Sentence Lessened In Sex Abuse Case

The punishments of two junior men at Princeton, alleged to have had "enforced intercourse" last year with a sophomore woman, were recently reduced from suspensions to disciplinary probation, officials in Princeton's dean of students' office disclosed last week.

Princeton's Discipline Committee last spring sentenced the two men, whose names have not been released, to suspensions of unknown durations. But this fail, after the men appealed their sentences to President William G. Bowen, their sentences for the April incident were reduced to disciplinary probation.

The details of the case, especially of the contents and procedure of the appeal, are being kept secret, and high-ranking university officials were unavailable for comment on the case this week.

The incident stems from a party last April, after which three men went back to the room of the woman, who, according to students familiar with the case, was too drunk to refuse their sexual advances.

All three of the men had sex with her, according to junior Clifford J. Levy, a reporter for The Daily Princetonian, but one of them has not been disciplined because he was unaware of her condition. The Discipline Committee suspended the other two men when the woman first presented her case in May.

Because of the reduced sentence, some students said they think Princeton's Discipline Committee is biased against students who bring sexual harrassment cases before it.

"The system is so biased against the victim that the victim is never heard. As a result, victims aren't willing to bring their cases forward, and then the university doesn't believe that such cases happen," said senior Jennifer S. Hirsch, co-chairman of the sexual harrassment, education and prevention task force at Princeton's Women's Center.

"There is no way for [the Discipline Committee] to know what went on from the way the hearing was conducted," said senior Elana W. Sigall, the task force's other co-chairman.

"The university demonstrated through this case and the case of a friend of mine that they couldn't handle this type of problem. I am appalled at the reduction in the sentence," said senior David W. Rogers.

"I hope that Princeton will begin to reconsider the possibility of having a separate committee to evaluate sexual harrassment. They turned it down last spring," Sigall said.

But some students said they think the reduced sentences for the men were just. "It doesn't seem like a clear case. If it were, the committee would have taken action," said sophomore Anne E. Gilson.

"I feel a lot safer on campus this year than last year. There are now emergency phones around campus with a bright light, which is a visible sign of the administration caring," Gilson said."

Said Associate Dean of the College Eva Gossman, the only Princeton official available for comment: "Sexual harrassment cases are incredibly complicated, but we try to deal with them fairly. Any institution that cared about the problem would take a while to think of a solution," she said.