Per KSTP: Top U of MN athletics fundraiser violated sexual harassment policy

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The important thing is perhaps going forward a few understand how deeply flawed the sole investigator/judge/jury method is, and how shoddy the process is at the EOAA (no court reporter or other recording of interviews, hopelessly biased report, lack of protections for accused that do not come close to a civil case). Attention has been drawn to the need to revert to a clear and convincing standard rather than preponderance of evidence, and the affirmative consent rule needs to be rightly thrown out as it is solely designed (and it's originators admit this) to enable easier guilty rulings in sexual assault cases.
 

bizzle22 said:
Handel wasn't hired by Coyle either. I'm not saying that should be the defining factor, but I think people need to choose: do you give Coyle a pass for anything Handel may or may not have done while also not giving Coyle credit for the success in athletics this year; OR do you hold anything that comes from the Handel situation against Coyle while also giving Coyle credit for the athletic department success this year? In my mind it has to be one or the other. Any combination of the two doesn't seem fair.

I agree that Coyle will mostly be tied to Fleck.

Personally I don't care how he sounds at his press conferences. He can get up there and sing Mary Had a Little Lamb as long as we are winning national titles and athletes are staying out of trouble. Would be fine with me.
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Addressed this with you in several posts a couple days ago. It doesn't matter. Coyle heads the department. He's been there a year. Laid down the law and his philosophy on what his expectations are 5 months ago in a scathing presser. His watch.
 


PMWinSTP said:
Addressed this with you in several posts a couple days ago. It doesn't matter. Coyle heads the department. He's been there a year. Laid down the law and his philosophy on what his expectations are 5 months ago in a scathing presser. His watch.
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Read the whole comment. Clearly said that I see the other side. Just think folks have to pick an ideology -- either you give him credit for the performance of the athletic department and criticise him for the issues that have come up OR you don't give him credit for the athletic accomplishments this year but give him a pass on the issues within the department. Can't have it both ways
 

Spoofin said:
If I'm remembering wrong, I apologize, but I am rather certain I had an a back and forth with you the afternoon the EOAA report was released (before the police report was released) where you referred to multiple things in the EOAA report as "a smoking gun". I consider that condemning someone.


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The police report was publicly available prior to the EOAA report being released.
 


bizzle22 said:
The police report was publicly available prior to the EOAA report being released.
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Sure enough. KSTP released them together so you are right. I stand by my statement about condemning them w/o facts last time, but was clearly wrong about what info was out there at the time. In any event, I agree with you that folks need to wait before deciding anything in this case as even less is known.


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bizzle22 said:
Read the whole comment. Clearly said that I see the other side. Just think folks have to pick an ideology -- either you give him credit for the performance of the athletic department and criticise him for the issues that have come up OR you don't give him credit for the athletic accomplishments this year but give him a pass on the issues within the department. Can't have it both ways
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I did. Also addressed that in my previous posts.
 

Pompous Elitist said:
how deeply flawed the sole investigator/judge/jury method is
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Also they're the folks who write the "laws" too... they have to get approval from others but still it seems like they'd have a vested interest in seeing those rules applied rather than not as well.

What is sad about this is you'd think a University as an organization would have some sense of history about how legal systems evolve, the pitfalls, and etc... but nope it is amatur hour.

Oh and I forgot, it's all secret, because historically secret justice systems are just great too....
 

A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
Also they're the folks who write the "laws" too... they have to get approval from others but still it seems like they'd have a vested interest in seeing those rules applied rather than not as well.

What is sad about this is you'd think a University as an organization would have some sense of history about how legal systems evolve, the pitfalls, and etc... but nope it is amatur hour.

Oh and I forgot, it's all secret, because historically secret justice systems are just great too....
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It's not a legal system, so no surprise it doesn't operate like one.
 




bizzle22 said:
Read the whole comment. Clearly said that I see the other side. Just think folks have to pick an ideology -- either you give him credit for the performance of the athletic department and criticise him for the issues that have come up OR you don't give him credit for the athletic accomplishments this year but give him a pass on the issues within the department. Can't have it both ways
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Two different issues, and Coyle has to live up to it as well. He has to give credit to Kill/Claeys for the APR just released if he wants any credit for a softball team, basketball team, etc that was built before he got here. Yet, in a radio interview last week, when setup to say the previous staff did a good job emphasizing academics and making huge strides after Brewster, all he could do was say the academic support staff did a nice job.

