Mercer University
By Amanda A. Farahany
Attorney at Law
Barrett & Farahany
Our firm specializes in civil cases against college campuses
for crimes on campus, in the hopes to make college campuses
safer and to raise awareness to the public that campuses are
not the safe havens promised by the schools.
There are two Mercer cases that relate to this situation (there
are now three Mercer cases, because our firm has sued them
again for another rape on their campus). In the first case,
the Mercer Police investigated my client's allegations and
took no actions against the rapist. During the course of discovery
in the lawsuit, we asked Mercer for prior criminal history
reports, which they said were irrelevant and refused to provide
them. We filed motions to compel their production with the
court and while we were waiting for the court's ruling, it
struck us that we could use the open records act to ask for
them. We asked for the records under the open records act
and Mercer responded that it did not apply to them.
Before the Court's ruling on the motions to compel, we dismissed
the Doe v. Mercer case. Our firm decided to take the open
records issue on against the school and the case was brought
as Barrett & Farahany v. Mercer. Our Doe client was not
involved in that case, and it was brought on behalf of the
public by our firm.
On of our firm's goals is to have the public talking about
this problem. Only when college campuses are held responsible
for their promises of safety and the public and students become
aware of the inherent dangers on campus, will students be
safe.
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