Help - reporting former colleague’s sexual misconduct?

[Catabogus]

I really need some advice from fellow academics. I have just found out to my horror that a former colleague has been appointed to a lectureship at a UK university (after a few years out of academia). He quit his post with us after being suspended because 2 female students accused him of sexual assault, and another 3 students accused him of sexual harassment and of tampering with their grades in return for sexual favours.

There was a lot of evidence that the accusations were true - copies of text messages and photos he’d sent the victims, online logs showing grade tampering etc. All the victims were young international students, and I would say quite vulnerable (alone in the UK, weak spoken English etc). I was involved in supporting some of the women, had to attend a hearing etc, and it was all pretty awful.

Ultimately, he quit before he could be sacked, neither of the women who had been sexually assaulted wanted to go to the police, and there was apparently (frustratingly) not a lot more the university could do. A senior colleague assured me, though, that he would “never work again” in UK academia as they would “put the message out” about him. Clearly the message has not been put out very effectively though! And he is once again teaching on a course very popular with international students.

In light of reflecting on recent news events, I feel as though I need to do something to try to prevent anything even worse happening. But what? I was contemplating emailing his new (male) department head, but I don’t know the man - expect that he’s very senior and eminent. I looked for a student pastoral support tutor or similar but can’t find any details of anyone in his new faculty. Can I really email someone about this? Will I be breaching some kind of rule? Will they take me seriously? WWYD? I’d be really grateful for any advice as I’m agonising over what to do. I don’t think I can just do nothing.

Go to your HR in writing putting everything before then and state in writing what you were told and then ask why the heck is it still working and able to carry on? Copy in your union

Thanks for the reply! I didn’t think of HR (they tend to be totally useless and were dreadful throughout the whole case).

But can I really say “Prof X said he’d make sure ex-colleague never worked again by a targeted campaign of gossip on the HE grapevine, and he hasn’t done so”? I mean, I guess that’s what I’d be complaining about - I don’t think it was ever an official university policy! The official Rennes from my institution all the way through was that there was nothing more they could do.

so am I right that this person is now at a different university to you?

do you have any contacts at all at the new university?
do you still have the records / evidence from the old investigation?

I guess you could email HR at his university.
Or my university has a student advocate who's role is to support students (across any faculties) if they have a complaint or need to raise issues of bullying or harassment. If his new uni has a similar role, you could get in touch with that person.

If you still have old records, you can make it clear this is not just gossip but you have documentation.

Thanks Parietal . Yes, the ex-colleague is now at a different institution. I have no contacts there as far as I know (certainly not close or senior ones).

I do have a lot of records regarding the old investigation, but they contain a lot of personal info about some of the victims, so I don’t think I could share those. I was thinking I could perhaps just say contact my institution’s HR department for full details (but would they do that, and would HR actually corroborate my account given he quit of his own accord?)

A student advocate-type person at his new institution is exactly the kind of thing I was looking for, but I haven’t managed to find one yet. I can keep looking.

Have a look and see if there is a whistle-blowing policy where he has gone to. Under that policy you could contact them and make it known you have info to disclose. Keep it factual. It would be in public interest. I'm not sure if they will do anything but you can be sacked for lying about why you left your previous role if he'd put that on his application. Either way if a note goes on his file you've tried your best.

Your HR dept would have been asked for a reference and probably just gave dates as presumably it was technically allogations as he quit.

I wonder if your university supplied a reference?

My HoD said he’d never be given a reference by us. So I’m also wondering what he told his new employer about why he left and couldn’t get a reference…. Unless HR really did give him a “confirming the dates” reference.

I wonder how I can find a whistle blowing policy. I’ll have a look. Thanks Toucans.

You might find it useful to remind the HR department at either your uni, the other one, or both, that Strathclyde Uni and Heriot Watt had a situation regarding a prof who moved to Heriot Watt after an investigation at Strathclyde. He was ultimately convicted of sexual abuse of 7 students. I suspect Heriot Watt would have been very grateful if someone from Strathclyde had told Heriot Watt HR about the investigation at Strathclyde that resulted in him leaving. Though it appears from the article below that someone tried to...

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-52715585

I would approach your HR dept with evidence - but nothing identifying of the students concerned - redact with black boxes if needed. Make it about safeguarding students and maintaining the uni's reputation for looking after student wellbeing, not about your former colleague. Keep it very professional and try not to let your horror about this character show. Ask them to contact the HR dept at the new uni. Bring a union rep along.

Good luck. The more folk call out this kind of creepy behaviour the less common it will be and the safer our vulnerable students are.

Thanks very much Nerdy (I feel bad calling you that!). Very helpful advice and I appreciate the link to the Heriot Watt case, which I hadn’t heard about.

There is a bit of an issue with the Union though, which is that he appears to be heavily involved with them at his new institution. I can’t imagine they will take kindly to me reporting his behaviour. A shame, really, because they would potentially have been very helpful.

