Harvard sued over alleged sex abuse, retaliation by professor

NEW YORK (BLOOMBERG) - Harvard allowed a "star" professor's sexual abuse of female students to continue unchecked for decades, contributing to a "culture" of harassment in its Anthropology Department, a new lawsuit alleges.

Professor John Comaroff "kissed and groped students without their consent, made unwelcome sexual advances, and threatened to sabotage students' careers if they complained", three graduate students at the university say in Tuesday's (Feb 8) lawsuit.

But Harvard either ignored their complaints or allowed its investigations to be used to help Prof Comaroff destroy students' educational and career opportunities, the complaint filed in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts says.

Prof Comaroff "categorically denies ever harassing or retaliating against any student," he said in a statement provided by his attorneys Norman Zalkind, Janet Halley, and Ruth O'Meara-Costello. Mr Zalkind and Ms O'Meara-Costello are of-counsel at Zalkind Duncan & Bernstein LLP. Ms Halley is a professor at Harvard Law School.

Harvard University had no comment on the suit, a spokesman for the school told Bloomberg Law on Tuesday.

But Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) Claudine Gay defended the school's Title IX policies and procedures in a Feb 3 letter responding to faculty members who questioned the findings of an investigation into the allegations against Prof Comaroff.

Gay confirmed that the Office of Dispute Resolution and the FAS found that Prof Comaroff violated Harvard's sexual and gender-based harassment and professional conduct policies.

She refused to comment on the specifics of the review, but cautioned that the faculty members were "necessarily operating without a comprehensive understanding of the facts that have motivated" sanctions imposed against the professor.

The students accused the school of violating Title IX, a federal law that prohibits discrimination in educational programs.

Ms Lilia Kilburn alleges that Prof Comaroff groped her in public, graphically described her imagined rape and murder, cut her off from other scholars, and derailed her academic trajectory.

Ms Margaret Czerwienski and Ms Amulya Mandava were fellow graduate students who reported Prof Comaroff's treatment of Ms Kilburn to university officials, the complaint says. Harvard didn't investigate the reports, they say. Its refusal to do so enabled Comaroff to retaliate against all three students, they say.

In fact, Harvard took no action against Prof Comaroff until a 2020 Harvard Crimson article exposed a "pattern of deliberate indifference" to sexual misconduct, abuse, and retaliation in the Anthropology Department, the complaint says.

Harvard's alleged inaction "demonstrates an institutional policy of indifference: a system designed to protect the University, its reputation, and the faculty who sustain that reputation at the expense of its students," the complaint says.

Prof Comaroff is a professor of anthropology and of African and African American studies. According to the complaint, he is a leading expert on Africa, legal and political anthropology, crime and policing, the anthropology of colonialism and postcolonialism, and historical anthropology.

Following an investigation prompted by the Crimson article, Harvard placed Prof Comaroff on leave for spring semester and imposed other "limited, temporary sanctions", the complaint says. Prof Comaroff and his wife have continued retaliating against the plaintiffs, it says.