10:48 PM - The Swastika Hearing
This is an excerpt of a letter sent to the Link, from a member of a panel that heard the swastika case.
"I just read the article by Peggy Curan ("Scrawled swastika on Israeli flag not harassment", The Gazette, June 12, 2003), and realized that my name was published in The Gazette as one of the student panelists in the case.
... "I have no doubt that some members of the previous CSU or its supporters know how I voted in this case... They also know that I am opposed to any panelist biasing a decision by bringing a personal agenda with them into a hearing. This means, for example, that a panelist should not twist or ignore the evidence in a case to suit their misguided sense of solidarity with an individual and/or the position they represent. Nor should a panelist go off and have a cigarette with a respondent or complainant in a case during a break. Both are acts of clear bias in a panelist that compromise the fairness and integrity of the hearing process. The former, while difficult to "prove," manifests as prejudiced reasoning during deliberation and is a form of intellectual dishonesty. The latter would be grounds for appeal; it�s a blatant procedural defect in a case and a clear statement of a panelist�s bias. In a formal legal system, this kind of behaviour would probably be used to support a claim of jury-rigging.
"Panelists must have a dispassionate, objective, and intellectually honest approach to adjudicating cases of student misconduct, be they related to academic misconduct or charges under the Code of Rights and Responsibilities. The rule of confidentiality bars me from stating how I voted in this case, because it might then make it easier to identify how the other panelists voted. All I can say is that anyone who has ever served on a panel with me knows that as a panelist I strive toward an ideal of compassionate and humanistic fairness, but am more than capable of upholding a charge and choosing a punitive sanction for any student whom the evidence has clearly shown to be nothing more than a provocateur, an agitator, and a bully."
- Linda Chernabrow,
Graduate Student