I disagree about the union. It’s not an old boys club - they are bound by professional and legal rules, they won’t just ignore a serious accusation simply because he’s volunteered to be union branch social secretary or whatever.
To be honest I’m not sure what’s stopping you contacting his HoD either - so what if he’s eminent? If he’s a decent and professional individual then he will also take this seriously.
I find it a bit worrying that you seem to think the other university won’t take you seriously or won’t do anything about this. At my institution the opposite would be true - it would be immediately and thoroughly investigated. And even if it wasn’t then at least I’d sleep better at night knowing I’d done everything I could!

Thanks Moving - I think what is bothering me is that he wasn’t sacked for this, he quit before he could be dismissed, was never formally charged etc. So if my institution’s HR refuses to confirm my account, or just says something like “he left of his own accord in 2018” or similar, then it may appear I’m a malicious gossip. And I might be breaching some sort of GDPR or similar by giving away personal details. Perhaps I’m over-thinking this.

With the union, I would think they would be more keen to protect a staff member of their own than to help me protect students. Just basing this on my past experience with UCU.

We had a similar case in my institution and we pushed HR to carry on with the investigation after the person resigned, so a finding was made. This allows HR to then include the disciplinary matter on any reference requests in the future. Worth knowing if you come across another case …

@thereinmadnesslies

We had a similar case in my institution and we pushed HR to carry on with the investigation after the person resigned, so a finding was made. This allows HR to then include the disciplinary matter on any reference requests in the future. Worth knowing if you come across another case …

That was what I really wanted them to do, but they hummed and hawed and said it wouldn’t be possible, nothing more they could do etc. It was extremely frustrating. Your institution sounds a lot more clued up!

I totally understand what you're worried about, I have had ' interesting' experiences with HR in the past where I got the feeling that one particular person's agenda was saving the uni's reputation rather than looking seriously into bullying. That's why the case I mentioned earlier is important to raise - it unequivocally made folk realise that dealing with abusers and bullies IS a matter of the uni's reputation.

If you don't trust the union (and it's very dependent on your local reps so I understand your nervousness, one of ours I'd trust, the other is dreadful) , then is there a senior academic you can ask to go with you? Is there someone you can contact through your learned society or other network that would back you up?

p.s. I'm nerdy and very proud of it!

@Catabogus I've never PMd someone before so I don't know if this will work. If I can help find you a senior academic to help then let me know. I do a fair amount in the EDI space as well as my 'real' research. Even if I just knew what discipline you're in it'd help.

OK, not that nerdy that I can work out how to PM obviously!

offer of help still stands...

Doing/saying something is definitely the right thing to do, but it's worth being very careful about how you do it. cf. this story Astrophysics professor sees off a libel case against her after branding her colleague a sex predator and accusing her boss of helping him get a new job (Daily Mail link). The whistleblower in that case is continuing to have a stellar career, but this must have been a horrific experience for her.

Are you sure your HR didn't reach a deal with him so that he resigned in good standing (and possible payout)? Very hard to tackle this if so.

Are you by any chance in a field with a professional body regulating / accrediting? Could whistleblow to them if so - but in a sense it's against your own institution for not laying a serious charge to rest. If he's been found guilty of nothing, not sure anyone can do anything with your accusations. Good luck though

Thanks to all for the advice. I have now managed to find the contact details for the academic head of equality, diversity and inclusion (not easy!). I am really worrying about what to say though - I do NOT want to face a libel case as ehtelp suggests above! Any suggestions on how to phrase this? I have no idea if our HR reached a deal with the ex-colleague, but I doubt it given the truly awful behaviour even beyond the sexual misconduct (he went very rogue when the grade tampering came to light). Do I put details in the email? Ask for a phone call? WWYD?

I wouldn't. You can't prove anything. They can't use anything you can't prove. Frankly they shouldn't - what's to stop him from doing the same to someone who turns him down ...

Libel suits rarely work in the UK but damaging someone's professional status is probably the easiest category to win.

Share your concerns and any evidence you have with HR at your own institution, in an email. Make it their (documented) problem. Disciplinary issues can be revisited after people leave, with proper justification. It's your own institution you need to focus on.

Thanks for this. I don’t know what HR at my institution can do now though - I presume they washed their hands of him when he left?

Might it be a good idea to post this issue on the main employment board? People from HR often pop up with advice there, but I don't think we get noticed here. You do need to protect yourself and there's no clear way to warn the new instituiton effectively, so with luck you'll get help there?

I'm concerned about this. If you talk to others about the case at your university that led to his resignation, you could be breaching confidentiality rules and also defamation laws. Please be careful. He was never convicted and even your own university investigation came to no conclusion. I know it's frustrating and I can see that if he is a predator he has put himself again in a position of authority over vulnerable young women. I don't really know what can be done within the law. This is why it's so important to convict - at least then there's a record.