UMass: 1 arrested is suspended, 2 not enrolled

[DonViejo]

Source: AP

DARTMOUTH, Mass. (AP) — The University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth has suspended one student charged in connection with the Boston Marathon bombings and says the other two aren't enrolled.

The university said Wednesday that Azamat Tazhayakov (AHZ'-maht tuh-ZAYE'-uh-kov) has been suspended "pending the outcome of the case." He and Dias Kadyrbayev (DYE'-us kad-uhr-BYE-ev) were charged with conspiring to obstruct justice.

Robel Phillipos was charged with making false statements. The university says Kadyrbayez and Phillipos aren't enrolled.

The FBI says the three removed a backpack containing hollowed-out fireworks from the dorm room of bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev (joh-HAHR' tsahr-NEYE'-ehv) three days after the bombings. Their attorneys say they had no idea the attack was being planned.

The FBI says the three began attending UMass Dartmouth with Tsarnaev in 2011. The university says it's cooperating fully with authorities.

###

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/umass-1-arrested-suspended-2-not-enrolled-210358252.html

[harmonicon]

1. Whoa.... that's FUCKED UP.

A university - a state university, no less!! - can suspend a student for being charged or investigated for a crime?! Forget this case, but what does that say about what sense of security a student should now have about their education? Get accused of a crime and get kicked out of school?

[DallasNE]

2. Point Taken

The suspended student faces a maximum of 5 years in prison if found guilty. That is about the same sentence as someone found with 2 joints on them. Does the University suspend them as well. I understand the PR of the University wanting to completely disassociate themselves from this trio but they still need to follow consistent procedures. If they did this, fine. If they did not then shame on them.

[harmonicon]

3. That was my thought, re: drug possession.

I had friends in college who were - and plead - guilty to things like marijuana possession, but never anything above a misdemeanor. I never knew anyone to be kicked out of school for that, but to be suspended simply for being accused seems criminal to me. There must be something that makes it legal, but that's appalling. Want to ruin someone's life who's in a university? Accuse them of a crime.

[geek tragedy]

6. If the question is involvement with terrorist attacks, well yeah

maybe best to suspend them pending resolution.

[harmonicon]

8. ... and if they're not guilty, then what?

Can they then sue the university for damages? I doubt it.

[geek tragedy]

10. They can always sue.

The case would probably settle.

If they blow a bunch of people up on campus, then that damage can't be undone.

[harmonicon]

13. Good point.

I think you should probably try to get locked up in prison, because there's no way to know what crime you might commit in the future. Just go and ask them to lock you up. With the current for-profit prison system, some place just might take you up on it.

[geek tragedy]

15. So, you don't think civil restraining orders should ever be permitted, correct?

I mean, those are a restriction on liberty without a criminal conviction.

If a husband beats the shit out of his wife, she should be the one forced to leave the home pending his criminal trial, right?

[harmonicon]

18. No one should be forced to do anything without any standing of the law behind it.

I'm pretty sure restraining orders are given out by a court. Nice try though.

[geek tragedy]

19. What about innocent until proven guilty?

Courts exclude accused batterers from their homes without a conviction all the time. How do you feel about that?

Do you think the school has an obligation to not force a woman to sit in a room with her rapist?

[harmonicon]

22. You know that a school isn't a court of law, right?

I'm guessing you DIDN'T google those terms I gave you earlier.

[geek tragedy]

25. Restraining orders are given pre-conviction.

The guy gets kicked out of his home before he's been convicted of a crime, while he's legally innocent.

Isn't that a violation of his rights?

[dballance]

39. Your Argument is Absurd. No Violation of Rights. A Judge Issues an Order. Not a School or LEO.

The person getting "kicked out of his/her home" has been judged as a threat by the legal system by a judge. And, BTW, people who are charged with crimes are remanded to custody all the time - by a judge and also pre-conviction. Not even based on the possible threat of further violence; just possible flight risk as well.

So let's take your absurd argument to its conclusion. Restraining orders should never be issued. Therefore, people with a history of abuse that a judge would otherwise issue a restraining order on should be allowed to go back to their physical residence - it's not really a "home" to the people being abused. They should be allowed physical contact with the people they've allegedly abused with the possible outcome being further abuse and possible death of the abused persons. So much for their right to "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness."

Isn't that what you're really advocating in your argument?

[geek tragedy]

40. I was engaging in reductio ad absurdum.

The person was pushing the "innocent until proven guilty" line as if it had anything to do with the right to remain enrolled in school.

