Douglas was charged with rape and indecentassault stemming from an incident that occurred onApril 4, 1998. The woman Douglas assaulted saidshe was "familiar" with her assailant.

The women assaulted by Douglas originally choseto pursue her charges against him through the AdBoard, rather than taking her case to the courts.

"It was...pretty sensitive stuff, and I didn'tlike the idea of it being splashed across thepapers," she told Perspective.

She said she would not have first brought thecase before the Ad Board had she not been led tobelieve the Ad Board would expel Douglas.

The Ad Board in recent decades has onlyexpelled students for admissions fraud.

The alternative, dismissal, means separationfrom the College for usually more than five yearswith the option to petition for readmission--amove that requires a vote of the full Faculty. TheAd Board recommends dismissal or expulsion to theFaculty.

"They encouraged me to go through the Ad Boardinstead of going to court by dangling the carrotof expulsion, even when they were fully aware thatit was not an option," she charged.

Ad Board representatives declined to respond tothis specific allegation.

The woman assaulted by Douglas said she askedAssistant Dean of the College Karen E. Avery '87if Douglas would be expelled. As dean ofcoeducation, Avery is usually the firstadministrator to deal with allegations of rape.

Avery and the woman's senior tutor had theresponsibility for representing her before the AdBoard.

"I had made it clear to both my senior tutorand to Dean Avery that I wanted the rapistexpelled and that only if he was expelled would Ieven consider not taking the case to court," thewoman assaulted by Douglas said.

Avery would not comment on these specificcases, but said that in general she never attemptsto predict the outcome of Ad Board proceedings,although she does sometimes give her opinionsabout the possible outcomes.

"There is no sense of, 'If this is how the caseturns out, that is the end result,'" Avery said."I give my opinion, and sometimes that's cause formisinterpretation or someone latching ontosomething they wanted to hear."

At the beginning of the Ad Board process, bothDouglas and the woman filed statements and thenresponded to each other's version of events. Theyappeared separately in front of a subcommittee thewoman said was convened to deal with the case--aprocedure allowed for in the user's guide to theAdministrative Board published by the College.

Lewis said the Ad Board ruled a rape hadoccurred. The Ad Board voted to demand thatDouglas withdraw, and to recommend his dismissal,but not expulsion, to the Faculty.