Friends, associates stick up for Kavanaugh’s accuser

PALO ALTO, Calif. — Her studies first brought her West, but for Christine Blasey Ford, the move to California proved a way to leave behind what had gone wrong in her teenage years in the patrician suburbs of Washington, D.C.

Born into a well-off family in Montgomery County, Maryland, Ford has said she spent years working to recover from an assault as a teenage girl in that world of prep-school parties — by Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, she would disclose years later.

Long before she decided to come forward, Ford, now 51, had built a new life for herself in Malibu, Honolulu and the San Francisco Bay area, embracing academia, surfing, cheering on the Stanford football team and taking in outdoor rock concerts.

Ford settled in the Silicon Valley in the 1990s and began working as a research psychologist and biostatistician at Stanford University. She later was hired as a professor in a consortium between Stanford and Palo Alto University. Soon, she married, and the couple bought a classic Eichler home in Palo Alto and had two sons.

“She is very friendly, outgoing and brilliant, and she is a great mother,” said clinical psychologist Erin Heinemeyer, a mentee of Ford’s who is also a friend. “I know in general she supports women’s rights, and she often stands up for students, and she had expressed concerns to me about other students who might be struggling.”

Friends and family members say she struggled with the decision to come forward about Kavanaugh.

“She clearly has nothing to gain and much to lose by going public with her story,” said Jim Gensheimer, a friend of Ford’s. “I know from things she has told me, including her need to have more than one exit door in her bedroom to prevent her from being trapped, that this event was serious enough to have a lasting impact on her life.”

Ford’s mother-in-law, sisters-in-law and other members of her husband’s family released a letter Wednesday asking that her “private and difficult recollection be treated seriously and respectfully.”

“We believe that Chrissy has acted bravely by voicing her experiences from the past, and we know how difficult this is for her,” said the letter signed by 11 of Ford’s in-laws.

Several former colleagues said Ford is known for her scrupulous and meticulous professional conduct. She has published several books and more than 65 peer-reviewed journal articles.

Her work often involves analyzing data gathered in medical studies ranging from investigations of new depression treatments to opioid-addiction interventions and traumatic brain-injury research.

Sarah Adler, a former student of Ford’s who is now a clinical psychologist at Stanford, co-organized a letter in support of her former professor that had been signed by more than 300 colleagues and former students by Tuesday afternoon. Another letter of support has been signed by more than 700 graduates of her private prep school, Holton-Arms.

Friends of Kavanaugh from high school have issued letters in support of him, too.

Ford values clear professional boundaries and isn’t one to share personal struggles with coworkers, the former colleagues said.

“She never said a word about this,” said Allan Reiss, a Stanford professor of psychiatry with whom she has written numerous scholarly publications. “But the fact that I know her as a person of integrity and honesty, it doesn’t surprise me that she came forward and that she has a personal sense of the importance of what she has to say.”

It was in couples counseling with her husband in 2012 that she first described an encounter with Kavanaugh in her freshman year of high school, she would later disclose.

But, in a letter posted to Facebook, a schoolmate of Ford’s backed her claim Wednesday.

“Christine Blasey Ford was a year or so behind me, I remember her,” wrote Cristina King Miranda, who graduated a year ahead of Ford at Holton-Arms. The Bethesda, Maryland, school is an all-girls school whose students frequently socialized with the students at Georgetown Prep, Kavanaugh’s all-male alma mater.

“This incident did happen,” Miranda wrote. “Many of us heard about it in school, and Christine’s recollection should be more than enough for us to truly, deeply know that the accusation is true.”