Thirteen months ago, The Chronicle's editorial board had this to say about the Brodhead administration's performance during the lacrosse case: "People should not forget to recognize the adequacy of a 'good' performance in the turbulent and charged atmosphere of the last year. And in the end, history may very well judge the University's response as sensible and well executed given the constraints and competing interests at stake."
It's hard to imagine anyone offering that assessment today.
Of the 2006 lacrosse team's 47 players, 44 (plus their former coach) have now sued or settled multi-million dollar claims against the University. Forty-one players' lawsuits are still pending, and Duke has retained former U.S. Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick (whose firm bills as high as $700 per hour) to mastermind the University's defense strategy.
If that's a "good" performance, then I can hardly imagine what a "bad" one would be.
Consider the most recent lawsuit, which was filed last week by prominent Washington attorney Charles Cooper on behalf of 38 lacrosse families. Cooper's claim largely echoes the December 2007 suit brought by Durham attorney Bob Ekstrand on behalf of Breck Archer, Ryan McFadyen and Matthew Wilson, documenting alleged collusion between Duke and Durham authorities to frame the players.
Particularly upsetting are Cooper's assertions that Brodhead and other senior administrators committed "constructive fraud through abuse of confidential relationship," negligently failed to supervise employees and failed "to protect students from known dangers."
But unlike Ekstrand's filing, which targets the case of three players who say they were wrongly suspended, Cooper's complaint advocates for all the other team members who felt threatened and wronged despite not being indicted.
It also comes complete with a PR consultant, a Web site and a high-profile press conference. That pageantry is a far cry from the closed-door negotiations and confidential settlements that characterized Duke's earlier dealings with Reade Seligmann, Collin Finnerty and David Evans, signalling a very different set of motives behind the Cooper suit.
As former lacrosse parent Steven Henkelman explained Thursday, his family joined Cooper's action "because no one in Duke's leadership has been willing to accept real responsibility for their wrongful conduct. Because no one in Duke's leadership has taken any action against those at Duke who violated the University's own policies specifically designed to prevent the type of abuses and harassment inflicted on our sons. Because no one in Duke's leadership has had the integrity to look these young men and their parents in the eye and personally apologize."
With litigants like the Henkelmans pressing for "responsibility" and "action," Duke could be in for a very interesting discovery process as the year progresses. These 38 families have already turned down the University's offers to fully compensate them for their expenses-legal and otherwise-during the saga, lending credence to the assertion that their goals extend well beyond money.
If that is indeed the case, then we should view this suit as the logical result of administrators' decision to shirk responsibility and stymie reform at every opportunity. From the newly disbanded Judicial Affairs Review Committee to the Campus Culture Initiative and beyond, Duke administrators have remained disconcertingly slow to learn from their mistakes, which were legion.
Don't expect admins to acknowledge that is was their unique combination of ignorance, arrogance and denial that brought us to this point.
But the inconvenient and unavoidable truth now seems to be that in his haste to avoid the perception "that a well-connected institution was improperly attempting to influence the judicial process" back in March 2006, Brodhead created many more problems than he solved.
Too bad the whole University will get stuck with the bill.
Kristin Butler is a Trinity senior. Her column runs every Tuesday.
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