Thursday, April 07, 2005

Latest on Klocek case: Lawsuit against DePaul may be near

The Chicago Journal, a downtown community paper, has spoken out about the free speech controversey at DePaul University. As with this blog, they mention that the Chicago area mainstream media has remained for the most part silent on this story.

John Mauck is representing Professor Klocek. Some interesting excerpts:

"Mauck said he decided to take the case after reading an October 8 letter from (School of New Learning Dean Susanne) Dumbleton printed in the school’s newspaper, The DePaulia, after Dumbleton advised Klocek not to speak to the press. Mauck took particular umbrage at a passage that focused on the content of Klocek’s speech rather than his conduct toward the students:

“'No students anywhere should ever have to be concerned they will be verbally attacked for their religious belief or their ethnicity,” Dumbleton wrote. “No one should ever use the role of teacher to demean the ideas of others or insist on the absoluteness of an opinion, much less press erroneous assertions.'

(The boldface was added by me for emphasis.)

Says Mauck, “That’s what got me going,” he said. “This was about content, not conduct.”

As I type this tonight, the link to that October letter from Dean Dumbleton is MISSING!!! Maybe their server is down. Maybe not. Stay tuned.

Notes: 4/8/2005 Blogspot's server was down too last night, so I've added couple of things that should've been there in the first place!

2nd Revision for 4/8. I found that link, the October 8 letter to the DePaulia from Dean Susanne Dumbleton.


And according to Klocek's attorney...

"Mauck says he expects to file suit against DePaul in the next few weeks on behalf of Klocek “unless DePaul should turn around and say we’re sorry and we’re going to make it right.”

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