Everything Hawk fans have denied, including those who say KF is beyond reproach, need to rethink what they have been saying. If this story is true, the who lot of them should be fired. And beyond than, convicted. They way they handled this rape is beyond belief.
This shows Ferentz WAS involved. How can anyone defend this?
http://www.press-citizen.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080719/NEWS01/807190322/1079
Alleged victim's mom criticizes UI
Says university officials were unresponsive
Brian Morelli and Lee Hermiston • © 2008 Iowa City Press-Citizen • July 19, 2007
University of Iowa officials, including Athletics Director Gary Barta and football coach Kirk Ferentz, encouraged the victim of an alleged sexual assault last fall involving UI football players to keep the matter in-house, the mother of the alleged victim said.
In a letter sent last fall to UI officials that she provided Thursday to the Press-Citizen, the alleged victim's mother chronicled the process she and her family followed and the university's response during a five-week period following the October 2007 alleged assault at Hillcrest Residence Hall.
"University of Iowa's character was non-existent. It is disappointing to say the very least," the alleged victim's mother said in a phone interview. "We were told the school will take care of it. We will keep it in house. We will be swift. We will be just, and you don't have to worry about it."
"My understanding is that the athletic department wants to wash its hands on this, saying they did what she wanted me to do, and that is not the case," the alleged victim's mother said.
Because the Press-Citizen does not identify victims of sexual assault, it is not identifying the alleged victim's mother.
The alleged victim, a UI student-athlete, was allegedly sexually assaulted by former football players Cedric Everson and Abe Satterfield on Oct. 14, 2007, between 2 and 6 a.m. in the residence hall. Everson has been charged with second-degree sexual assault and Satterfield has been charged with second- and third-degree sexual assault. Everson has pleaded not guilty, and Satterfield's lawyer has said Satterfield plans to plead not guilty.
The alleged victim's mother dated her letter Nov. 19, 2007, and sent it to UI officials within the next two days.
She said she received no response.
UI Department of Public Safety Director Chuck Green said he received the letter, and Johnson County Attorney Janet Lyness said she was aware of the letter but could not recall whether she had seen it.
The letter details the alleged victim's and her family's frustration to the unresponsiveness, a lack of answers and a lack of transparency from UI officials.
UI officials, including Ferentz, Barta, and UI President Sally Mason, did not return messages Friday seeking comment. The university declined to say whether Mason or other UI officials had seen the letter and declined to answer specific questions but issued a statement.
"We understand the strong emotions arising from this difficult case and continue to feel compassion for what this student and her family must be going through. The safety and well-being of the student has always been at the forefront of our concern.
"Each step of the way everyone involved with the university worked in accordance with university policy and procedures and attempted to convey those policies and procedures to the student and her family. At all times, she and her family had the ability to determine whether to pursue this matter within the university or outside of it, and we repeatedly informed them of those options."
Some of the key points contained in the letter:
• Within 36 hours of the alleged incident, the alleged victim repeated her allegations to Barta; Associate Athletic Director Fred Mims; Ferentz; Betsy Altmaier, a UI faculty member and a representative on the Presidential Committee on Athletics that serves as a liaison to the Big Ten and NCAA; and the victim's coach.
Mims did not return messages seeking comment, and Altmaier declined comment.
• Those five officials encouraged the alleged victim to follow an "informal" process, according to the letter.
"They were told that if the victim chose to go with an informal action the athletic department would act swiftly and effectively. If she chose to go formally, which was explained as an in-house process but going outside of the athletic department, she would be looking at a long, arduous process. ... She was really encouraged to try the informal route first," the alleged victim's mother wrote.
No one at UI seemed to be directing the process, the alleged victim's mother said in a phone interview.
• The alleged victim discovered on Nov. 13, 2007, that Everson was living with his girlfriend three doors down the hall from her.
• "After having been confronted by the perpetrators and their friends on a daily basis and having found no sense of protection or involvement from UI" the alleged victim reported the incident to police on Nov. 5, 2007, according to the letter.
