Details Emerge of Alleged Hate Incident, Police Misconduct in March 6 UC Davis Arrest
Last night at the Davis Human Relations Commission meeting, students expanded on a police incident that occurred…
Last night at the Davis Human Relations Commission meeting, students expanded on a police incident that occurred…
It was September, 2009, when the Vanguard first published the account of Janet Keyzer, who filed suit…
The University of California at Davis, West Village, the nation’s largest planned zero net energy community, racks up an impressive list of achievements in its initial year of review. The first formal analysis of West Village shows that, even in its initial phases, it is well on the way to the ultimate goal of operating as a ZNE community.
The report released today from UC Davis, and its partner West Village Community Partnership LLC, outlines major milestones including West Village producing 87 percent of the energy it consumed in a one-year period — well in advance of the project’s full completion.
Mr. Beachy, internationally known for his scientific leadership and groundbreaking research related to disease-resistance in crops, will assume the new position Jan. 1.
When former UC Davis Police Lieutenant John Pike received a workers’ compensation award that was greater than the payout to his victims, the Vanguard wrote that the payout makes both a mockery of the system and the incident.
The Vanguard was not alone in its indignation.
It is interesting that this month saw both the culmination of the worker’s compensation process for former UC Davis Police Lieutenant John Pike, as well as the presentations last week of the UC Davis Police Oversight Plan, which are part of the outgrowth of the pepper-spray incident that has its dubious second-year anniversary coming up in just under one month.
“At UC Davis there has been a serious breach of trust between the UCDPD and the campus community,” the report on the oversight plan indicates. “The establishment of oversight is an important step in working to build a bridge to restore trust between the police and the campus community. To have credibility, oversight must be visible and must be a strong, effective model.”
Apparently an administrative law judge has taken the old adage – this hurts me more than it hurts you – to a new a level when deciding to award Lt. John Pike 38,056 dollars. Lt. Pike filed a worker’s compensation claim in which he claimed depression and anxiety brought on by threats and criticism he and his family received following the infamous November 18, 2011, incident on the UC Davis Quad.
On the other hand, 21 students settled their claims against the university, related to Lt. Pike’s decision to pepper spray protesters on that November 18 day, for a mere $30,000 each. The university admitted to no wrongdoing in that dispute. They deny and “continue to deny each and all of the claims alleged by Plaintiffs in the Litigation. Defendants contend that they acted reasonably and in good faith.”
This differs somewhat from the program that the city of Davis implemented in late 2007 with the hiring of Police Auditor (originally designated as Police Ombudsman) Robert Aaronson.
“To date, we are aware of seven campus facilities and several parked cars that were damaged, including 31 broken windows,” Chancellor Linda Katehi wrote in a letter to the “Campus Community.” She noted, “In the course of these acts, a hateful racial slur was written on a blackboard.”
The Sacramento Bee on Monday reported that her salary will be $260,000 – which is more than any other campus communications chief in the entire UC system.
The legislation will link student loan interest rates to the financial markets. That means lower rates for students right now, but higher ones down the road. The measure passed the house 392-31 and will head for President Barack Obama for his signature.
University of California students might be forgiven if they are a bit cynical. After all, for years now they have been asked to pay an increasingly larger share of the burden of their education. Much of that money will be repaid later severalfold as students struggle under an avalanche of debt that the leadership in Congress has failed to address and has at times made worse.
Still, I think that most students could probably understand that, as the natural outcome of the worst recession since the Great Depression, this is a state that continues to teeter on the brink of budget crisis and overall malaise – if only that burden seemed to be shared evenly across all comers to the UC System.
Former UC Davis Lt. John Pike filed a worker’s compensation claim for injuries suffered on November 18, 2011, during the incident in which he doused protesters with pepper spray on the UC Davis Quad.
While much of the information remains confidential, protected under privacy and other rights, the form indicates that the impact was “psychiatric” and affected the “nervous system.”
In May of 2012, following the release of the Kroll Report and the Cruz Reynoso Task Force report with the names of police officers redacted, the Los Angeles Times and Sacramento Bee argued that the public and press interests were not represented in the agreement to suppress the names of officers who were involved.
In a case that is likely destined for the state’s Supreme Court, the First Appellate District, Division Four, ruled in favor of the newspapers and ordered the release of the names of 12 officers named in the two reports commissioned by the University of California Regents.
While the public and the activist class has weighed in on the appointment of former Homeland Security Chief Janet Napolitano to become the next president of the University of California, the major newspapers in California are split, sometimes within themselves, on whether it was a good move, a desperate move, or a disaster.
One area of concern was the process, with the LA Times asking how we can tell if this is a good choice or not, based on the limited search process that went on.
Ms. Napolitano, the first female president in UC’s 145-year history, succeeds Mark G. Yudof, who steered the university through the depths of California’s financial crisis that led to sharp cutbacks in state support for public higher education.
The appointment would mean that a woman would head up the nation’s premier public higher education system for the first time in its 145 year history.
Congressman John Garamendi, who represents much of Yolo County in Congress, fought hard against these changes and said on Monday he was “outraged by the shameful failure of Congress to stop the subsidized Stafford Student Loan interest rate from doubling.”
Early this morning, the Vanguard received a call that protesters had locked down Dutton Hall and barricaded all entrances to the building. When the Vanguard arrived on the scene this morning, there were estimated to be roughly 30 protesters who had locked themselves up in the building.
There was a single police officer – not authorized to speak to the press – and a single university official – also not authorized to speak to the press – giving instructions to students and employees who mainly sat outside of the building awaiting to hear instructions.
Details at this time are sketchy, but officials from the UC Davis Police Department are confirming that a crime is being investigated as a hate crime.
According to Campus Crime Alert Bulletin, the incident occurred on Sunday, May 12 at 8:10 p.m. The victim and a witness were walking along Levee Road near Brooks Road when a burgundy Jeep SUV “pulled up alongside of them.”