Wild Justice Part 23

Apparently, thought Jane, if he hears anything contradictory to what he's already established as correct, someone has to come back and explain it away.

Chapter 20

The next witness was Roz Peel.

Throughout the ordeal of the hearing, Roz had been the sparkplug of the outfit. Her high spirits and unquenchable optimism lifted the whole group of witnesses.

Here was a young woman who had known severe adversity in her life which she had battled and continued to battle.

Few knew the particulars because she was a very private person.

She didn't feel that anything was accomplished by bleeding all over other people about her own troubles. It was much better for her and others to be positive and upbeat.

When she identified herself and was sworn, she told the panel that she was a full-time student in the College of Agriculture and worked part-time at the Belmont print shop.

A pet.i.te woman in her late twenties, she sat back in her chair, larger than life and twinkled merrily at the panel. Her good humor was so contagious that the panel, as one, smiled back at her.

She readily confirmed the testimony of Jennifer, announcing clearly that she was present when the conversation with Lyle took place.

"He said many times that no student evaluations had ever been sent to the doc.u.ment examiners. When we asked him how he knew beforehand that none of the ones he was sending were student's, he replied that he knew who had written them before they were sent away to be a.n.a.lyzed."

Diana asked her to think carefully, "Are you sure that he meant that he knew this before the doc.u.ments were sent and not as a result of the report of the doc.u.ment examiners?"

Roz's reply was good natured but firm. "Yes, I am certain.

We asked him the question several times because we found his answer a little odd, I mean, why would he bother to have them a.n.a.lyzed if he knew who wrote them?

"He said clearly, more than once, that no student evaluations had been sent because he knew beforehand who had written the ones sent."

"Did he have any opinion on why I would do such a thing?" prompted Diana.

"He said you had a psychological problem. He inferred that you were sick but he was not a psychologist so he couldn't define it."

"How did he conduct himself during your conversation?"

"He was very angry and seemed threatened by us.

I backed away many times when he raised his voice and shouted.

I thought it was a little strange that two undergraduate women would be a threat to him--maybe he needs psychological help!"

Roz turned to the panel with a big smile to share the joke with them.

Diana placed her hand firmly against her mouth and looked down at her notes until the bubble of mirth that threatened to overcome her had dissipated, then continued with her questioning.

"On a different subject now--do you have any contact with medical students?"

"Yes. Working right in the medical building as I have for the last three years, I get to know a lot of them."

"Last year, during the first semester--that would be from September through December--do you recall any impressions you might have gotten as to their feelings about the radiology course?"

"Yes. They felt that the professors knew very little about what they were teaching so it was a waste of time to go to lectures."

"Now," interposed Henry, "we are getting into secondhand information and we should be hearing from the medical students themselves."

"Fine," rejoined Diana. "If you can get them over here, do that.

I would be happy to have them testify.

"In the meantime, you wrote in your letter to me that I could present whatever I felt was germane and since the medical students are not allowed to come, this is the best I can do."

"It will be noted that it is secondhand information,"

said Henry haughtily. He pretended to appear unconcerned with the testimony and adopt a.n.u.se's strategy of ignoring anything Diana might say that was bothersome.

"I agree. The testimony should be labeled clearly as secondhand."

Diana pounced on Henry's depiction of Roz's testimony.

"Now let us go back over the testimony your witnesses gave which alleged that students had been manipulated for years by me.

Let us get all of the student evaluations for all of the years, that your witnesses testified to, but never produced.

Let us get all of the prior information out into the open and let's honestly label it for what it is--secondhand information."

Henry rolled his eyes back in resignation, "Get on with it."

"Thank you. Roz, during the three years that you knew freshmen medical students that were taking the radiology course, did you ever hear any of them say that I had tried to influence them in any way or told them how to write their evaluations?"

"Certainly not!" Roz was very firm on this. "If they could be such pushovers as to be influenced by a non-tenured faculty member, the university should reevaluate its admission policy."

"Thank you, I have no more questions."

Henry knew he had to make a desperate attempt to trip up the witness in semantics. Always before, this had been the purview of Frank a.n.u.se but this time Frank sat silent, and for good reason. He had known Roz for some time and was not about to go for two out of three falls with her.

"You must be aware that there was no way in which your evaluations could be tied to a specific student because there was no student handwriting sent," challenged Henry.

"How was it known that no student handwriting was sent?"

questioned Roz, serenely.

"I just want to a.s.sure you that no student handwriting was sent."

A flush began to appear on his brow.

"Are you trying to say that no student standards were sent?

If so, I understand that. But SmurFFs with student writing on them were."

"Yes, SmurFFs were sent, but there was no way in which one could identify them." Henry was unaware that he had caught himself in his own semantics and made an interesting admission.

Roz wasn't going to let up or get sidetracked by it from the main argument. "That is not relevant to what we are discussing. It was wrong to send those evaluations, whether so-called standards of ours accompanied them or not.

Because technically, that was our writing."

Henry slumped in his chair in desperate need of an antacid, as the others on the panel asked questions relating to the nursing nutrition course. Suddenly Frank a.n.u.se leaned forward and interrupted the questions. "Do you remember a time when Diana had a sprained wrist?"

"Yes. She sprained it late in November and some of us helped put notes on the board for the final labs in December."

Blocked on that issue, a.n.u.se tried to maneuver her into agreeing that it should be wrong for anyone who was not a student to fill out evaluations. "It could be very harmful for a faculty person, couldn't it?"

"Two evaluations out of two hundred?" twinkled Roz. "I think they would have survived. But to more fully reply to your question, it has not been proven that the evaluations in question were not filled out by students."