While six sexual assaults have been reported on the UAlbany campus since September, university police contacted Albany County District Attorney David Soares' office for only one - the alleged rape of a freshman woman by the three football players. In the five other cases, the victims declined to press charges. In the case involving the football players, the district attorney's office was called by a television station before receiving a call from the UAlbany police. [...]The department always honors victims' request, said UAlbany Police Capt. Aran Mull
Crowley, Cathleen F. "Handling of rape case defended; UAlbany police chief says officers followed protocol in dealing with alleged assault." Albany Times Union. October 26, 2006: A1. http://albarchive.merlinone.net/mweb/wmsql.wm.request?oneimage&imageid=6365244
Why do so few victims at UAlbany feel safe enough to report, and so few feel safe enough to press charges? Why did UAlbany for so many years (perhaps still) decline to report assaults to the DA's office ASAP given that the DA's office has indicated that they can help strengthen cases for the prosecution and provide better victims' services if they are contacted ASAP? Rhetorical questions, really. Police in New York too often serve criminals and not victims - I wish it weren't so, but it is.
"SUNY police chiefs serve at the pleasure of the campus president, thus are motivated to keep crime stats down by any means […] SUNY can no longer afford to staff, or overstaff, a body, or overstaff, a body which is subject to inefficiencies, manipulation, cronyism, ill motivation and mismanagement."
Peter Barry, VP & Legislative Director of NYS University Police Officers Union Local 1792 of the American Federation of State County & Municipal Employees AFSCME, Council 82 & AFL-CIO. (127-128). http://www.nysenate.gov/files/SUNY%20Testimony%20pt.%203.PDF
Mull might have been a different kind of person years ago. In 1994 a politically biased, bigoted, nitwit prick named Richard D. Cole was writing about how he believed that "the conception of date rape as an idea [...] has been dealt, or mis-dealt with on campus." Cole managed to identify and contact a woman in a case that was under active investigation by the DA's office, and which evidently had already resulted in one man's expulsion.
After Cole "made an attempt to interview the victim," Aran Mull then went to Cole's office and indicated they wanted Cole to "leave the victim and her friends alone." According to Cole, "Officer Mull attempted to stare me down and scare me away from writing the story. (Officer Mull: You dont [sic] scare me a bit. You can stare at me all you want, but if you do it again it might be considered police harassment.)"
Cole concluded his article by writing the victim "needs to take responsibility for bringing two male students to her room either drunk, or then drinking. No one is blameless in a case such as this."
Cole, Richard D. "Drinking & Fornicating III: The Final Chapter?" Statesman [SUNY Stony Brook] 37(54). April 25, 1994. 4. https://dspace.sunyconnect.suny.edu/bitstream/handle/1951/25579/Statesman,%20V.%2037,%20n.%2054.PDF;jsessionid=21379E3AC3A5BC424F9FF729D882BE93.suny_101?sequence=1
It's just as well Cole didn't interview the victim, given that he'd already decided she was to blame. People might not want to serve Cole alcohol or invite him anywhere alcohol is being consumed, considering the license he felt that it gives (hopefully he's changed). Even in general he was a piece of work:
"I did not come to Stony Brook racist. But after being beaten, hounded, yelled at, threatened, etc. I do hold some negative opinions of African Americans. Objectively I know that racism is wrong, but my life here at Stony Brook has taught me to be wary, distrustful and at times, down-right revolted by African Americans. [...]
"Regardless of all I have said so far, the point is that people need to be aware that their behavior has reprecussions. [sic]"
Cole, Richard D. "Stony Brook Teaches Reactive Racism." Statesman 37(37). February 21, 1994. 4.
In other words, the African Americans on campus should not have been angry at Cole for being racist, because they (in his view) were to blame for his racism. Victim-blaming was apparently an institution with Cole.
Why grant a degree to such a person?
"Over two hundred students attended the Town Meeting held at the UNITI Cultural Center last night to 'organize, mobilize and take action' against the 'racist slander in Statesman, sanctioned by its new editor,' Richard Cole."
Krupski, Catherine. "In Unison at UNITI: Rich must go!" Stony Brook Press 15(10). March 1, 1994. 3. http://dspace.sunyconnect.suny.edu/bitstream/handle/1951/37756/Stony%20Brook%20Press%20V.%2015,%20N.%2010.PDF?sequence=1
Such writing as his in a student-published paper is pretty appalling to see, but Cole may have had license to say and write whatever he liked.
"Is it racism that permits Richard D. Cole to attend Stony Brook after he allegedly referred to a Black professor as 'Bitch!' in her classroom, or is it overlooked because his father [Stephen Cole] is a Sociology professor here at Stony Brook? Or, is it just the privilege of having a white skin?"
Douglas, Maurice. "Too Black, Too Strong." Stony Brook Press 15(9). February 22, 1994. http://dspace.sunyconnect.suny.edu/bitstream/handle/1951/37755/Stony%20Brook%20Press%20V.%2015,%20N.%2009.PDF?sequence=1
Mull seemingly was on the victim's side at Stony Brook back in 1994. These days, not so much. There doesn't seem to be any room in the rather large UAlbany Police Department for anyone who would take a victim's side.
