UC Santa Barbara archaeologist Danielle Kurin and her attorney attempt to intimidate anthropology department members who look out for students and try to stop abuses [Updated August 20, 2020, including yet another story of abusing students, this time from last year]

UCSB's Humanities and Social  Sciences Department, home of Anthropology

As the defamation suit filed against me in the Southern District of New York by University of California, Santa Barbara archaeologist Danielle Kurin rages on, Kurin and her attorney, David Scher, can be counted on to do everything they can to try to intimidate not only me, but faculty, students, and other individuals who have bravely tried to deal with Kurin's long history of abuse and to prevent future victims. This morning I received the following email from Scher:


"Mr. Balter,

In par. 128 of your answer you state that a faculty member gave you a student’s personally identifying information, which enabled you to contact the student.  We believe this act by this faculty member violates FERPA and Title IX and have therefore reported this incident to UCSB’s counsel.  Counsel asked me to ask if you would provide the identity of the faculty member.  I told him that you strongly support the ferreting out and stopping of Title IX and FERPA violations and most certainly would want to cooperate.  Would you kindly provide this identity to me (to be treated confidentially) or directly to UCSB counsel?

Also, as a separate note, of course Dr. Kurin knows the student who the faculty member disclosed because Dr. Kurin recruited her. After getting your email, she became scared and ran and withdrew her fully paid scholarship admission. All other archeology candidates for that term (none of which would have worked with Dr. Kurin) also withdrew in fear. These are the careers that were destroyed as a result of your email and I thought you should know the damage that your actions caused.  

Regards,

Dave Scher, Partner

Hoyer Law Group, PLLC

[The Answer to the Complaint can be found at this link]

My email response to Scher:

"Thank you for your message.

The individual you mention acted as a confidential source and thus I will not be disclosing their identity. Please inform UCSB's counsel of my position.

I consider your communication an attempt to intimidate both me and members of the UCSB anthropology department  who might cooperate with my reporting and who might wish to exercise their rights to speak either internally in the department or externally about their concerns about misconduct by Danielle Kurin or anyone else.

As for careers: Your information seems to be based entirely on what your client has told you, which is incorrect. The student who narrowly escaped working with your client, and other students who decided not to work in the UCSB anthropology department because of their concerns about  a toxic atmosphere, actually had their careers saved from the very serious damage that  your client and others like her in archaeology and anthropology have done.

Since this email goes to the issues in the litigation, it is on the record and I am  free to publish it.

Best regards,

Michael Balter"

I will go even further than I did in this email, and say that the faculty member who facilitated my contacting the student involved acted in the absolute best of intentions and with the kind of due care for the wellbeing of students that neither Kurin nor UC Santa Barbara have shown during this long saga of abuses and enabling abuse, which goes all the way back to 2013 when Kurin first started teaching at UCSB. Indeed, Kurin and her attorney are excellent practitioners of the art of DARVO ("Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender") which abusers have been using since time immemorial. This too will fail.


Update: Further response from David Scher and my response.

Mr. Balter,

I want to be very clear with you that I have no intention of intimidating or harassing you in any way. Indeed, as you have seen in other communications that have been quite cordial, we are working diligently to conduct an orderly litigation and providing you whatever information we can as a pro se litigant.

This incident is unrelated to the litigation.  We became aware of a very blatant FERPA and Title IX violation and felt we had to report it – to UCSB. We did not publish it, we did not threaten you about it – we simply reported it.  UCSB counsel (not us) asked me to ask you for the identity of the violating faculty member.  Merely asking you, on behalf of UCSB, for the identity of a faculty member who clearly violated FERPA and Title IX seemed reasonable and in fact something you would want to do.  That you have decided not to is noted and we will let UCSB counsel know.  You are, in a sense, shooting the messenger, accusing us of harassment – when in fact all we did was transmit information we thought vital to what is now an investigation into a Title IX and FERPA violation committed by a tenured professor – a violation that we know about only because you yourself wrote about it in detail in your Answer.

You might perhaps consider this.  You have accused Dr. Kurin of conspiring to violate Title IX (above and beyond the already known charges) and refusing to cooperate in a Title IX investigation.   Here are the facts as we see them:

1. A faculty member gave you personally identifying information about a student and asked you to contact the student.
2. You did not report the faculty member for this blatant Title IX and FERPA violation.
3. Instead you emailed the student – in our view, invading her privacy (but that is a topic for another day).
4. Now, in present day, you revealed how you came to this student PII – via a current UCSB faculty member - which forces us to report it to UCSB.
5. UCSB asks us to ask you for the identity of the of the faculty as part of their investigation into the matter.
6. You refuse to cooperate with the title IX and FERPA investigation and instead publish a blog accusing me personally of intimidating and harassing you.

This conduct, to us, is eerily similar to the conduct you are reporting over and over about regarding Dr. Kurin.  It is the pot calling the kettle black.

