fraternities, neither woman believes shutting down the Greek system entirely is the answer. Both were members of sororities, and Seccuro has married twice, both times to UVA fraternity members.  Painting all fraternity men with the same broad brush, they say, is unfair.

“I had friends who were in frats who were members of One in Four,” said McLaughlin, referring to the campus men’s group that works to prevent violence against women.  “I think the problem goes beyond fraternities,” she said, mentioning athletic teams as another all-male group setting in which sexual assault happens and may be overlooked or even encouraged.

“I don’t think the answer is getting rid of frats across the board,” she said. “That doesn’t necessarily help other universities figure out how to help stop sexual assault.”

Hylton believes administrators, and particularly UVA deans who have heard victims’ stories for years, hold a key to changing the culture by using the particular details of women’s accounts to create targeted action plans that might include, among other things, greater oversight or a change in rules regarding fraternity parties.

“They are hearing these women come and say ‘I was raped in a fraternity,’” she said. “Why then, did UVA not do something very specific about the details? I’m sure they know about other details that they haven’t had to report where they could also focus attention.”

Hylton and Seccuro also say there must be stronger support for victims, and they empathize with Jackie, whose case is now under investigation and continues to be the focus of intense media scrutiny.

“No one trains survivors how to work with the media,” said Seccuro. “I feel for her.”

“She should be very proud of herself,” adds McLaughlin, who said that despite the anxiety the revival of her own story brings, she does not regret going public a decade ago, and she hopes other women will follow her own and now Jackie’s lead.

“Hopefully this will bring national attention both to UVA and the larger issue of sexual assault that is desperately needed,” she said.

This story is part of our ongoing coverage in the wake of the Rolling Stone story on rape at UVA. There’s more: An in-depth look at the University’s sexual assault policy, a Q&A with Board of Visitors member Helen Dragas on her reaction to the story, responses from two women who reported their own rapes while students, a look at an alumna’s success raising money for a victims’ defense fund, and information on victims coming forward from a Charlottesville prosecutor. 

For the handful of current and former UVA students named in the Rolling Stone story that rocked the University last week, the publication of the piece didn’t come as a shock. That doesn’t mean they weren’t taken aback.

Freelance reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely first got in touch with Emily Renda in July. Renda, a 2014 graduate now working as a project coordinator on sexual assault prevention for UVA Vice President and Chief Student Affairs Officer Patricia Lampkin’s office, is a well-known and outspoken advocate for sexual assault victims and for policy reform at the University. Back in April, when she was still a student serving as co-chair of the Sexual Assault Leadership Council, she wrote a piece for the Huffington Post detailing her rape by a party date as a first-year. She’s long been frank about what happened to her at UVA.

“I’ve never really thought twice about participating in any kind of forum where I’m asked to share my personal experience,” said Renda, who knows the still-anonymous woman called “Jackie” whose story is at the center of the Rolling Stone piece. “By speaking out, you give permission for others to speak out. I never really hesitated to share my story.”

Erdely approached other activists, too, including Sara Surface, a student leader with University’s Sexual Violence Prevention Coalition; Alex Pinkleton, a rape survivor and a member of anti-sexual assault advocacy group One Less; and Brian Head, president of UVA’s all-male sexual assault peer education group One in Four. All were quoted in Erdely’s piece, but their advocacy work wasn’t mentioned.

That bothers Renda and Surface, who both said they felt that Erdely didn’t accurately represent them or the University’s activism community.

“We were sort of portrayed as party people that she found on Rugby Road,” Surface said.

“I was dismayed that after having told my story to so many people, I was portrayed as though I somehow didn’t report or share my story because I wanted to gain some sort of social status,” said Renda, who is quoted in the piece as saying she drank to deal with her own rape after not reporting it to the school. “I didn’t want to see that trivialized, as if I was a socially climbing alcoholic. I think that nuance was totally missed.”

Surface also accurately predicted people would pounce on one detail that didn’t ring true to many current and former students: the claim that the offensive old frat song “Rugby Road,” which includes verses that praise binge drinking and girls who will “fuck for 50 cents,” was still an “integral part” of UVA culture.

But both women said their main concern was that the story failed to explain the complexities of the University’s sexual assault policies, and unnecessarily vilified administrators, including Associate Dean Nicole Eramo, whom Renda and Surface praised as a strong defender of victims.

“It’s a subject that evokes a lot of anger and disgust and grief,” Renda said, and she’d hoped the story would have done more to educate people. “In circumstances like that, it’s really easy to point fingers, create an effigy, hang it and burn it. You want to be angry at something. I don’t think there’s a lot of critical engagement.”

“My biggest fear from this is that there will be people who don’t think that there are allies at the University, which is just completely untrue,” said Surface.

“I think it’s really encouraging that a lot of students are involved,” said Erdely in an interview the day after the Rolling Stone piece was published online. “I’m sorry they feel that I didn’t shine enough of a light on that. I think they are a very small and important light on a very dark campus. Their work is hopefully in its infancy, and hopefully will start to take on greater significance and importance. I did not mean to undermine their good work.”

Erdely acknowledged that her story showed one side of UVA culture, “but it is the dominant culture,” she said. Which is why she kept hammering on those “Rugby Road” verses.

“That’s what I wanted to address, that the degradation of women is intrinsically woven into the campus, and on every campus, and frankly in our culture,” she said. “If people are getting confused by that, I’m sorry to hear that. It’s another aspect of their denialism.”

Despite their qualms, Renda and Surface were adamant that the piece served an important purpose: It’s blown up an issue that for too long has been dealt with quietly or ignored.

“I think the intent of the article is to erase the silence around sexual assault on college campuses,” said Surface. “I think nationally, that will hopefully be an effect.”

When asked if she regretted agreeing to be a part of the story, Renda paused.

“It’s very much a double-edged sword,” she finally said. “I’m trying to think of something comparable, and I’m thinking about it like an amputation. We’ve lost our innocence and our ability to ignore this. That said, having a leg chopped off hurts.”