Case Update #49 – Week 4 of Hearing Complete

This week we fully completed four Class Member witnesses.

On Monday, March 27 we heard from General Class Member Tara McBryan, who earned an MSc in Zoology at UBC Vancouver. She completed both her direct examination and cross examination. The parties and the Tribunal agreed that the abusive student that she reported will not be named, and was referred to as Student X.

On Tuesday, March 28, Dr. Caitlin Cunningham of the Mordvinov Class completed the last hour or so of her direct examination and completed her cross examination through the rest of the day.

On Wednesday, March 29 and Thursday, March 30, the Mordvinov Class Member known as Student E completed both her direct and cross examination. She finished about mid afternoon on Thursday, so the parties took some time to discuss the logistics of future hearing dates.

On Friday, March 31, the Mordvinov Class Member known as Student B completed both her direct and cross examination.

Both Student E and Student B had been residents of Green College, as opposed to members of the History Department.

I want to emphasize my appreciation for the witnesses who are testifying, especially the ones that came this week, as they had to go over some very harrowing experiences and revisit uncomfortable feelings that everyone hoped were in the past. I recognize doing so is a burden.

No members of the public opted to join and listen to the Hearing this week (including the Risk Management official from the province of British Columbia, who as far as I recall only observed my own testimony and cross examination). Anonymized individuals will not have their names published in the final decision, and as we have gone through the testimony, if witnesses needed to discuss anonymized individuals (other than themselves), we have asked them to use our Student A/B/C/etc. system, so eventually any direct quotes of their testimony will maintain that. Although it was not an issue this week, Member Prince said that she would remind any members of the public of the order to keep certain names private.

In addition to the three weeks scheduled in the fall, we discussed and scheduled a week in December for the hearing. Counsel for UBC advised that it he would let us know if a conflict in his schedule opened up in the summer, most likely in June, so that we could continue presenting our witnesses.

We also raised the issue that UBC has not put certain witnesses on its witness list that we, the complainants, feel we need to hear from, so we may choose to call them ourselves. Counsel also suggested that he may not call some of the witnesses he did list, and the lawyers discussed how that choice might be an issue for our ability to put all the evidence in that we think the Tribunal needs to hear. Before the complainants close the remainder of our case, we would require clarity on what to do about those additional individuals, but nothing was decided this week. As of right now, the complainants anticipate calling three fact witnesses, all from the History Department, with an estimated amount of hearing time as at least a week and a half to get through them (not counting the whole discussion of calling others).

Member Prince issued another Notice of Hearing with the additional dates. They are:

September 5, 6, 7, and 8; 18, 19, 20, 21, 22;

October 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6; 10, 11, 12, and 13;

December 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.