Author: Melissa Angell

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Frat brothers’ defamation case thrown out

Phi Kappa Psi. File photo

A New York federal judge dismissed a defamation lawsuit on June 29 filed by three members of Phi Kappa Psi against Rolling Stone and writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely for the now-discredited 2014 story, “A Rape on Campus.”

“Their defamation claims are directed toward a report about events that simply did not happen,” wrote U.S. District Judge P. Kevin Castel in his decision.

George Elias IV, Stephen Hadford and Ross Fowler were UVA students in 2012, when the alleged rape occurred, although a Charlottesville Police investigation later determined no evidence the gang rape described in Erdely’s article ever took place. None of the plaintiffs were identified by name, but they claim that the article’s references to the attackers inadvertently involved them—even though they also claim that the same attackers were invented by “Jackie.”

The three fraternity members said the story could have prompted friends, family and peers to erroneously deduce that they were participants in the gang rape.

Elias said it could be inferred from the description of the room where the purported rape occurred that it was the room he lived in for two years and the only one accessible at the top of the stairs without an electronic keypad lock.

“Now, climbing the frat-house stairs with Drew, Jackie felt excited,” said the article. “Drew ushered Jackie into a bedroom, shutting the door behind them.”

Castel disagreed, and said that while Elias had one of several bedrooms on the second floor, the article did not identify him.

Fowler’s qualms arose with the story’s insinuations that the alleged gang rape was a requirement for initiation with its statements such as, “Don’t you want to be a brother?” and “We all had to do it, so you do, too.” As the fraternity’s rush chair, he alleged the story directly implies that he was the maestro behind the heinous acts described.

Fowler further claims that as an avid swimmer who frequented UVA’s Aquatic Center, readers would automatically associate him as one of the rape’s perpetrators.

Judge Castel didn’t buy those claims either, and said Fowler relied on an interpretation at odds with the surrounding context created by the article and said a “strained or artificial construction” could not be made defamatory.

“Essentially, real people don’t have a right to sue when someone makes up fictitious people that in some way resembles them,” says legal expert David Heilberg.

Hadford, a 2013 UVA graduate, continued to live on Grounds for 15 months after graduation and frequently rode his bike between his residence and his job at UVA Medical Center’s emergency department. According to Jackie, former associate dean Nicole Eramo claimed all of Jackie’s perpetrators had graduated, yet, Jackie had seen one riding his bicycle that same day she talked to Eramo.

“Friends, family, and acquaintances of Hadford would have made the connection that Hadford must have been the person who Jackie saw riding his bike on campus,” he claimed in his suit. The judge denied this allegation because the article failed to provide additional details of the bike rider.

This is one of three cases that Rolling Stone and Erdely faces. Phi Kappa Psi also filed a defamation suit, and another hearing in Eramo’s lawsuit is scheduled August 12 in Roanoke.

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Hungry bears on the move

No, not the bathroom for female bears. Warnings of bear sightings are posted at Mint Springs. Staff photo

A black bear near the Barracks Road Shopping Center created a frenzy June 21 as excited grocery shoppers caught a glimpse of the furry mammal behind Harris Teeter. The bear ventured toward a construction site off Arlington Boulevard and ran into the woods when police arrived.

Bear sightings this time of year are not unusual, says Bob Crickenberger, Albemarle director of parks & recreation, who has gotten about a half dozen reports of bears on hiking trails in 2016. “Their food supply is limited so they move in search of food, which means trash cans are an easy target,” he says. So are dumpsters, which the parks lock to discourage foraging.

Mint Springs Valley Park in Crozet gets the most sightings of county parks, followed by the more remote Patricia Ann Byrom Forest Preserve. As a safety precaution, bathroom doors at Mint Springs recently were posted with bear warnings.

Encounters with black bears are generally harmless, unless pets are not kept on leash. Crickenberger recalls one instance of a dog injured when it charged a bear, and he reminds residents that county regs require dogs to be on a leash.

And if you see cubs, he suggests, “I would back pedal.”

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Missing doctors: Patient seeks records after clinic closes

Dr. Zachary Bush, right, opened alternative clinic Revolution Health Center in Scottsville. Dr. Martin Katz was a partner there, and both told their patients: “You have the power to heal yourself.” John Robinson

When a medical practice in Scottsville shut down and relocated to Charlottesville, a lupus-stricken patient was frantic, thinking 15 years’ worth of her medical records had vanished.

