Brown and White Vol. 135 no. 5

              The Brown and White Vol. 135 No. 5
Friday, September 21, 2018 ‘All the Lehigh News First’
Increasing sexual assault
awareness on a national level
has inspired a greater number
of individuals, especially college
students, to come forward about
instances of on-campus sexual
violence and rape.
In the midst of this move-ment
comes 18 reports of rape at
Moravian College within a three-year
period, according to the col-lege’s
crime statistics report. This
influx of rape reports has left
many colleges and universities in
challenging situations, including
Moravian, which is involved in a
federal lawsuit.
A Moravian student claims to
have reported an alleged sexual
assault that occurred in her dorm
on Aug. 28, 2016, to her building’s
residence assistant, who allegedly
failed to report the incident to the
school, according to the case.
The student is suing the school
for violations of Title IX, as well
as her alleged rapist who was
expelled and sent back to his home
in Saudi Arabia nine months after
the incident took place.
Leah M. Naso Breisch, the Title
IX coordinator for Moravian,
declined to comment on the inci-dent.
“The (misconduct investiga-tion)
process is intended to be
thorough, equitable, and timely.
College investigations generally
take up to 28 calendar days and
Lawsuit prompts sexual assault discussion
Sally Gu/B&W Staff
Moravian College is facing a lawsuit after a student claimed that the school mishandled her sexual assault case in 2016, in which
Moravian failed to take action against her attacker for nine months. There were 18 filed rape cases at Moravian from 2014-2016.
See MORAVIAN Page 2
LUPD’s ‘HawkWatch’ app supports student safety
Photo Illustration by Kate Morrell/B&W Staff
The HawkWatch app was released by LUPD earlier this semester. The app features a
variety of resources for students to access emergency contacts.
At night, small blue lights shine
across campus. They are not for
aesthetics, though — they iden-tify
emergency phone stations
that provide immediate contact
with dispatchers at the Lehigh
University Police Department, 24
hours a day, seven days a week.
For years, the blue light phone
system was the only form of direct
and immediate communication
between students and LUPD.
Now, HawkWatch, a new safe-ty
app launched this fall, fills a
void created by the loss of the
EmergenSee app.
Jason Schiffer, the chief of
LUPD, said HawkWatch is supe-rior
to other app options because
it offers an array of features, such
as the ability to contact LUPD
while receiving directions and
other emergency contact infor-mation.
“(The app) allowed us to inte-grate
a lot of other resources that
are on campus to help students,”
Schiffer said. “It’s not just safety.
It’s a way for everyone on campus
to get access to almost anything
that can help them.”
Another feature, “Virtual
Walkhome”, uses students’ loca-tions
so campus security can
track where users are traveling
to and from.
“(The app is) more useful for
when you’re off campus,” Ruth
Densamo, ’19, said. “I think that
was the only time where I felt like
it would be nice to have someone
walk me home.”
Ari Chan, ’19, said the app is
innovative.
“I think it’s a really cool idea,”
Chan said. “It’s kind of what you
do with your friends anyways —
like when your friend asks you
to text them when you get home.
Now you basically have a mobile
See SAFETY Page 2
reach resolution within 60 cal-endar
days, unless good cause
exists to extend this timeline,”
Moravian’s sexual misconduct
policy states.
The victim is suing the school
for its failure to meet the stan-dards
of its misconduct policy.
She remained living in the same
building and attending class with
her attacker for nine months fol-lowing
her report, the case said.
Lehigh, which has a student
population of over 7,000, has had
five reports of rape since 2015,
compared to Moravian’s 18 filed
cases and student body of just
over 2,000, a Lehigh Valley crime
report said.
Such contrasting statistics
raise questions among students
and faculty.
(“Failure to report sexual
assault) is a cultural problem at
Lehigh,” said Amanda Spina, ’20,
a member of Break The Silence.
“Because we have such a large
party culture and such a large
By EMMA SATIN
Associate News Editor
By JISU CHOI
Designer