Status report on UW-Madison employees convicted of felonies

UW–Madison has been criticized over its handling of disciplinary matters related to three employees convicted of serious felonies. In each case, there were calls from state legislators and the media that the employees be immediately fired and that the university’s response time for discipline or dismissal was too slow.

The university community shares in the horror and anger over these reprehensible crimes, which include sexual assault of children, stalking and child enticement. And the university shares the same frustration over the time that is required to legally resolve them.

UW–Madison has in fact been working diligently to resolve these cases, under a process required by state law and university policy. The university cannot fire an employee solely on the basis of a court conviction, even in the case of the serious felonies involved here. The university is required to show evidence of a connection between the crime and the individual’s employment and this must be established through a formal investigation.

The Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development (DWD) states that employment discrimination on certain bases, including conviction records, is prohibited. The law can be accessed online.

The following steps are required of the university regarding employee discipline:

• A complaint must be filed against the employee.
• An internal investigation must be conducted to determine whether the offense meets the criteria for discipline or dismissal. In all three cases, those investigations are now complete, as indicated below.
• After consulting with faculty leaders, a formal recommendation to terminate employment must be issued by the university provost. As indicated below, the decision to recommend firing two of the three employees will be made this week by Provost Peter Spear; a third recommendation to fire was made in June.
• The employee then has the legal right to appeal the decision. They remain university employees during the appeal process. The decision to terminate is made final by a vote of the UW System Board of Regents.

State law requires the university to pay employees any previously earned vacation time, even if an employee is fired or dies. Under present law, there is absolutely no circumstance in which the university can take away previously earned vacation.

Specific details on each case follow:

• Steven Clark: The human oncology professor is serving a one-year jail term for felony stalking. He was not granted work release privileges. He has been incarcerated in the Dane County Jail since June 23. The internal investigation on Clark was completed this week. Based on the findings in that case, Provost Spear has decided to recommend firing Clark. Clark remains on leave without pay.
• Roberto Coronado: On March 28, 2005, physiology professor Roberto Coronado pled no contest and was found guilty in Dane County Circuit Court of three felony counts of repeated sexual contact with a child. The UW–Madison investigation into Coronado was completed in June and Provost Peter Spear recommended that Coronado be fired. Coronado remains on unpaid leave.
• Lewis Keith Cohen: The comparative literature professor was sentenced to 30 days in jail and two years probation on a felony conviction of exposing a child to harmful material. His sentence began Aug. 26. An internal disciplinary investigation on Cohen was concluded and forwarded to Provost Spear this week. Based on the findings of the case, Provost Spear has decided to recommend firing Cohen and will also prohibit Cohen effective Sept. 16 from coming back to campus. To accomplish this, the university will have no option other than to place Cohen on paid administrative leave while his case is under appeal.

Note of Clarification: There have been incorrect reports about the nature of Cohen’s work release activities and access.

For example, media has stated Cohen is working in a library at Van Hise Hall. According to the comparative literature department chair, this “library” is actually a graduate student reading room for several departments that was closed down last spring. The books are in boxes in a storage room in Van Hise Hall. Cohen is working in the storage room cataloguing the books in the boxes. He had no general access to students.

Another mischaracterization concerns Cohen’s access to graduate student applications. If Cohen continued working at UW–Madison, plans were to have him catalogue incoming graduate student applications, letters of recommendation, areas of interest, etc. In addition, he was going to summarize the writing sample. He never would have had any access to personnel records. In any case, no applications have come in yet (it is too early in the year) and he hasn’t done any of this work.

“Our goal throughout all of this was to find productive work for Cohen — since we are required by law to pay him — that would keep him away from students as well as staff and faculty,” Spear says. “Now that our investigation is complete and we have determined that he should be terminated, we have decided to remove him from campus immediately.”