Jennie Hamilton-Thorne of Keene says she last visited a doctor at Revolution Health Center in December and was not notified the practice was moving in January. When she went back again in late April, the clinic had closed. She says she learned from Scottsville Pharmacy that the “doctors had left town.”

“I sent an e-mail in May, asking for my records because I did not wish to travel out to Charlottesville,” says Hamilton-Thorne. “I received no reply, so I called and left messages. I even wrote them.”

She says she received no response, leading her to believe that her doctor had gone missing and the practice was ignoring her.

“I hadn’t seen him in weeks or heard from anyone, so I involved the Virginia Board of Medicine to help obtain my records,” says Hamilton-Thorne. She learned that her physician had an address change. The board also assisted her in a written request for her records.

One of Hamilton-Thorne’s doctors wasn’t missing at all—but instead, had left the practice. Dr. Martin Katz is now with Downtown Family Health Care in Charlottesville.

According to the Code of Virginia, physicians are required to transfer patient records when a practice relocates, is sold or closes.

In an e-mail to Hamilton-Thorne, Revolution says it attempted to notify patients of its move starting in late 2015, and that it changed its phone message, posted signs, sent e-mails and in some cases letters to patients without e-mail.

Hamilton-Thorne notes that she received her first response from Revolution Health Center after contacting C-VILLE, and she found an unsigned e-mail lurking in her junk mail June 22 that offered a brief apology followed by an explanation of Revolution’s attempt to notify patients of its move.

Revolution says it mailed Hamilton-Thorne’s records June 21 after receiving her e-mail request and before C-VILLE contacted the clinic.

Revolution says it did not receive Hamilton-Thorne’s previous e-mails and phone calls. “I do not remember receiving a phone call nor voice message from you in May either,” writes Stacey Forren in an e-mail to Hamilton-Thorne.

“A written medical records request must be received by Revolution Health Center to have a patient’s medical records transferred either to themselves or another physician’s office,” Forren says.

All medical record requests will be processed within 48 hours upon receipt, she says. Revolution Health Center will not e-mail records to patients or other physicians’ offices; however, records can be faxed or mailed via the United States Postal Service. Patients may also pick up their records from the office if they’ve made prior arrangements to do so.

Hamilton-Thorne consulted Revolution’s website, which says the grand opening of the new center is anticipated in mid-2016 and provides details of the location of the temporary clinic.

C-VILLE reached out to Dr. Zachary Bush, one of the senior founding partners at Revolution Health Center. “At this time he is not giving any interviews with the local media as the transition to Charlottesville is not complete,” says an e-mail signed by the Revolution Health Team.

On June 25, Hamilton-Thorne received some of her records and says she’s continuing to lobby for the rest.

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UPDATED: Judge denies Eramo’s request for Jackie’s e-mails

UVA Associate Dean Nicole Eramo. Photo: UVA University Communications

A judge denied Nicole Eramo’s request for additional documentation from Jackie in Eramo’s lawsuit against Rolling Stone.

The 46-minute hearing was conducted June 20 before U.S. Magistrate Judge Joel C. Hoppe, who released his verdict the next day. Hoppe ruled that “the steps taken by Jackie’s counsel were relatively straight forward and appear to have exhausted all known areas of inquiry for responsive communications currently in Jackie’s possession.”

In court, Andrew Phillips, representing Eramo, expressed frustration at Jackie’s failure to respond to Eramo’s subpoena ordering Jackie to produce all documents and electronically stored communications between herself and Ryan Duffin and between herself and Haven Monahan.

To provide a refresher, the 2014 Rolling Stone article detailed Jackie’s alleged rape on September 28, 2012. After the rape, Jackie claims she emerged from the fraternity house Phi Kappa Psi disheveled and battered after the incident and contacted three friends. The friends immediately met with her, but were depicted within the article as callous and self-absorbed.

Jackie’s friend “Randall” in the story is Ryan Duffin, a young man with whom Jackie was not only friends, but was also enamoured. The romantic feelings, however, were not reciprocated. Eramo’s lawyers claim that, in response, Jackie created the alias of Haven Monahan and set up a ploy to engage communication between Monahan and Duffin, using texting services such as Text Free, an application that allows users to use different phone numbers for anonymous texting.

