A Senate committee is considering a bill that would allow a student to have legal representation during a disciplinary hearing.
Under current procedure, a student can have an attorney present – but the attorney can’t say anything.
"What you have before you today is a bill that deals with due process," said Sen. Ray Holmberg (R-Grand Forks), the bill's sponsor.
Sherry Warner Seefelt is the president of Families Advocating for Campus Equality. She says her son, Caleb, was expelled from UND after being accused of sexually assaulting another student. Seefelt told the Senate Judiciary Committee – the accuser had one of UND’s attorneys present with her at the hearing, but Caleb was not allowed legal counsel. The woman was later charged with filing a false report, and Caleb was allowed back in school.
"Punishing innocent people is traumatically destructive, and is poor policy which does damage to everybody, including true victims of sexual assault," said Seefelt. "Our entire society has a vested interest in creatting fair and just processes for determining guilt or innocence on such important accusations."
An attorney representing NDSU and the State College of Science testified against the bill – saying it would be expensive, and wouldn’t correct the problems with the occasional bad decision.
"Is that the best way to fix that potential issue, or is a re-hearing process, like NDSU has, where new evidence can be considered that shows the likelihood of a bad decision," said attorney Chris Wilson. "I personally believe that's a better avenue to go, if all the colleges have such a process."
The committee did not take action on the bill. The chairman – Sen. David Hogue (R-Minot) – asked Wilson to meet with the sponsors and the committee to work out some amendments.