And compounded the issue by stating that if someone's accused of a crime, there's "no reason" to think they committed the crime.

[dballance]

36. So NOT the same thing. A Judge has to issue a restraining order.

A restraining order is issued by a judge after they are presented with facts in the case. So the person who is subject to the restraining order has been judged in our judicial system to be a threat.

The kid who was suspended has not been found guilty of any crimes nor has he been judged a threat. He's not even accused of being a conspirator to the bombings. Just tampering with evidence after the fact and lying to the feds. The charges speak for themselves. The authorities obviously don't have the evidence or the belief that he was involved in the initial crime.

[DallasNE]

48. Technical Correction

The suspended student has been charged with tampering with evidence after the fact but not with lying to the feds. The American citizen is the only one charged with lying to the feds, which is the more serious charge.

[24601]

11. They could suspend him for not attending class. But if UMASS wants to be seen as tough on terrorism,

they can retroactively re-enroll the other two as honorary students, and then suspend all three.

[DallasNE]

16. The Suspended Student Is Not Charged With "Attacks"

And the maximum prison sentence is 5 years if found guilty on charges so I'm not sure of your point in this specific case. Obviously the student bomber would be immediately suspended.

[geek tragedy]

20. Those are the initial charges.

We'll see where this goes.

Regardless, he can't attend class due to being in jail.

[Cali_Democrat]

46. 5 years for carrying two joints? Huh?

In California you just get a ticket if you're in possession of less than an ounce.

[DallasNE]

47. Does It Take 3 Joints To Get Over The Threshold

My bad.

[geek tragedy]

5. You would prefer that accused rapists be allowed to attend class with their

victims?

[harmonicon]

7. Yes.

Because if it's only an accusation, there's no reason to think the accused is a rapist.

You would prefer someone could accuse someone of rape to ruin their academic career because of some misplaced anger or vendetta?

[geek tragedy]

9. "there's no reason to think the accused is a rapist"

[harmonicon]

12. Hi, welcome to the first day of criminal justice 101.

Innocent until proven guilty. Maybe you've heard something about that before? If not, well, that's how it works in the US. If someone is accused of a crime, they are innocent of that crime until otherwise proven guilty. I'd give you a reading list, but you have an internet connection. I'll give you a few words to google to get you started though (oh, google is a search engine you can use to find things on the internet - if you're not familiar with "innocent until proven guilty" I guess you might not know about google either: http://www.google.com): "US criminal justice system," "branches of government," "US constitution," "Bill of Rights."

[geek tragedy]

14. That's for incarceration/criminal trials, not the right to attend class.

Students get suspended for behavior in the absence of a criminal conviction all the time.

And, you pretty much implied that we should treat every accusation of rape as a false one, in other words assume the victim is lying.

Steubenville is lovely this time of year, I hear.

[harmonicon]

17. What did I "pretty much" do?

Again, I have to ask, do you understand "innocent until proven guilty"?

[geek tragedy]

21. You said that if a woman accuses a man of rape, that there's "no reason"

to think he's raped anyone until there'sx been a trial.

[harmonicon]

23. I sure did. (nt)

[geek tragedy]

24. So, you see no duty on the part of the school to make itself safe

for the victim of violent crime. Just do nothing and let the court system sort it out.

And you also believe that the school should treat the accusation as presumably false.

And, you'd have no issue with a female relative going on a date with an accused rapist. I mean, there's no reason to think he raped anyone, right.

And, there was no reason for Penn State to think Jerry Sandusky raped any kids before he was put on trial, right?

[harmonicon]

26. I can't tell if you're trolling or if you don't understand simple concepts.

A third option is that you just enjoy antagonizing me because you can't stand me standing up for basic human rights.

In any one of those three cases, I don't know what more I can say to get through to you.

[geek tragedy]

27. You said that an accusation is "no reason" to think someone committed a crime.

That everyone just needs to go on as if nothing happened.

Your mistake is assuming that "innocent until proven guilty" is binding on society as a whole.

It's not.

Fortunately, our legal system does not share your complete disregard for public safety and the rights of victims.

[harmonicon]

28. That's why it's good that we do have such rights.

If we didn't, we'd have lynch mobs made up of people such as yourself committing murder. I'm glad that we - mostly - don't.

[geek tragedy]

29. You understand the basic difference between lynching someone

and prohibiting someone like Jerry Sandusky (pre-conviction) from having access to victims, right?

Under your formulation, pre-conviction jail is unconstitutional.