Since you have published my last email, which in our view is actually an abuse of the litigation process and could prejudice witnesses, we ask that you now also publish this email, so that our firm’s public stance that we are compliance with all Court rules and conducting this litigation properly is made public.  Thank you.

Regards,

Dave Scher, Partner

Hoyer Law Group

www.hoyerlawgroup.com

Mr.  Scher,

Yes, I will publish your  email.

I  will also publish my inquiries into this matter, which  reveal  that neither  FERPA nor Title IX were  violated in this case. Please inform the UCSB counsel  of  that so this campaign  of harassment, initiated by you and your client, can cease.

MB


Further comment: The essence of what has happened above is that the University of California, and UCSB's Counsel specifically, are collaborating with Danielle Kurin and her attorney to attempt to expose a source of my reporting. Perhaps UC is a naive and unwitting collaborator,  or perhaps this is part of the university's long effort to give Kurin a pass for her continuing misconduct, but in the end it amounts to the same thing.


And more:

Mr Scher

Since this situation does not involve either you or your client, please put the UC counsel in touch with me directly.


Scher: "My understanding is that you have already contacted UCSB counsel and have his info.  Of course you are free to contact him."

"The UCSB counsel, Nancy Hamill,  has  forwarded my Litigation Hold Orders to Michael Goldstein, UC Counsel.  Goldstein and I are disagreeing about some matters related to serving of eventual subpoenas, but we are in touch. Is Nancy or Michael the one you are talking to?"

MB

Scher: "Yes Mr. Goldstein."

MB: "Okay, good. He should have contacted me directly about this, and not through you. You and your  clients are not disinterested parties, despite your pretense otherwise."


And still more, re discovery: 


From Scher:

"I gather you intend to subpoena UCSB employees from your email.  Please note that we object to any effort to seek to depose any UCSB employee (and/or to obtain any documents of any kind for UCSB). Indeed, we view that as an effort at intimidation and harassment – not so much of us – but of the staff and students at UCSB – and will vigorously oppose it.

Because you are a pro se litigant, for your information, you will need to prepare a subpoena, have us oppose it, and then, if you win that motion, domesticate the subpoena in the proper jurisdiction and effect service.  You are responsible for effective proper service, scheduling, ensuring the appearance of the witness, deposition costs, witness fees and your copies of any transcripts.   Our client is not responsible to produce any non-party witness and she will not do so. In accordance with the rules, please provide us in advance copies of any intended subpoena or other service document so that we may file a motion to quash with the Court."

And my response:

Yes, of course you will try to prevent testimony from witnesses who possess  information key to evaluating the allegations in your Complaint, because they have intimate knowledge of your client's misconduct and the disciplinary proceedings that have taken  place in response to it. As from the beginning, you and your client seem to think that all you have to do is file a lawsuit in order to win it. That is not how it works in the American system of justice.

And, of course, this is the judge's decision to make, not yours, and I am confident that he will allow a Defendant in a case such as this to conduct the widest possible discovery so he can defend himself properly. Thank you for the information about how to proceed.

MB



In which Balter calls for Kurin to be placed on administrative leave for the duration of this lawsuit.

To:

Henry T. Yang, Chancellor

David Marshall, Executive Vice Chancellor

Charles Hale, Dean of Social Sciences

Casey Walsh, Chair Dept of Anthropology

Michael Goldstein, UC Senior Counsel

Dear colleagues,

As you know, UCSB anthropology assistant professor Danielle Kurin has sued me for defamation in the Southern District of New York for my truthful and accurate reporting about her history of misconduct, including the 2016 Title IX for retaliating against students who were sexually harassed by her partner and later husband.

In the American justice system, Kurin has the right to seek relief in the  courts for any injuries she believes she has suffered, although I am vigorously denying and fighting her claims in my current status as a pro se litigant.

It is my belief, based on my reporting, that the real purpose of this lawsuit is to intimidate her anthropology colleagues, and possibly the university itself, into giving her tenure. You are no doubt aware that Kurin previously sued the university itself, although she lost that case.

Today, Kurin's attorney, David Scher, accused one of my sources of violating FERPA and Title IX, a baseless charge for which he had no evidence whatsoever (this was communicated to Mr. Goldstein who is copied here.) This accusation was aimed at a member of the faculty, and Mr. Scher and Mr. Goldstein urged me to divulge the name of  this innocent person.

It is clear to me that Dr. Kurin and her attorney  are attempting to use the university to intimidate potential witnesses in the litigation and to retaliate against them. Unfortunately, Mr. Goldstein's office seems to have fallen for that ruse.

To prevent further interference with the litigation; to prevent attempts to intimidate and retaliate against members of the UC community who might wish to give evidence or otherwise participate in this process; and to avoid UC becoming an instrument of Kurin's baseless litigation:

I call upon you to place Danielle Kurin on administrative leave until the lawsuit is resolved.

