UBC sexual assault complainants say nothing changing at school

The University ofBritish Columbia issued a public apology to a group of students for failing to act quickly on their complaints about a 28-year-old graduate student from Russia.

That student, Dmitry Mordvinov, was a history PhD student. UBC received at least six complaints against Mordvinov going back to the Spring of 2014 including harassment and sexual assault.

The university expelled him last week and he says he is appealing.

Caitlin Cunningham is one of the women who filed a complaint with UBC.

She was one of Mordvinov's classmates, and she says the way UBC handled the case left her with "a sense of betrayal."

"While the outpouring of support from colleagues and friends has been immense, the apologies and the responses from the university have felt backhanded. And that's upsetting to me," she said.

"It feels like the same sort of thing I've been dealing with for the past year and a half is continuing now after we're trying to have a frank, open, constructive conversation about some of these issues."

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Kaitlin Russell is a former executive in the History Graduate Students' Association who tried to get her department to take action against Mordvinov on the women's behalf.

They both joined On The Coast host Stephen Quinn to talk about their experiences.

Caitlin Cunningham, why did you think going to the university would be more useful than going to the police?

I wasn't raped, I was assaulted in public, it was an escalation of maybe an uncomfortable social interaction that became more of an assault because I was grabbed and held against my will. I'd never been in this position before. I'd never made a report to police. And I was kind of lost. I didn't know if I had grounds to go to the police. When I turned to the university, I was asking for that kind of support. Because I wanted to know what I could do to help them do what they needed to do.

This happened off-campus. Why did you think it was a matter for the university?

We were students together on campus. So we were put in positions where we were in the same room frequently. So after I was assaulted, although I did not report it, I did a lot of things to make sure I was never in any kind of position of vulnerability with that particular student. Some of the TA offices were not safe spaces, down dark hallways with not a lot of security access. So what I was trying to point out was I have to be around this student because he is a student here, and I think that's entirely inappropriate.

Why did it take the university so long to act?

Cunningham: I don't know. We talked a lot about this. I still struggle to understand why one student was so much more important than so many other students. I have always and still respect justice. This was never about retribution, this was about justice. I just wanted there to be a proper investigation, swiftly, and I wanted to see it happening right away. And that's not what happened. And I still don't know why.

Russell: It was a very scary processbecause I think we discovered along the way that there was no process. And I think a lot of this could have been prevented a long time ago, even at the departmental level, just by the university having a clear set of steps in place. Rather than shifting the problem around, have something in place. Maybe a sexual assault response team, someone who can arrange academic concessions to make sure you don't have to sit in a classroom with your assailant.

To university administrators, is the university's reputation more important than the safety of women on campus?

Cunningham: It feels that way from where I'm sitting. And to the response, this feels like more of the same. All the way along it's felt like, "Yeah, yeah, we're going to make you feel okay, but we're not going to take a hard look at ourselves." [UBC vice-president of equity and inclusion] Sara-Jane Finlay called us "these girls," which felt very undermining. I've not been a girl for a very long time. I'm pushing 30 now. So that was sort of offensive. It felt like my positionality was totally being minimized.

We often hear police officers and people in authority encouraging women to come forward and report harassment and sexual assault. Kaitlin Russell, from where you're sitting now, how would you encourage women to do that?

I think the creation of a sexual assault response team would be a great first start. What this case especially and many other cases that we don't know about have demonstrated is a lack of trust in university processes right now. I think Sara-Jane Finlay said they're going to "consider" the creation of a sexual assault policy in the new year. I think that speaks to why people don't currently report to the university.

This interview has been condensed and edited for length and clarity.

To hear the full interview, click the audio labelled:Women who reported UBC sexual assaults respond to apologies