Tufts mediation policy between perpetrators and victims

In the American Prospect, Tufts’ policy is mentioned in the article (emphasis mine):

Perhaps it’s because making rape prevention the responsibility of young women teaches students that guys can’t be expected to be responsible for their own actions. Not surprisingly, that results in student bodies eager to let rapists off the hook and campus policies (like the one recently implemented at Tufts that forces victims into “mediation” with their rapists) that treat rape as an unfortunate disagreement instead of like the violent crime it is.

There have been a few questions about this policy (it unfortunately is not new and has been around for a long time) Tufts has that forces perpetrators and their victims to go into mediation when a complaint is filed. I will show exactly where you can find this.

The 2003 version of the Student Judicial handbook is online. It’s a pretty short handbook and to begin the process, a complaintant writes their story. In the case of rape, the rapist gets an EXACT COPY of what the victim said and has 48 hours to reply. This isn’t always the case – there has been an incident where a victim wrote her account and the rapist didn’t have to respond. Then if the stories don’t agree with each other, a date is made for a Judicial Hearing if the complaintant wants the perpetrator to have disciplinary action against them. Before that hearing, mediation is required.

The 2003 version is very out of date. It had a clause that said

Note: Mediation may not be appropriate in cases where the issue involves the behavior of an individual who may pose harm or danger to others in the community.

For some INSANE reason, that was taken out. A more recent copy for the 2008-2009 Handbook can be found here for download.

On the page about Sexual Assault (page 19 on the 2008 copy) the first sentence is

Sexual assault cases follow the same general set of procedures as other cases

This means that mediation is a step that mandatory. During the Spring 2009 sexual violence community forum, students expressed their concern about this necessary step. The administrators at the meeting (which included the Dean of Student Affarirs, Dean Reitman and the Judicial Affairs Officer, Veronica Carter), steadfastly DEFENDED this measure and refuse to acknowledge the ridiculousness of having the raped and raper mediate with one another.

Why is this school so reluctant to change their policies? Mediation should be only optional – I’m sure that if it was in sexual assault cases it would rarely be used, if at all. Most survivors who have made it far enough to report would not want to have their rape trivialized by the rapist’s lawyer offering  that the perpetrator does community service because someone “thought that they were raped.”

Yet another sign that Tufts does not take sexual assault on campus seriously.

edit 09/27/09

I have been told that Tufts claims to not “force” their survivors into mediation with their rapists. However, it is still an option, which I think is very wrong. I think that this issue shows that Tufts needs a completely different guide to judicial hearings regarding sexual assault, instead of just one page in the current handbook.