SPORTS

Trustees criticize UK's suit against newspaper

Morgan Watkins
@morganwatkins26

BOWLING GREEN — The University of Kentucky’s lawsuit against its student newspaper over an open records dispute drew sharp criticism from a few UK trustees Friday after the college's president defended the way the school has handled the situation.

UK is appealing a decision by Attorney General Andy Beshear that said the university violated Kentucky's open records law when it denied the Kentucky Kernel's request for information on a professor accused of sexual misconduct.

At the Board of Trustees meeting Friday, UK President Eli Capilouto emphasized the university's responsibility to protect victims' privacy.

"I feel deeply that our students involved in this incident and their families deserve privacy," he said. "They should be the only ones who decide whether to tell the details of their story."

But trustee David Hawpe, a former Courier-Journal editor, criticized the university's handling of the Kernel case.

"I think the university’s position is unwise and unfair," Hawpe said. "Secrecy leaves people in doubt about how the university is operating. ..."

Hawpe said he was simply offering his opinion. He said  he was told the president would resign if he prompted a vote on this issue at Friday's meeting.

But board chairman Britt Brockman denied telling Hawpe that Capilouto would resign if there was a vote; instead, he said, Brockman told Hawpe that if the board voted on the issue and was divided that the president potentially could step aside to avoid being the focus of the conversation.

Trustees first discussed the Kernel lawsuit during a closed executive session Friday morning, Brockman said, but the issue came up again when the board reconvened that afternoon. The meeting was held on the campus of Western Kentucky University.

Beshear, whom UK cannot name as a party in the lawsuit, said he will ask a judge to let him intervene in the case after the university refused to let his office review the records it withheld from the Kernel. Those documents pertained to James Harwood, a former associate professor of entomology, whom the Kernel reported was accused not only of sexual harassment but also of sexual assault.

Although UK hasn’t handed over the documents on Harwood, the Kernel received the records from another source and has published some details. The Kernel, which did not identify the victims, has reported that Harwood denied the accusations against him but agreed to resign and continued receiving his salary until the end of August.

Capilouto said Friday that the Kernel, by printing "salacious details" to attract readers, effectively identified the victims in this situation.

The people who muster the courage to come forward with their stories of sexual assault must be given full assurance that those details will remain confidential, Capilouto said.

"But the bottom line for me is this: Losing a case in court along with the attendant headlines worries me much less than not doing everything I can to fight for the privacy and confidentiality of those victim survivors," he told the trustees.

But when UK handed out copies of two letters written by victims in the Harwood case at Friday's public meeting, one of those letters included the first name of one of the victims. University spokesman Jay Blanton quickly emailed the Courier-Journal a new copy of the letter that no longer included that person's name and said they had redacted references to the victims' names before distributing the letters but accidentally missed one.

The trustees took no action Friday on the Kernel case.

Trustee Lee Blonder, a faculty representative on the board, said the university has mishandled the case, adding that  it puts the faculty of UK's journalism school – who teach the students who write for the Kernel – in a difficult position.

"The situation has gone national," she said. "I think that this has to become, at some point after it plays out, a teaching moment for all of us."

Trustee Mark Bryant also criticized UK's lawsuit saying the university could redact victims' names before releasing the information that has been requested. "What do we have to hide?" Bryant asked.

After the afternoon meeting, Brockman, the board's chair, said he knows 17 people – meaning the other trustees – who don't agree with the three board members who spoke against UK's handling of the Kernel situation.

During Friday's meeting, Brockman read aloud letters from the two victims.

"The resolution of this case was that, ultimately, there was enough evidence for a reasonable person to find Dr. Harwood guilty for two counts of sexual harassment, and two counts of sexual assault," one of the letters said. "Unfortunately, the refusal of an open records request of our case has eclipsed the bigger issue of misconduct in the sciences (and academia) as well as what we can do to prevent it from happening in the future."

There also was a court hearing Friday for UK's lawsuit against the Kernel, although Blanton, the university's spokesman, said no significant action was taken on the case.

The Kernel lawsuit isn’t the only legal challenge UK recently has made over attorney general opinions. The university also has sued the Lexington Herald-Leader over an issue involving the state’s open meetings law.

During Friday's meetings in Bowling Green, the trustees reviewed Capilouto’s annual performance evaluation. Capilouto was commended for his integrity, for building productive relationships with lawmakers and stakeholders, and for being proactive about fostering a diverse, inclusive community at the university. However, the evaluation said there was room for improvement when it came to ensuring UK’s compliance with state laws on open records and open meetings.

Reporter Morgan Watkins can be reached at (502) 875-5136 or mwatkins@courier-journal.com.