A subpoena was served on Yahoo to investigate the e-mail address of Monahan. Yahoo complied, and said the e-mail account was created one day prior to the day that Duffin received an e-mail from Monahan titled “about u.” The e-mail’s content included a flattering short essay that Jackie wrote about Duffin, according to Eramo’s attorney.

The e-mail starts off with commentary from Monahan: “you should read this. iv never read anything nicer in my life.” The e-mail goes on about Duffin: “He’s gorgeous, but gorgeous is an understatement. More like you’re startled every time you see him because you notice something new in a Where’s Waldo sort of way.” This e-mail from Monahan was sent to Duffin days after Jackie claimed she was raped at Monahan’s fraternity.

“The ‘about u’ message was one of the first things that made me particularly skeptical of Haven Monahan’s identity,” Duffin tells C-VILLE. “It seemed strange to be contacted directly by Jackie’s alleged assailant so soon after the attack. After I received that email, I started trying to find out if Haven was actually a student at the school. My search turned up nothing, but that wasn’t enough proof. It wasn’t shown definitively until the media was able to start making inquiries.”

Phillips told the court that there was heavy underlying evidence based on two known e-mail exchanges between Duffin and Monahan, along with hundreds of texts, that Jackie had orchestrated this communication and authored the messages. Phillips demanded an explanation.

Jackie’s counsel, Philip O’Beirne, retorted that these requests are unnecessary and have been deemed so in the past by a previous judge’s ruling. O’Beirne further said that a forensic investigation was completed on all of Jackie’s electronic devices and accounts and nothing was found that met Eramo’s demands.

The attorney went on to say that Eramo was attacking Jackie with attempts to obtain these documents and that it was inappropriate to include details of the assault that weren’t mentioned in the original interviews conducted by Rolling Stone. “Rolling Stone doesn’t think there’s any merit,” O’Beirne said.

Hoppe concluded in his order that any further explanation of Jackie’s search process was “unnecessary and not calculated to lead to a stone unturned.”

Updated: June 22 with judge’s decision

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Changing of the BOV guard

James Murray joins the UVA Board of Visitors with previous experience on the College of William & Mary BOV. Photo courtesy James Murray

Every year, the governor announces appointments to the University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors. While donations are not a prerequisite, it’s been common in the past to find that appointees have contributed to the governor, and this year is no exception. Three out of the four new members have made significant donations. President Teresa Sullivan’s four new bosses will begin their terms July 1.

Elizabeth Cranwell

Hailing from Roanoke, Cranwell is a public relations professional and a Democratic activist. A UVA alumna, she holds a bachelor’s degree in American government and Spanish along with a master’s in public communication from American University. She is married to Richard “Dickie” Cranwell, former Democratic Party of Virginia chairman from 2005-2010 and former majority leader in the House of Delegates. Cranwell is the only new visitor who is not a major McAuliffe donor.

Thomas DePasquale

DePasquale is chairman of Yopine and former president and CEO of Outtask Inc., a company that introduced Cliqbook, a service that aids with online corporate travel management, as well as a self-proclaimed visionary, according to his LinkedIn page. DePasquale attended the McIntire School of Commerce at UVA and graduated with a degree in commerce with a concentration in accounting. He’s also the biggest donor of the new appointees, writing checks totaling nearly $124,000.

Babur Lateef

Lateef is an ophthalmologist who has his own practice in Woodbridge and who has improved accessibility for patients within the region who require extensive eye care treatment. Lateef is also a volunteer physician for the Prince William County Area Free Clinic, and he holds a bachelor’s degree from Youngstown State University and an M.D. from Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine.

James. Murray Jr.

Charlottesville native Murray is a venture capitalist who has been a founder or a founding partner of various companies, including Court Square Ventures and Columbia Capital, which he started with former-governor-now Senator Mark Warner. He is the author of Wireless Nation: The Frenzied Launch of the Cellular Revolution in America, which provides his industry-insider account. Murray, a founder of the Presidential Precinct, has previous BOV experience at the College of William & Mary, where he served for six years and where he earned a law degree. He attended UVA as an undergraduate. Murray, who makes 100-wealthiest-Virginians lists, is also a big donor to both sides of the aisle.

