By Erasmus Baxter
A Whatcom County Superior Court judge has denied a motion to prevent the release of a report that found a Western professor responsible for sexual harassment.
Copies of the report provided to the court show that the professor, who works in the department of communication sciences and disorders, admitted to having a three month relationship with post-baccalaureate student he was supervising. The student later filed a sexual harassment report with the Equal Opportunity Office alleging they had lost out on educational opportunities as a result.
The document was requested by the AS Review as part of a routine request for EOO investigations.
The professor’s attorney, Richard Hughes, argued that the report should be withheld because he did not believe the Equal Opportunity Office had the authority to investigate, and that the finding was incorrect. He said a consensual relationship could not be the basis for a sexual harassment complaint.
Assistant Attorney General Melissa Nelson, representing Western, argued that those were separate issues, and that the university was bound to release the documents under Washington’s public records act.
Judge Charles Snyder agreed. Concerns about the investigative process were not a part of the case at hand, and the report showed that the student said they suffered a loss in educational opportunity by not pursuing a thesis, as they were concerned about having to work with the professor, he said.
“I believe, by reading those documents and reading the case law, it is not the court’s determination as to whether or not it would come to the same conclusion under that investigation,” Snyder said. “It’s the court’s determination whether that investigation was conducted in such a way that the conclusion has some support and some validity.”
In reviewing the documents, Snyder found that the university came to a conclusion that was not inappropriate or capricious, and was based on university policies and information gathered in the investigation, he said.
The documents concerning disciplining a professor were subject to the public disclosure act, because the release of the information was of significant public interest, he said.
The report is planned to be released sometime next week, after Western redacts additional information about an allegation regarding the professor that was not found to be substantiated. Otherwise, the report will be released after approval by the court, and will contain the name of the professor and the details of the three substantiated allegations.
This story is developing and will be updated with additional details about the case.