I think Coyle has done a nice job with many things, but his communication has been poor - and there was no need to denigrate work of past football staff. Just say you want to make a change. All that said, the timing of this just sucks - whether he hires someone or not, there are going to be employees who make mistakes. Coyle shouldn't be judged by actions of that staff person, but how he holds them accountable. In this case, it's not just Coyle, but probably above him given the investigation and getting the word out too soon by a regent didn't even allow the process to run its course:


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Ozzy&Ray said:
Two different issues, and Coyle has to live up to it as well. He has to give credit to Kill/Claeys for the APR just released if he wants any credit for a softball team, basketball team, etc that was built before he got here. Yet, in a radio interview last week, when setup to say the previous staff did a good job emphasizing academics and making huge strides after Brewster, all he could do was say the academic support staff did a nice job.

I think Coyle has done a nice job with many things, but his communication has been poor - and there was no need to denigrate work of past football staff. Just say you want to make a change. All that said, the timing of this just sucks - whether he hires someone or not, there are going to be employees who make mistakes. Coyle shouldn't be judged by actions of that staff person, but how he holds them accountable. In this case, it's not just Coyle, but probably above him given the investigation and getting the word out too soon by a regent didn't even allow the process to run its course:


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The bold/underlined above is one of the most perfect statements describing the situation I've seen. Excellent job!

No matter how much background checking, training, etc. you do someone will violate a policy. It will happen. The fact that someone was written up means that there likely wasn't an attempt to bury it and that they take it seriously. Next will be the punishment. The unfortunate part is that the punishment will almost have to be much more severe than deserved (assuming he doesn't deserve the harshest punishment) because it was made public in the first place (which it shouldn't have been) and especially since it was made public after three major public situations regarding EOAA investigations.

Note: I've mentioned multiple times I believe the allegations to be minor since he was not suspended prior to this becoming public and the fact that they are making a bigger deal of the leak than the allegations. If that is not correct and if this is major and true, I hope he gets the book thrown at him and gets every punishment possible. However, I just have a feeling that's not the case. But I've been surprised before. And I have zero inside info, so use your own judgment.
 



Someone is putting this incident on Coyle now?

I'm pretty sure the staff member knew the rules, did whatever. Coyle can't be responsible for this anymore than TC could carry a ball into the endzone....

I'm no Coyle fan but this isn't his issue in any way as far as I can tell.
 

A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
Someone is putting this incident on Coyle now?

I'm pretty sure the staff member knew the rules, did whatever. Coyle can't be responsible for this anymore than TC could carry a ball into the endzone....

I'm no Coyle fan but this isn't his issue in any way as far as I can tell.
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This can't/shouldn't be used against Coyle.

Better f*ing question is why the weasels at KSTP and maybe a few people on the board (not including you) are still running on the assumption that the guy is "guilty as charged"?

Except for the people who were happy about it, everybody else should have learned that lesson.
 

According to this article it was some hugging, inappropriate over the clothes touching to remove fuzz from the woman's clothing, and a few comments he made to her. She says it made her feel uncomfortable. He says there was no sexual intent and denies some of the allegations. I guess the good news is that it wasn't anything violent or totally egregious. Hard to know how inappropriate it was without seeing it. Doesn't really say what actions/remedies are being considered.

http://www.startribune.com/report-u...ely-touched-hugged-female-employee/422796934/
 

What if instead of Handel doing these exact things, it was a female co-worker. Would it be considered sexual assault? The only thing I read that would be considered inappropriate is the "If i was a few years younger"

The lingering around female workers seems far fetched. Is he not going to mingle with co-workers just because they are female? Those departments are dominated by female employees. It would be pretty hard to just ignore them all.
 

bizzle22 said:
According to this article it was some hugging, inappropriate over the clothes touching to remove fuzz from the woman's clothing, and a few comments he made to her. She says it made her feel uncomfortable. He says there was no sexual intent and denies some of the allegations. I guess the good news is that it wasn't anything violent or totally egregious. Hard to know how inappropriate it was without seeing it. Doesn't really say what actions/remedies are being considered.

http://www.startribune.com/report-u...ely-touched-hugged-female-employee/422796934/
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If it happened that way as reported. ... and again, I said, "if", you just can't do that in these times. That's a no-no whether you think what you're doing is harmless or not. Be professional, respect personal space, and absolutely do not touch. Too many people out there looking for a quick payday (not saying that's the case here).
 

Dumb

SelectionSunday said:
If it happened that way as reported. ... and again, I said, "if", you just can't do that in these times. That's a no-no whether you think what you're doing is harmless or not. Be professional, respect personal space, and absolutely do not touch. Too many people out there looking for a quick payday (not saying that's the case here).
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Guessing this stuff usually happened after a 3 martini lunch.
 

Handel is probably not lacking in the confidence department; likely has a history of schmoozing women going back to grade school. It's what makes Randy Randy. Doesn't sound malicious; he's just doing his schtick with flirtation, and times have changed. If he can't adjust he should be gone.
 