"The whole (UI Public Safety) department was mortified that something had happened and no one had contacted them," the mother said in a phone interview.
Alleged victim was harassed, mother says
The alleged victim was harassed, followed, taunted and called names such as "*****" by members of several athletes from UI athletic programs, including Satterfield and Everson and many players on the football team, her mother said in a phone interview.
"It was an arrogance of being just untouchable because nothing was done," the mother said of harassment from the perpetrators. Satterfield's lawyer declined to comment about the allegation of harassment, and Everson's lawyer couldn't be reached for comment about that allegation.
During this period, the alleged victim's father was contacting UI General Counsel Marc Mills and Mims daily, the mother said in a phone interview.
"We are taking care of it," was the response he received, according to the alleged victim's mother.
Mills declined comment Friday.
Mills was brought in to the process on Oct. 20, 2007, by Altmaier, according the letter by the alleged victim's mother.
"From that day forward, any communication regarding this situation was initiated by the father. He was directed to speak with Mark Mills. ... We were never given any clear reason why he was now involved.
"We asked over and over and over and over and over and over -- what is the process? What can we expect?
"Who is protecting the victim after she told her story to so many people that first week? Where are these boys in all of this? NO ANSWERS. Only, due process, due process. Our question was also who is in charge?" according to the letter.
The alleged victim first learned from police that she was sexually assaulted by two perpetrators instead of one after Nov. 5, 2007, according to the letter. The athletic department knew this the first week after the incident but kept that from the victim and her father, according to the letter.
Letter details frustration with Mason
The alleged victim's mother contacted UI President Sally Mason on Nov. 19 to express her frustration about how the case was being handled, according to the letter.
"She shared her concern but told me in no uncertain terms that she very rarely gets involved with things of this nature. Isn't that the truth? Me neither," the letter stated.
"I believe that she is involved whether she wants to be or not as she is giving statements to the press. I told her she might like to take a minute with me and she simply told me she would direct me to someone who handles these things. My question today is WHO IS THAT PERSON AND WHERE HAVE THEY BEEN FOR THE PAST FIVE WEEKS?" according to the letter.
On Nov 19, the day the letter is dated, Mason told the Press-Citizen editorial board that UI had been working closely with the alleged victim and the alleged victim's family and the university had tried to keep the wishes of the alleged victim in mind every step of the way during the investigation.
Mims directed the alleged victim to speak with other UI officials during the week of Oct. 21, 2007, but did not tell her who, according to the letter and the alleged victim's mother. This was the Office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity, which is part of UI's mandatory reporting structure, according to a document titled Resource and Referral Options for Victims of Sexual Assaults.
Marcella David, Jennifer Modestou and Tiffini Stephenson Earl, who are officials in the equal opportunity office, declined comment through a secretary Friday.
The alleged victim left the office in tears, according to the letter.
"They were aggressive and forceful in their interviewing tactics and accusatory in their stance. She told me afterwards, while crying, that they basically accused her of bringing this upon herself. She was interviewed with the intention of making her feel that she caused this. ...
"Her friends were called in as well, not having any idea what they were being called in for, and without the mention, again, of the right to an advocate, and they also left crying feeling as if they had committed some kind of crime by being associated with the victim and this situation," according to the letter.
Many officials involved in response
The alleged victim was not advised to retain a victim advocate, the letter stated. She did not have a victim advocate for 3½ weeks after the alleged assault.
Carla Miller at the Rape Victim Advocacy Program, which serves students and non-students, said normally a sexual assault victim should have an advocate "immediately" and UI athletic department officials know a victim should have an advocate.
"(A victim) shouldn't have to go (to the equal opportunity office) alone. She shouldn't have to do anything alone. By Iowa law, she has a right to a victim advocate," Miller said.
On Nov. 13, 2007, Mills advised the alleged victim's father to contact Vice President for Student Services Phillip Jones. Jones did not return messages seeking comment.