With thanks and best regards,

Michael Balter

cc. David Scher, attorney for Dr. Kurin


Update August 20, 2020: Legal discovery is a broad tool to investigate claims in a lawsuit.

I know that a lot of people are following this lawsuit and my ongoing reporting closely, as is made clear by the relatively large number of page views each day (usually more than 2000, sometimes 3000 or more.) It's obvious that Scher has tried to take advantage of the fact that I am a pro se litigant (that is, representing myself), although legal observers tell me that I am holding my own pretty well. I may well have representation very soon, however, and then any advantages that Scher has over me professionally will disappear--indeed, since he does not appear to be that great a lawyer (he has allowed his client to kick a number of own goals in this lawsuit and it's still early days) he may end up at a distinct disadvantage as more attorneys get involved on my side of the case.

I have been greatly helped by the fact that during the 1980s I worked at the ACLU of Southern California on a major lawsuit against the Los Angeles Police Department for spying on peaceful political groups (Congresswoman Karen Bass, then a community activist, was one of the plaintiffs.) I helped the lawyers prepare the depositions and other legal discovery requests, and helped prepare our clients for the depositions that the LAPD's lawyers took of them. I also sat in on all the depositions and advised ACLU lawyers on what questions to ask. So I learned a fair bit about civil procedure.

In his email above, Scher states that he will oppose any efforts I or my attorneys make to gather legal discovery from UCSB and/or University of California employees. He calls that "harassment," as if his client's $10 million defamation suit against me is not itself harassment, as well as a blatant attempt to intimidate survivors of sexual misconduct, bullying, and other acts that Kurin is either directly or indirectly responsible for (and for which she has been found responsible by two organizations, UCSB and the Institute for Field Research, as I have reported.)

But the simple legal truth is that courts generally allow very wide latitude in discovery efforts, and permit litigants to not only obtain documents and testimony from parties to lawsuits but also from "third parties" who might have relevant evidence. (For some basic primers on discovery,  see here and here.) But it does not take any real latitude for a court to allow discovery on issues that a litigant has directly raised in legal pleadings (such as the Complaint and Answer in Kurin v. Balter.)

For example, Kurin contends that everything was going great for her at UCSB, and nothing stood in the way of her receiving tenure, until I began reporting on her. Not only does my reporting already show that this is not true, but I have also identified key witnesses who possess knowledge and documents that will further show this is not true. In other words, rather than going on the kind of fishing expedition that Scher engaged in when he tried to out one of my sources in the UCSB anthropology  department, I will be able to engaged in targeted discovery aimed at proving that Kurin's contentions are false. And there are many of them.

So, despite Scher's bluff and bluster, I expect that we will indeed be able to obtain documents and take depositions of UCSB and UC witnesses. Indeed, such discovery is routine. Please stay tuned for updates, which are likely to come fast and furious as the case proceeds.


Update: Still abusing students after all these years.

Last week I reported on the cases of "Lara" and "Jessica," two undergraduate students who gave detailed accounts of being abused by Danielle Kurin in 2015 and 2014, respectively. Both of these students reported their experiences to faculty members and both the dean's office and/or the university Ombudsman. They both suffered trauma, and Lara left school without graduating as an eventual result of her treatment. From 2016-2019, Kurin was on administrative leave due to the Title IX findings that she had retaliated against students.

This week I Tweeted a rhetorical question: Is Danielle Kurin still abusing students?

The answer is yes, and I am going to tell here of one incident, witnessed by a number of people.

In fall 2019, right after Kurin returned to teaching after three years away, she and other faculty members were participating in a faculty meeting. I will let one of the witnesses tell the story, with some deletions to prevent them from being identified:

"[The] faculty meeting had just ended....An undergrad...was wandering the halls, and Kurin was the first person to step out of the room. The undergrad approached her asking for directions to a specific office. Kurin lost her shit. Accused the student of harassing her, told the student she was being extremely rude, etc... some of her choice phrases... 'Do you know who I am? You can't just walk up to me like this. This is extremely rude and unacceptable. I am an extremely busy person.' Her voice was raised, she was looming over the undergrad, and the undergrad was about to burst into tears. Kurin stormed off."

I want to emphasize that I have heard many such stories, going back as early as 2009, and reported on some of them. There are two very striking things here: First, that this happened right after Kurin returned to teaching after being on leave for misconduct, a clear indication that she had not learned anything or changed; and second, that while there were a number of witnesses among the faculty, most just ignored the incident. One source says that's because they realized that for Kurin this was just "par for the course."

The anthropology faculty, and the university, obviously have to decide if this is the kind of person they want to give decades of tenure to (as far as I know, there is still no mandatory retirement age in the University of California system.)