What did Lou Nanne say? He (Handy Randy) is a touchy-feely kind of guy? Some people do that with no malicious intent.

We have a lady friend that is just like that. Real bubbly and huggy-muggy, touchy-feely. If you did not know her, you'd think she is being salacious.

The McCarthyist/Sexual Harassment line is a very thin one at The U.
 

I use to work for a place where we had to do this annual "Sexual Harassment Seminar." The bottom line was this. If you did something that wasn't right, the other person was to "say" something where 'you're making me feel uncomfortable' or something of that nature. That meant, whatever you were doing needed to stop right there with that particular individual. If the problem persists then that individual being "harass" or whatever could go to the offender's supervisors to deal with it.

So did Handel keep doing what he was doing, given a chance to back off and quickly learn from this situation. We have to remember as indicated before in previous posts, times have changed and many woman are tired of being picked on, ridiculed, and mocked. As a result of this they are speaking up and rightfully so.

Grant it there are situations where perhaps the "woman" is being picky about something due to a bad day or whatever. However that is for the "superiors" to decide. This is where it is unfortunate that it was leaked and KSTP is making what could be a small situation that could have been taken care of internally before mushrooming to a large problem.

As a result the person who did the leaking should clearly be punished unless this was a reoccurring thing where no one was doing anything. There is a time to be a whistle blower and a time not to. Likewise if KSTP had any morals, they should realize that this is something that shouldn't have been reported unless once again it is a reoccurring situation regarding the same person that was not being taken care of properly.
 

The fact the report makes mention of "picking a piece of lint off the back of her shirt" tells me about all i need to know. So, the guy is nice?
 

... "If you did something that wasn't right, the other person was to "say" something where 'you're making me feel uncomfortable' or something of that nature. That meant, whatever you were doing needed to stop..."

This is the Litmus Test in this case.
 

DLguy said:
The lingering around female workers seems far fetched. Is he not going to mingle with co-workers just because they are female? Those departments are dominated by female employees. It would be pretty hard to just ignore them all.
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Not that far fetched. Virtually all the women I work with totally ignore me.


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hungan1 said:
... "If you did something that wasn't right, the other person was to "say" something where 'you're making me feel uncomfortable' or something of that nature. That meant, whatever you were doing needed to stop..."

This is the Litmus Test in this case.
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I agree. Some of this seems a little small potatoes, but it does sound like she asked him to quit the hugging and he persisted. If that is true, then he has to be held responsible for whatever punishment is the case.
 

Hugging is "in" Of course, you should say: " Can I give you a hug?" We've a " Vintage Picks" business ( antiques and collectibles) Hell, if I had a dollar for every hug my wife and I received over the past 10 years we've had the business regarding a transaction I could spend a week at Pebble Beach. This sounds pretty petty to me.
 

According to the Trib on line...sorry don't know how to link and can't get in....Over the course of a year he touch and hugged a person over 40 times including behind closed doors. He needs to go. Surprised it went this long and it appears no one did anything about it. KSTP to the rescue. All sketchy as I'm going by a blurb on the Trib this evening.
 

I see this as a lot of gray area. Without a full report, too many questions. did the victim tell him to stop? did she report it to someone else in the department? did anyone talk to Handel and tell him to stop and/or modify his behavior?

Maybe there was malicious intent - or maybe Handel is just a clueless guy who thought he was being funny.

No advocating for harassment, but this type of behavior 10 or 15 years ago would never have resulted in any type of disciplinary action.

But, people hear "sexual harassment" and they tend to picture something more overt. this behavior could fall into the category of a misunderstanding. I'm not saying the victim wasn't uncomfortable, but it just seems like there should have or could have been some other avenue to take to resolve this without getting the EOAA involved.
 

Having to work with situations like this, as described it would likely not lead to termination. However, it would lead to a letter of direction that it cannot happen again and would result in termination if it did. HR would also include a standard non-retaliation warning. That said, we also do not know if this is something that was previously brought to the attention of supervisors and the behavior persisted. That would take it to another category.

Bottom-line is this never should have been leaked by the Regent, or whoever did that. The Board, lead by Johnson, is correct to be addressing the leak because there was a serious violation of board ethics, as well as the privacy rights of Handel in this case. That is their primary concern because at this time the issue is really not the role of the Board, as their work is governance, not management. Their focus should be on the leak because they do not have a role at this point in any investigation. This really makes it difficult for Kaler, for example, to be able to share information with Regents as he can't trust it won't be shared. Again, it his job, and that of his reports, to manage, and the regent's job to govern. There is an important, and essential, distinction between the two.


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