"He, Dean Jones, preceded to tell me that he did not know who I was, did not know my name, my daughter's name, nor anything regarding this investigation," the letter stated.
Jones told the mother that there was no "informal process" for sexual assault reporting, and that according to the student code, Jones should have been notified, according to the letter.
The Resource and Referral Options document also indicates that Jones and the equal opportunity office should be notified at the same time, and that there is a link between the two offices during this part of the process.
The alleged victim and her family contacted Jones to get out of her housing contract because Everson was living down the hall and the perpetrators "mocked her, called her names, laughed at her and had been left free to do whatever they chose after she had told her story for a week to various university officials with absolutely no help forthcoming.
"Dean Jones asked the victim point blank, 'How can I know you will be safe if I allow you to go in and out of Hillcrest?' Her reply was simply that she had been doing it all alone for almost five weeks, with no help or intervention from anyone, and had trusted that someone would come to her at some point with a solution, help, hope, a sense that what she had reported was taken seriously."
The letter continued, "Never happened. She also told Dean Jones that the athletic department had lied to her directly the week of October 15 knowing there was a third boy" involved "and her trust of the university was depleted."
Documents detail allegations
The university announced that UI police were investigating the alleged assault on Nov. 14, 2007, more than a month after the attack allegedly occurred with no explanation for the delay.
The Press-Citizen began questioning the university about the alleged assault on Oct. 19, 2007, and filed several open records requests for information. UI responded with 18 pages of documents but declined to provide other documents citing student privacy. The Press-Citizen has a pending open records lawsuit against UI for documents related to the investigation.
It wasn't until May that Satterfield and Everson's names were released in connection to the alleged attack when arrest warrants were issued. The Press-Citizen filed a motion that resulted in making those search warrants public, which is when details of the assault began to emerge.
Affidavits included in the search warrant indicated that four Iowa football players -- Everson, Satterfield, Clemmie Jevon Pugh and Michael Daniels Jr. -- were either inside or came by the allegedly vacated Hillcrest Residence Hall Room where the attack allegedly occurred.
According to the warrants and related documents, the alleged attack occurred in room N207, which allegedly had been vacated by football player Lance Tillison. According to the warrant documents, wide receiver Derrell Johnson-Koulianos told police that within days of the reported assault, Ferentz told Tillison to return to N207. Johnson-Koulianos also agreed to move into the room. Pugh, Daniels, Tillison and Johnson-Koulianos have not been charged in the case. Pugh has left the university.
An affidavit from UI police officer Brian Meyer said the alleged victim told police she "drank a lot in a short amount of time and got drunk very fast," the night of Oct. 13, 2007. She then left Hillcrest for a couple of hours before returning and encountering Pugh and Satterfield outside. The affidavit says the alleged victim told police the players took her outside of Everson's first floor room before taking her to N207, which Satterfield had a key for.
According to documents related to the search warrants and criminal complaints, both Everson and Satterfield sexually assaulted the alleged victim after she became intoxicated. The alleged victim, who told police she had no recollection of a sexual encounter with Everson, said she woke up with blood on her hands and body. The alleged victim tried to get back into her dorm but was locked out and went to a friends' dorm.
According to information in the court files, the friend then took the alleged victim to the emergency room, where a sexual assault examination was conducted and later picked up by UI Public Safety.
In the days that followed, Johnson-Koulianos said other members of the team began to hear about the alleged assault as "rumors started floating around that Everson and Satterfield raped someone," the warrant documents state.
Ferentz later suspended Satterfield and Everson and said they were "not in good standing" with the team. The warrant documents state after Johnson-Koulianos moved into N207, he threw out a new condom and a used condom found behind a bed and a mattress cover with an "orangish-reddish color" substance on it.
UI police later said preserving the evidence in the room was an issue in the investigation.
Reach Press-Citizen reporters Brian Morelli and Lee Hermiston at 319-339-7360.
