FSU Official Admits Football Players Get Special Treatment in Sexual Assault Cases

[BusSport]

From ESPN:

The Florida State University official once in charge of the office that counsels campus r*pe victims told lawyers suing the school that football players receive special treatment, and that most of the 20 victims who alleged sexual assaults by team members during the past nine years declined to press student conduct charges.

Melissa Ashton, who had been director of FSU's victim advocate program until August, made the statement in a deposition given this past June in an ongoing civil lawsuit filed by former student Erica Kinsman against the university.

Speaking of others who said they had been sexually assaulted at the school over the past nine years by football players, Ashton said the majority "chose not to go through a process, a lot of times based on fear." Ashton said victims had "a fear of retaliation, seeing what has happened in other cases and not wanting that to be them."

In her deposition, Ashton estimated that her office had probably dealt with as many as 40 cases involving football players and other incidents of "intimate-partner violence." She added that her office offered help to more than 100 victims of sexual battery on FSU's campus during 2014. She was somewhat critical overall of how the university deals with student conduct cases, saying, for example, that the university does not have a practice of expelling students who violate student conduct rules.

But in her statements she said she was concerned that athletes get preferential treatment during investigations of misconduct, including access to an athletic department official who helps them get access to outside lawyers.

 

[theboardref]

If you did any type of research in to the Jameis Winston case, like I have, you read this and say, NO SHIT.

 

[bamabear82]

 

[cwerph]

If it was her job to counsel and advocate for these victims, why did she allow the preferential treatment of athletes and intimidation of these poor girls? She should have been fired a long time ago.

 

[7Samurai13]

@FSUmanager gonna be pissed.

 

[occupant]

You guise are SO quick to judge...

 

[FSUmanager]

@FSUmanager gonna be pissed.

Not at all. Saw this long before ESPN wrote a story. Will sat this though. In the original AP story the number was 20 sexyal assault victims and 20 of the intimate partner violence.

There were 113 case reported in 2014. She is upset at the reporting because only 9 were reported to the feds. That being due to the Clery Act which only requires universities to report on campus sexual assaults.

Per usual some media outlets have chosen to omit certain things for whatever reason. Tampa Bay Times gave more detail than ESPN. It is what it is. When/If specifics come out I will comment more.