Where would you want your kids to study?
By Anthony Hegarty
There are many websites devoted to telling us which university is ranked higher based on a range of variables such as student satisfaction, published research, graduate numbers, graduate jobs etc.
As a criminologist, I was looking for a rank on universities hiring criminals and when caught what they do about it which could provide us with another rank dealing with integrity.
It wasn’t that long ago that Seoul National University (SNU) Professor Hwang Woo-Suk fell from grace for lying about his research into stem cells.
I actually felt quite sorry for him because so much expectation had been placed upon him that his judgement may have been impacted. However, wrong is wrong and he was swiftly dismissed.
In contrast, however, there are the shameful antics of Cambridge University in England, my own country, which plays host to convicted paedophile professor Nicholas Hammond and, unlike SNU, after his conviction instead of firing him they promoted him.
In the case of Hwang, despite his dishonesty, there was still going to be a considerable loss of knowledge for SNU but they chose to put the school’s reputation first.
In the case of Hammond, he lectures in “17th-century French thought.” Like we need those graduates in the economy, right? The fact that they can’t find a French national to teach the subject confirms just how worthless the subject is anyway. So why on Earth do they keep him?
Currently the BBC is on trial in the U.K. media and courts for covering up decades of child sexual abuse by its employees, one of whom is on trial at this time and others are the subjects of an ongoing police investigation.
There is no suggestion here, nor indeed any evidence that such things are going on at Cambridge University, but their behaviour raises many questions.
Recently, I made a legal request for details of any child sex offenders employed by the university, to which they replied that there were none.
An odd response given that Hammond was teaching at the university when he was arrested for child pornography offences and the school would most certainly have known. What is more, when he wasn’t sent to prison for his serious crimes, the case was widely reported in the British media.
When challenged on the falsity of their answer they chose to hide behind clauses within the Freedom of Information laws claiming it would be too expensive at 450 pounds (800,000 won) to search university HR records to identify child sex offender staff; not particularly convincing given that their 2011/2012 income was 1.322 billion pounds (2,354,393,344,012.73 won).
Child pornography in the U.K. is graded into five levels commonly known as the Copine Scale. Level 5 is deemed most serious where children are raped or forced to have sex with animals.
Prof. Hammond’s charges were that he possessed 1,100 child pornographic images including those of babies; levels 4 and 5, as well as videos. They were predominantly of boys aged from 2 days to 6 months of age. His 15 charges included possession, production and distribution.
The majority of child sexual abuse victims are abused by close family friends or relatives. At the time of most cases of non-penetrative abuse there is little or no physical trauma simply because the child cannot understand what is happening.
They may know something is wrong, but do not know enough to tell the adult to stop.
At some point later in their lives, when it starts to make sense to them, they are struck by what has been termed complex post traumatic stress disorder and can sink into a depressed state struggling to deal with life and to form relationships.
It is often the betrayal more than the abuse itself which causes the most damage at this point in their lives.
The knowledge of one’s indecent images having been passed around the Internet has a further serious psychological effect on sex abuse victims.
It should be noted also that for the sexual gratification of Hammond, more than 1,000 very young children were sexually abused.
My own university falls some distance behind Cambridge in the rankings, but at least, like Seoul National University, when something is very wrong I know it will be dealt with effectively.
The writer is managing director of Discreet
Services Risk & Security Management Consulting.
His email address is helios@discreetservices.
com.