According to Businessweek, the U.S. Department of Education has begun a review of Penn State’s campus security program to see whether university officials broke any federal laws by failing to report instances of child sexual abuse.
The Department of Education will start by meeting with officials and administrators working for the university police department. From there the agency will interview individuals in the judicial affairs, residential life, student affairs and athletic departments, along with members of various fraternities and sororities to determine if the school complied with the Clery Act, which requires schools to report abuse.
The Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act or Clery Act, signed in 1990, is a federal statute that requires all colleges and universities that participate in federal financial aid programs to keep and disclose information about crime on and near their respective campuses. Compliance is monitored by the United States Department of Education, which can impose civil penalties, up to $27,500 per violation, against institutions for each infraction and can suspend institutions from participating in federal student financial aid programs if violations have occurred.
The law is named for Jeanne Clery, a 19-year-old Lehigh University freshman who was raped and murdered by another student, Josoph Henry, in her campus residence hall in 1986.
The Department of Education became involved after allegations of abuse by former Penn State defensive football coach Jerry Sandusky surfaced. The Department of Education notified Penn State in a Nov. 9 letter that it planned to send representatives to the campus beginning Monday morning.
Penn State President Rodney Erickson said that the university is “making every effort to provide the review team with immediate access to all requested records and information sources pertaining to all aspects of Clery Act compliance.” He says school officials have “been busy gathering as much of that information in advance of their visit as possible.”
Only weeks ago Marquette University announced that it too was under investigation by the Department of Education for possible Clery Act violations. The investigation at Marquette centers on a residence hall, where in two incidents in October 2010 and February of this year, five student athletes were accused of sexual misconduct with three female students.
The University’s Public Safety department investigated, but because Milwaukee police weren’t notified until weeks later a proper criminal investigation was deemed impossible. It led to frustration from the district attorney and a subsequent investigation by the Department of Ed.
The Department of Education has Special Agents similar to the FBI for these kinds of investigations. We ran into this kind of investigation in Kansas a few years back when we represented a college coach in federal court. These cases can escalate quickly with subpoenas to the grand jury and threats of perjury by federal prosecutors. It is not only the obvious defendant who is investigated, but also subordinates, supervisors, athletic department directors and their staff, and of course the business office. Penn State like every major university receives federal funds from various sources, and with that comes federal jurisdiction and now a federal investigation.
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