By Catalina Righter and Brooke Schultz
Editor-in-Chief and News Editor
On Jan. 25, the Circuit Court for Kent County issued a summons for Fope Moses Fadojutimi, 17, a former Washington College student charged with second degree rape, second degree sexual offence, and second degree assault of a female student, all stemming from an incident on Sept. 8, 2016. Fadojutimi is being charged as an adult.
An initial hearing is scheduled for March 3.
Initially, the College investigated the incident under Title IX, which is a college-based system for handling reports of sexual misconduct. Under Title IX, greater anonymity is granted to the “reporting party” and “responding party” of the alleged misconduct and investigation goes through the College’s Honor Board.
One of the three alleged victims later decided to pursue criminal charges, and Chestertown police issued a warrant for Fadojutimi’s arrest on Nov. 4.
According to the Kent County News, District Court Judge John E. Nunn III unsealed the documents for the case Dec. 21., making it available in the public record.
Two other cases of sexual assault occurred and were reported to the WC Department of Public Safety the same week of Sept. 5 and were investigated under Title IX. Fadojutimi was the responding party in all three cases.
According to the Kent County News, “Lt. John Dolgos confirmed Dec. 22 that Chestertown police are conducting a criminal investigation into a second alleged sexual assault.”
College administration expelled Fadojutimi from WC in September.
In a case like this, the intake is done by one of the Title IX assistant coordinators or the Title IX Coordinator Candace Wannamaker.
Sue Golinski, one of the Title IX coordinators and operations supervisor at the Department of Public Safety, said, “We try to give both sides the same opportunity to make a statement, to have a support person in with them, just different things we offer to both sides. Once we conduct the intake, the case is assigned to usually a pair of investigators. Then they’ll go through the process.”
Director of Public Safety Gerald Roderick also works as a Title IX investigator, and said that once the investigation begins, they have a 60 day window to complete their work. “Sometimes there can be a stop-gap in there if the complainant goes to the police simultaneously. The police can ask us to stop our investigation and give them up to 10 days to do their investigative work, just so there’s no interference in their investigation. So at the end of that 60-day time, we then turn our investigation back over to Wannamaker, who reviews it and determines where it moves from there,” he said.
While working with Title IX cases, Roderick said they can help explain the criminal process and what the victim’s options are if they wish to pursue a criminal complaint.
“Having Public Safety personnel who are also Title IX investigators, if a case comes in through normal channels, we can also explain to them the Title IX process and [help] if they want to file a Title IX complaint,” Golinski said.
“If [the case] is handled in-house, we stick with it pretty closely. Once it’s turned over to the police, we allow the police to do their investigation separate from our investigation….We’ll be working with the police and the prosecutor’s office as we guide [the student] through the legal system to make sure that our complainants understand the process. We try to make it as comfortable as possible for them because that can become a pretty lengthy process with multiple hearings,” Roderick said.
He said they also offer assistance to help the student understand “what to anticipate, how this works, what the next hearing is about.”
Local resources for victims of sexual assault are available through For All Seasons, Inc. via www.forallseasonsinc.org or by calling their hotline, (410) 820-5600 or toll-free 1-800-310-7273.
WC Students can report assault to the Department of Public Safety, 410-778-7810. Survivors and friends of survivors of sexual assault, dating violence and stalking may contact the Sexual Assault Response Advocate hotline, 410-699-0742, available 24/7. More WC-based resources are available at http://www.washcoll.edu/offices/wellness-and-prevention-education under “Gender-Based Violence Resources.”