Collateral damage in the #MeToo movement.
Via Fox News:
The new Ithaca College president is making headlines this week after at least two college newspapers published anonymous documents they received about a 16-year-old criminal case she was involved in.
The Ithacan student newspaper and the Vanderbilt Hustler both published stories on Tuesday evening detailing information they received regarding a 2001 sex abuse case in which College President Shirley M. Collado pleaded no contest.
According to the articles, Collado, who worked at The Center at the Psychiatric Institute of Washington in D.C. at the time, was accused of having a five-month sexual relationship with a female patient who was undergoing therapy for post-traumatic stress in 2000.
The victim claimed they entered a sexual relationship after Collado kissed her and said these actions – which included fondling and kissing – would be “therapeutic for the victim; that it would bring her out of her shell,” the Government’s Memorandum in Aid of Sentencing said during the case, according to the Hustler.
Collado was convicted of one count of misdemeanor sexual abuse in August 2001 after pleading no contest. She received a 30-day suspension, 18 months of supervised probation, and 80 hours of community service. She was also force to pay a $250 fine and ordered to stay away from the patient.
Collado insists she is innocent, even though she pleaded no contest.
“Recently, I learned that an anonymous source has been circulating misleading information to other colleges and universities and their news outlets about a traumatic time in my like that took place almost 20 years ago,” she wrote in a statement on the college’s website released to students Tuesday.
“Seeing how profoundly the facts and my character are being misrepresented and being forced to relive the pain of that time have left me feeling upset, perplexed and targeted. I do not know who is disseminating this information or how widely it is being shared.”
She continued: “In light of the resurfacing of this legal action, I want to unequivocally state now, as I did then, that the accusations in the court documents are simply not true.”