
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 2, 1995                   TAG: 9508020024
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-12   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NORFOLK                                LENGTH: Medium

COMPLAINT AGAINST PROFESSOR WILL GO FORWARD

A federal judge was asked Monday to throw out the College of William and Mary's complaint against a tenured professor whose alleged sexual harassment of a student led to a lawsuit against the school.

``It muddles the issue,'' Eileen N. Wagner, a Richmond attorney representing William and Mary doctoral student Karen Veselits, told U.S. District Judge Richard B. Kellam.

But Assistant Attorney General Richard Kast defended the ``third-party complaint'' that the school brought against history professor Ismail Abdalla in April, a month after Veselits filed a $2 million lawsuit against the college.

Veselits' lawsuit, which did not name Abdalla, contends the college mishandled her sexual harassment claim against the professor. The college's court filing seeks to make Abdalla responsible for any damages.

According to Wagner, a William and Mary sexual harassment committee that started looking into the student's allegation in 1993 concluded that she was pressured for sex and that she received a punitive grade when she refused.

But Wagner said the college's handling of the matter was ``deliberately slowed down'' in a way that hurt her client's chance of getting relief.

``I dare say if she had gotten an apology, that would have ended it,'' Wagner told Kellam.

Robert T. Billingsley of Richmond, the professor's attorney who also asked that the college's third-party complaint be dismissed, said the William and Mary committee report raised doubts about whether Veselits actually received a punitive grade.

He also said the committee didn't conduct a due-process proceeding that allowed the professor to cross-examine witnesses.

Kellam did not indicate when he would rule on the college's complaint or on Wagner's request that the committee's harassment finding be accepted by the court. Billingsley opposes the request.

Dean David J. Lutzer of the Arts and Sciences faculty at William and Mary was still reviewing the committee's findings when the doctoral student filed her lawsuit. The case does not yet have a trial date.

by CNB