After an emergency month long suspension that appeared to prompt Sigma Nu to cancel their fraternity house lease and conduct an internal membership review, a panel ended UCF’s ability to suspend the fraternity by finding it not guilty of sexual misconduct — absent a new hearing.
“A panel today recommended that Sigma Nu should be found not in violation of the following rule of conduct governing student organizations: Condoning or encouraging acts of sexual misconduct,” according to UCF Spokesman Chad Binette.
If the panel finds the organization not guilty, the university’s director of Student Right and Responsibilities cannot overrule the panel and punish the organization. The director would have to reject the panel’s decision and the panel would then have to have another hearing with the organization and find it in violation before UCF could punish Sigma Nu.
UCF is a public university and is publicly funded by the government, so UCF cannot punish an organization for speech that is protected by the First Amendment. It appears UCF believes the rape chants in this case were protected speech.
“The appalling behavior seen in this video is not how responsible men act. While offensive speech may be allowable, it is inappropriate in every sense. That’s why we’re working with the national fraternity office to help change the culture that led to this behavior,” Binette said.
The hearing was not scheduled to start until 9:00 a.m. Knight News was on campus at the University of Central Florida Office of Student Conduct at 8:00 a.m. hoping to get the chance to talk to the Sigma Nu president before the hearing to get their side of the story and see if he wanted to apologize for the comments made in the video that upset people from across the nation.
Unfortunately, Knight News was unable to do so.
It appeared that UCF had snuck the Sigma Nu president into the hearing through a secret entrance or back door. Knight News was able to confirm once the hearing started that the president was in the hearing room but never actually walked through the front door.
UCF even sent multiple police officers to help protect the fraternity from the media cameras.
The hearing ended around 12:30 Thursday afternoon. Again, the president of the fraternity did not leave from the front door.
Below are the events that led up to Thursday’s hearing in which the panel found Sigma Nu not in violation of sexual misconduct section 5f – condoning or encouraging acts of sexual misconduct as defined above or failing to stop an act of sexual misconduct while it is occurring.
UCF’s Office of Student Conduct received a formal complaint of a violation that involved sexual misconduct on July 9 and that they would be investigating the complaint, according to UCF records.
On July 17, the Sigma Nu national office told the UCF chapter that they had received information regarding the possible violations and immediately put the chapter on a temporary suspension, according to UCF records.
On July 20, after receiving reports of alleged violations of UCF’s Rules of Conduct, UCF’s Office of Student Conduct put the Sigma Nu fraternity on a suspension until the disciplinary case was resolved, according to UCF records.
The indicated charge was “Sexual Misconduct (5f) – Condoning or encouraging acts of sexual misconduct as defined above or failing to stop an act of sexual misconduct while it is occurring, according to UCF records.
A hearing to review the action was scheduled for Monday, August 3 at 11:00 a.m. Attendance to the hearing was mandatory, according to UCF records.
After reviewing the information presented in the hearing on August 3, UCF’s Interim Suspension Hearing Officer Brian Boyd told the fraternity that they would remain on interim suspension until such time that a student conduct hearing is convened to address the alleged incident, according to UCF records.
On August 7, the UCF Office of Student Conduct notified the fraternity again. This time saying that they had received an incident report alleging violations of UCF’s Rules of Conduct (sexual misconduct section 5f – condoning or encouraging acts of sexual misconduct as defined above or failing to stop an act of sexual misconduct while it is occurring), according to UCF records.
The office of student conduct set up a meeting for the Sigma Nu president to meet with an office of student conduct staff member. That meeting occurred on Friday, August 7 at 10:00 a.m., according to UCF records.
After the fraternity president met with a staff member, a conduct panel hearing was scheduled for Thursday, August 20 at 9:00 a.m., according to UCF records.
UCF released video of the interim hearing from Aug. 3, but has not released video from today’s hearing.
Knight News is suing UCF so the public can monitor UCF’s justice system at open hearings to see whether it’s fair.