Mark Bowles of Goochland was reappointed for a second term to the BOV. Bowles is a partner and executive vice president of McGuireWoods Consulting. He graduated from James Madison University with a degree in English and political science and attended law school at the University of Richmond. He joined the board last year as a replacement for Dr. Edward Miller, who resigned after disagreements arose with the board about discrepancies in UVA’s medical system and the 11 percent tuition hike.

Frank Atkinson of Ashland, Victoria Harker of McLean and Bobbie Kilberg of Herndon were all appointed by Republican Governor Bob McDonnell on July 1, 2012, and were each eligible for reappointment, but were not reinstated. Atkinson noted that he would not seek reappointment.

Helen Dragas of Virginia Beach concluded her second BOV term June 10, which is also the four-year anniversary of her announcement while rector that Teresa Sullivan would resign as president. Neither faculty, students nor alumni took kindly to her efforts, expressing their rage through protests, which, after 18 days of leaderless turmoil, saw Sullivan reinstated. While Dragas was an advocate for keeping tuition low, her legacy is inextricably tied with the 2012 debacle.

 

Donations from each member pictured above

 

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Close to home: Charlottesville reacts to Orlando massacre

Someone fired a gun on the Corner Saturday night. File photo: Martyn Kyle

 

A shot rang out in front of Eddy’s Tavern on the Corner after a dispute had taken place within the establishment Sunday, June 12 at 1:34am. Not even 30 minutes later, rounds of gunfire were unleashed in Orlando, an assault that is now lamented as one of the worst attacks since 9/11, and the deadliest mass shooting in American history.

The incident at Eddy’s began to brew with a noticeable disagreement between two people that broke out into a dispute near the patio, according to a release. Several minutes later, a gunshot was fired outside the restaurant. Charlottesville Police officers on foot patrol quickly responded and were met with a huge crowd at the scene, but the suspect, described as an African-American male in his early 20s with a stocky build wearing a white tank top, had already fled.

“Police were here right away for everyone’s safety,” says James Tharpe, head chef at Eddy’s. “No hysteria, no running, nothing like that took place. We still had our doors open because it was before 2 in the morning, but we [also] kept doors open so the police could come in and speak to individuals.”

Another report of gunshots occurred around 5am Sunday on Cherry Avenue. And less than a week earlier on June 7, officers were dispatched to Gordon Avenue. Students were notified of the gunman threat on Gordon and were instructed to avoid the area.

A public safety substation debuted in January on the Corner as a resource to help students who find themselves in high-risk situations.

“The reception area exists as a place for students that need to get home or if they don’t feel safe,” says Jerry Leon, substation program coordinator. “We can provide escorts for them, we can call cabs for them. Reception is here 24/7.”

Virginia is no stranger to gun violence and the Orlando nightclub shooting has now displaced the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre as the deadliest shooting by a sole gunman within the United States.

“It’s a terrible crime,” says Delegate Rob Bell. “Obviously we’re keeping these families in our prayers. It’s a terrorist incident on our soil,” Bell says he’d need to know more details about the Orlando investigation when asked about legislation to prevent this from occurring in Virginia.

“We are stunned by this senseless act of violence because Orlando could have been any one of our communities,” says 5th District congressional candidate Jane Dittmar. “It is a reminder of how easy it is for people who have deadly intentions to shoot Americans in a church, a school, a movie theater and now a nightclub. This was not just an attack on Floridians, it was an attack on all of us—on what defines us as a country.”

The shooter, Omar Mateen, pledged his allegiance to the Islamic State over a 911 phone call before committing the mass shooting. According to the New York Times, Mateen had been the subject of two investigations with the FBI for possible links to terrorism prior to the catastrophe, yet he was still able to legally purchase an assault weapon and held a firearms and a security-officer license.

The Islamic Society of Central Virginia strongly condemned the recent shootings in Orlando in a statement. “This attack does not represent the values or teachings of the Islamic faith or of the Muslim community and we stand united against any and every criminal act of this sort. We send our deepest condolences to the families and friends of the deceased at this extremely difficult time.”

Cville Pride is hosting a candlelight vigil at 7:30 pm tonight at the Free Speech Monument on the Downtown Mall.