A critical third presidential committee report has prompted the University to question its actions in the days following a March 13 party where three members of the men's lacrosse team were accused of raping an exotic dancer.
In a report released May 8, the committee announced that the Duke administration responded "much too slow" to the lacrosse situation.
The Duke University Police Department and members of the administration underestimated the gravity of the situation and other sensitive issues, the Investigation of Duke Administration Response Committee reported.
"We find no evidence, however, that this delay represented any effort to cover up the problems revealed by these events, to deceive anyone, or to play down the seriousness of the issues raised," the committee reported.
The committee also praised President Richard Brodhead's leadership during the period, calling it "effective."
Brodhead, other administrators and the Board of Trustees said they respected and accepted the findings and would investigate the shortcomings highlighted in the report.
The president and other officials, however, defended the University's actions and suggested some of the committee's recommendations were impractical.
"The truth is Duke did not have the capacity to interrogate the person who was making the allegations," Brodhead said the day the report was released. "If we had done that, I'm sure we would have been thought guilty of meddling."
The committee concluded that administrators responded to the alleged incident in a timely fashion, although Brodhead and academic administrators did not find out about the incident until nearly a week after the party was held.
Brodhead learned of the alleged rape when he read a March 20 brief in The Chronicle, the report stated.
Although the Durham Police Department report "indicated clearly" that the woman making allegations was black, top administrators did not know about the racial components of the case until March 24-an oversight that could in part be traced back to the DUPD, the committee said.
When the alleged rape was initially reported by the DPD to the DUPD, Durham officers said the allegations "[would] blow over" and that "if any charges were brought, they would be no more than misdemeanors" since the exotic dancer's story "was not credible" and "kept changing."
These sentiments kept DPD from initially realizing the severity of the case, the report suggested.
When Duke Police Director Robert Dean reported the allegations to Sue Wasiolek, assistant vice president for student affairs and dean of students, at 7:30 a.m. March 14, he did not inform her of the exotic dancer's race.
The committee reported that none of the administrators inquired further about the race of the exotic dancer-a decision that Wasiolek and other officials defended.
"At the time, my focus was on the allegations," Wasiolek said. "Those acts against any individual are very, very serious, regardless of race."
DPD informed DUPD of the exotic dancer's 911 calls and of the reported use of racial slurs, but this information "did not move up the administrative ladder."
Wasiolek called Larry Moneta, vice president for student affairs, and various members of the athletics department March 14, but Brodhead did not find out about the 911 calls or the racial slurs until March 28.
The committee also reported that limited diversity among top administrators further "handicapped" the University's response to the situation. In addition, the athletics department was to blame for not taking "clearer and firmer actions" in response to earlier events involving the lacrosse team.
The committee-which looked through a number of memos, e-mails and police reports, among other documents-suggested that the University present better guidelines for student conduct and look more closely into alcohol consumption off-campus.
The University should further investigate the athletics program and the Duke-Durham relationship, the committee concluded.
William Bowen, former president of Princeton University, and Julius Chambers, former chancellor of North Carolina Central University, headed up the committee. Brodhead created five committees April 5 to conduct an external investigation of the lacrosse situation. Two other committees reported back to the president May 1.
Jared Mueller contributed to this story.
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