Latest News and Comment from Education

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Reynoso pepper-spray report Long-awaited reports are no whitewash | Davis Enterprise #ows

Long-awaited reports are no whitewash | Davis Enterprise:


Long-awaited reports are no whitewash

AN AVOIDABLE TRAGEDY … while there’s plenty of blame to go around in the long-awaited Reynoso pepper-spray report that was released Wednesday, the very first paragraph of the report, under the simple heading “Introduction,” said it all … noted the report: “Our overriding conclusion can be stated briefly and explicitly. The pepper spraying incident that took place on November 18, 2011, should and could have been prevented.” … I think many of us had come to the same conclusion some time ago, but the Reynoso task force was able to back up that position with some incredibly eye-opening facts and figures …
NO WHITEWASH HERE … up until the minute the Reynoso findings were released along with the Kroll report, many people were skeptical that we’d learn much of anything … I was among them … words like “whitewash” and “cover-up” became part of the skeptics’ vocabulary … however, after reading these twin reports, it’s obvious many, many stones were overturned and many questions asked … and while it’s true that some police officers refused to be questioned, the same could not be said for UC Davis administrators, several of whom came in for extreme criticism from the Reynoso group, which had particularly harsh words for Chancellor Linda Katehi and Vice Chancellors Fred Wood and John Meyer … cover-up? … protecting the campus brass? … not in this report …
COMEDY OF ERRORS … apparently, the initial plan was to remove the occupy tents at 3 a.m. when there were