[harmonicon]

30. You REALLY didn't google those terms I gave you, did you? (nt)

[geek tragedy]

31. No, I just understand them much better than you do.

I understand that "innocent until proven guilty" only applies to criminal proceedings. And even then, the government is allowed to put you in jail before you're convicted.

Under your formulation, accused rapists and murderers must be allowed to mingle freely amongst potential future victims with no measures being taken to protect those potential victims.

[harmonicon]

35. I'm really glad I'm not a trout.

If I were a trout, I might have a lot to fear from you.

[dballance]

41. geek_tragedy is assuredly trolling for a pissing match. Look up thread. He argued the other side.

Just looking at the posts in this thread I'd say geek_tragedy is just trying to stir crap and pick fights. S/He's been on both sides of the argument about rights just within this thread.

Up thread s/he argues that restraining orders are a violation of rights. Now s/he's arguing that people who are charged should be prevented from attending classes, etc.

If geek_tragedy is trying to educate people and get them to see both sides I believe it can be done more constructively than what I've seen in this thread. One doesn't have to be so argumentative to get across a point.

[24601]

44. So one of the threads on Latest Breaking News is about a women charged with lying to police about

making a facebook threat to rape her (but to frame someone else).

If the charge that she made a rape threat is substantiated, and since the threat was against her, should the college allow her in the same classroom with herself?

[Xithras]

33. SOP at most colleges and universities.

Nearly all colleges and universities have a code of conduct that the students agree to as part of the application process. Those typically state that students will be expelled if they are charged with serious or violent felonies.

FWIW, most of those CoC's also include an appeal procedure. If the student is cleared of the charges, the appeal procedure can typically be used to reverse the expulsion and reinstate them as a student. I personally know of one case at my previous college where a student was arrested and charged with an off-campus gang affiliated shooting. The student was immediately expelled. After the DA dropped the charges against him (he knew the shooter, but was wrongly identified as being at the murder scene), the student used the appeal procedure to get the expulsion reversed and was allowed to attend classes again.

Schools DO recognize the concept of "innocent until proven guilty", but will err on the side of expulsion while the student is actively being tried for the crime. I've never heard of a case where a student was cleared of charges and was denied re-entry. If the student isn't convicted, he/she will be allowed back into school.

[harmonicon]

34. Allowed back into school, sure, but what about their time and other expenses?

I assume there must be things students sign agreeing to this sort of thing (I probably did), but I think it must be selective in terms of enforcement.

In the case of the person you know who was falsely accused, I'm sure you know that just having that false accusation made their life hell enough without having further insult piled onto them.

[Xithras]

43. It wasn't a person I knew.

I knew of the case, but not the person himself. I was faculty at the college and he was one of the students.

As for selective enforcement, the last college I taught as limited it to "violent or serious felonies", and it was rigorously enforced. Once charges are filed, the student is assumed to be a potential danger to the campus or its students. They are excluded to ensure the safety of all students, and to minimize any on-campus disruptions that may be caused by their interactions with other students.

On top of that, virtually all faculty contracts contain clauses allowing them to exclude any student from their course who makes them fear for their safety. Would you expect a female college instructor and rape survivor to simply ignore the fact that the student in her front row has been charged with violently raping other women? It's unrealistic and disruptive.

Besides, in all honesty, if you're being charged with a serious felony, there are more important things for you to be worrying about than college credits.

[harmonicon]

45. I think it's really a tricky issue.

Ultimately, I think these sort of things need to be dealt with by courts. If someone is ruled to be a danger, they can be held without bail.

Both stances are about erring on the side of caution, it's just a question of where that caution is placed.

I agree that people charged with a felony probably have larger things to worry about than college credits, so isn't suspending or expelling them just adding to that worry? Different people deal with tragedy in different ways. For some, maybe getting deeply involved with their academic work would be just what they need.

[Cha]

4. thanks for the news, DV

[Gin]

32. How did they live in a dorm if they werent enrolled?

[KittyWampus]

38. the other two lived elsewheres, I believe and have wealthy families.

[mysuzuki2]

37. I used to teach Anthropology at Umass Dartmouth.

It was called Southeastern Mass State Univ at the time. I absolutely hated it there. Mostly because it is such a physically unappealing campus. It is entirely of concrete and looks like a high tech prison.

[harmonicon]

42. Ah... "neo-communist" I called it when I was in college.

I didn't go to UMass, but there's a sort of university-style architecture of the 20th century that was really terrible. My university had buildings from both the 19th and 20th centuries, and the difference was staggering. It was nice going into the nice buildings, and it was depressing going into the depressing buildings.