Barry O'Bama
07-27-2011, 11:42 AM
The couple met their freshman year at Stanford University, two bright science majors who shared a new circle of friends. She was a hard-working idealist and active campus volunteer. He was a chatty pre-med student whose interests would later shift to law and politics.
David Wu, future Oregon congressman, and the woman later dated in their junior year. But that spring, in 1976, she broke things off. A few months later, an encounter occurred that neither wants to discuss.
That summer, the 21-year-old Wu was brought to the campus police annex after his ex-girlfriend said he tried to force her to have sex, according to Raoul K. Niemeyer, then a patrol commander who questioned him.
Wu had scratches on his face and neck, and his T-shirt was stretched out of shape, Niemeyer said.
Earlier, someone had interrupted a scuffle in the woman's dorm room. A Stanford professor said the woman told him the next day that Wu had angrily attacked her. An assistant dean who counseled the woman for two months said that the woman called it attempted rape and that Wu used a pillow to muffle her screams.
Wu told police that what happened was consensual. "He said, 'We just, I was with my girlfriend, and we just got a little carried away,' " Niemeyer remembered. After that, he said, Wu "clammed up."
Wu, 49, issued a statement today admitting to "inexcusable behavior on my part," confirming that he was disciplined by Stanford and asserting that he worked with a counselor after the incident.
"As a 21-year-old, I hurt someone I cared very much about. I take full responsibility for my actions and I am very sorry," he said. "This single event forever changed my life and the person that I have become." Wu's admission comes after The Oregonian published its account of the incident today. He previously had declined multiple requests for interviews about the matter and did not respond to written questions. His campaign manager had said the Portland Democrat would not answer "unsubstantiated allegations."
Wu was not arrested. The woman ultimately declined criminal prosecution and did not file a formal disciplinary complaint, former Stanford officials said. But before the next school year began, Wu was "de-selected" for a job as a dormitory resident assistant, a professor who would have supervised him said.
With Wu running for his fourth term in the 1st Congressional District this year, The Oregonian investigated a recurrent rumor that he had been accused of a sexual assault during his college years.
Versions of the story have circulated behind the scenes among Democratic insiders since Wu's first run for Congress in 1998, when it figured in the unexpected resignation of his campaign manager.
Although the newspaper found that Wu did face serious accusations in 1976, some aspects of what happened remain hidden by the passage of time, by the fact that police and university records have been purged or are confidential, and by the unwillingness of Wu or the woman to tell their versions of events today.
Wu's ex-girlfriend steadfastly has declined to comment, both in person and through an intermediary, citing privacy concerns.
Reporters contacted scores of former Stanford students, current and retired university officials and professors, law associates, and former campaign staffers and friends of Wu to determine what occurred.
Current Stanford officials would not discuss what happened between Wu and the woman or the university's handling of the matter, citing university policy and student confidentiality laws.
The account that follows is based on recollections of the Stanford patrol commander, the woman's counselor, two professors who supervised dormitories at the time and several classmates who were on campus that year.
http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2004/10/allegation_of_assault_on_woman.html
David Wu, future Oregon congressman, and the woman later dated in their junior year. But that spring, in 1976, she broke things off. A few months later, an encounter occurred that neither wants to discuss.
That summer, the 21-year-old Wu was brought to the campus police annex after his ex-girlfriend said he tried to force her to have sex, according to Raoul K. Niemeyer, then a patrol commander who questioned him.
Wu had scratches on his face and neck, and his T-shirt was stretched out of shape, Niemeyer said.
Earlier, someone had interrupted a scuffle in the woman's dorm room. A Stanford professor said the woman told him the next day that Wu had angrily attacked her. An assistant dean who counseled the woman for two months said that the woman called it attempted rape and that Wu used a pillow to muffle her screams.
Wu told police that what happened was consensual. "He said, 'We just, I was with my girlfriend, and we just got a little carried away,' " Niemeyer remembered. After that, he said, Wu "clammed up."
Wu, 49, issued a statement today admitting to "inexcusable behavior on my part," confirming that he was disciplined by Stanford and asserting that he worked with a counselor after the incident.
"As a 21-year-old, I hurt someone I cared very much about. I take full responsibility for my actions and I am very sorry," he said. "This single event forever changed my life and the person that I have become." Wu's admission comes after The Oregonian published its account of the incident today. He previously had declined multiple requests for interviews about the matter and did not respond to written questions. His campaign manager had said the Portland Democrat would not answer "unsubstantiated allegations."
Wu was not arrested. The woman ultimately declined criminal prosecution and did not file a formal disciplinary complaint, former Stanford officials said. But before the next school year began, Wu was "de-selected" for a job as a dormitory resident assistant, a professor who would have supervised him said.
With Wu running for his fourth term in the 1st Congressional District this year, The Oregonian investigated a recurrent rumor that he had been accused of a sexual assault during his college years.
Versions of the story have circulated behind the scenes among Democratic insiders since Wu's first run for Congress in 1998, when it figured in the unexpected resignation of his campaign manager.
Although the newspaper found that Wu did face serious accusations in 1976, some aspects of what happened remain hidden by the passage of time, by the fact that police and university records have been purged or are confidential, and by the unwillingness of Wu or the woman to tell their versions of events today.
Wu's ex-girlfriend steadfastly has declined to comment, both in person and through an intermediary, citing privacy concerns.
Reporters contacted scores of former Stanford students, current and retired university officials and professors, law associates, and former campaign staffers and friends of Wu to determine what occurred.
Current Stanford officials would not discuss what happened between Wu and the woman or the university's handling of the matter, citing university policy and student confidentiality laws.
The account that follows is based on recollections of the Stanford patrol commander, the woman's counselor, two professors who supervised dormitories at the time and several classmates who were on campus that year.
http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2004/10/allegation_of_assault_on_woman.html