Vanessa Miller, CR Gazette –
UPDATE: The UI Department of Public Safety doesn’t have any criminal complaints associated with Peter Gray, a former senior academic adviser who resigned last week amid accusations he provided football tickets and money for sexual favors and inappropriately touched student athletes.
But University of Iowa police did complete an “incident report” on Oct. 24 for “improper use of complimentary tickets by athletic staff” that did not identify any suspects but listed Gray as an “other person.”
According to the report, which includes no narrative and lists its status as “unfounded,” the date of the alleged incident was between Aug. 1, 2011 and Oct. 8, 2012.
Although the report states that it involves suspicious persons or activities, it shows that there are no suspects and no victims. According to the report, the incident location is listed as the Gerdin Athletic Learning Center, which is where Gray worked.
Documents obtained by the Iowa City Press-Citizen show that an internal UI investigation turned up sexual harassment violations by Gray, who was associate director of Athletic Student Services and director of academic advising and counseling before he resigned.
Gray worked for the UI from 1993 to 1995 and again from 2002 until last week, when he resigned. University officials have declined to comment on why Gray resigned or on the leaked internal document. Officials say both issues are internal personnel matters.
State Regent Bob Downer, an Iowa City attorney, said Monday he is most concerned about the rehire of Gray, given what has been reported. It’s important for the Board of Regents to discuss what sort of policies are in place about the rehire of former employees at all three of the regent universities, and to make sure those policies are being followed.
“As far as the difficulties that he apparently got into during his first employment, it’s hard for me to see, assuming these stories are accurate, how he passed muster for re-employment,” Downer said. “And to me that’s a significant issue in terms of policies for all of the universities, that if there are these sorts of things on someone’s record, how they would slip through for re-employment, and particularly in the same department.”
Downer said because complaints of sexual harassment are handled through internal university processes, it’s common that details of such reports do not come to the regents for discussion or review. They’re dealt with on the institutional level and “ideally, that’s the way it should be,” Downer said, since the internal policies are there to deal with such matters.
In an initial response Monday to open records requests from The Gazette seeking emails from various UI officials regarding Gray, university officials said several top administrators, including UI President Sally Mason, had no emails from this fall about Gray or the investigation.
Gray is accused of making sexual comments in a presentation to recruits and touching a student’s genitals, among other things, according to the report. Officials found inappropriate photographs on his work computer and pictures of college-aged people posing in swimsuits, the documents show.
A UI student told investigators, according to the report, that Gray exchanged money and football tickets for sexual favors from another person who wasn’t affiliated with the UI. Gray admitted to providing the tickets and money during the 2011 season, but he denied it was for sexual favors.
Reporter Diane Heldt contributed to this story.
