THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 8, 1994 TAG: 9410080265
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ESTHER DISKIN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 76 lines
In February, after a group of professors at Regent University law school filed a complaint with the American Bar Association over the university's tenure policy, Regent Chancellor Pat Robertson rained his wrath down upon them.
Now, three members of that group want him to pay for it: Each has filed a $10 million lawsuit against Robertson and Regent University, saying his comments injured their reputations and held them up to public ridicule.
In a letter, widely circulated at the university and published in The Virginian-Pilot and The Ledger-Star, Robertson said the professors were not ``capable teachers of law,'' and compared them to ``cultists after the order of Jim Jones or the Branch Davidians.''
Two of the professors, Roger Bern and Paul Morken, were fired by Regent University in May. The third, Jeff Tuomala, remains on the faculty.
All three men have previously sued Regent over changes in teaching contracts that they say endangered job security. In July, the university changed from a long-standing tenure policy, with automatically renewed three-year contracts, to a system that requires professors to undergo performance reviews.
The new defamation lawsuits raise the stakes in an ongoing battle between several faculty members and Regent over the direction of the university founded by Robertson.
The legal challenges come at a sensitive time for Regent's law school, which is seeking full accreditation from the ABA. Regent is in its fifth year of provisional accreditation, and faculty job security and academic freedom are key requirements for full approval.
The turmoil began more than a year ago with the firing of former law school Dean Herbert W. Titus, a biblical conservative who claimed he was dismissed because his views did not match Robertson's. Titus has sued over his dismissal.
Several law school professors - including Bern, Morken and Tuomala - signed a complaint to the ABA alleging that Titus had been improperly dismissed. The complaint also expressed worries that academic freedom was threatened at Regent.
That complaint unleashed Robertson's anger. According to Morken's lawsuit, Robertson derided their actions at a chapel meeting at the university, with ``several hundred'' people in attendance. Robertson stated that the law school faculty were in rebellion, which is ``as the sin of witchcraft,'' the lawsuit said.
In a widely distributed letter, Robertson said their complaint could be a roadblock to the law school's accreditation and said ``their reasoning borders on lunacy.''
``No rational professional person seeks to destroy the source of his own employment and career advancement,'' Robertson wrote. ``Only cultists after the order of Jim Jones or the Branch Davidians do such things.''
Those insults injured the professional reputations of Morken, Bern and Tuomala, and caused them ``embarrassment, humiliation and mental suffering,'' according to the lawsuits. All three, contacted by telephone, declined to talk about the lawsuits.
A lawsuit presents only one side of the matter. Robertson's spokesman, Gene Kapp, declined to comment.
The university's president, Terry Lindvall, could not be reached for comment on Friday.
The law school's dean, J. Nelson Happy, called the recent lawsuits ``ridiculous.'' He said the professors' personal argument with Robertson would not harm the university.
``The fact that these guys' feelings were hurt by Pat's letter has nothing to do with ABA accreditation,'' he said. ILLUSTRATION: $30 MILLION BATTLE
Pat Robertson, left, is being sued by two former Regent law
professors, Paul Morken, right, and Roger Bern, and one current
professor, Jeff Tuomala. Each is seeking $10 million.
KEYWORDS: LAWSUIT REGENT UNIVERSITY by CNB