UC professor fired in sexual harass cases
University says instructor violated institution’s faculty code of conduct
BERKELEY — UC Berkeley has fired an assistant professor for sexually harassing four students.
Blake Wentworth, who taught in the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies, was found to have violated the school’s faculty code of conduct and its sexual harassment policy, the school said.
The firing, effective immediately, apparently ends a controversy that lasted more than two years.
In March 2015, two graduate students told the school Wentworth touched them inappropriately and made sexually charged comments.
Wentworth told Erin Bennett that learning the Tamil
language “was better than sex,” according to a state complaint she filed later, and once placed his hand over hers while trying to hold her gaze. Kathleen Gutierrez, another student, said Wentworth told her he was “attracted” to her and even that he “could lose my job over this.”
Often, professors under investigation try to remain under the radar. But in a somewhat unusual turn of events, Wentworth filed lawsuits against the students for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
In a separate lawsuit, he accused the UC Board of Regents, which oversees the 10-campus system, of discrimination and retaliation. Those cases are still pending.
Wentworth, through his lawyer, Michael Hoffman, declined to comment Thursday on his firing.
But Hoffman’s firm, San Francisco-based Arena Hoffman, said in a statement: “Today’s distortion, ostensibly timed to shift news away from UC’s finan- cial scandals and civil rights violations, will be addressed in Dr. Wentworth’s pending lawsuit, where the evidence will show that UC’s campaign to ruin his career began days after his hospitalization. Dr. Wentworth denies the false assertions, which are a pretext to discriminate and retaliate against him.”
The announcement of Wentworth’s firing comes days after the end of Berkeley’s school year and at a time when UC is also under scrutiny for a blistering state audit of its budget practices.
“These actions are part of the university’s continuing effort to eradicate sexual misconduct from our campus,” Berkeley said in a statement. “The harassment of students by faculty represents an unacceptable breach of the teacher-student relationship and carries the potential for enormous harm. The university is committed to holding violators strictly accountable.”
But students and faculty say it took too long for the school to fire Wentworth, and it’s not the only time UC Berkeley has been criticized for its handling of sexual harassment claims.
The school investigation after the students initially came forward in 2015 found the professor sexually harassed one of the students. But frustrated with what they saw as a continued delay of disciplinary proceedings, the students filed a claim with the state in April 2016. “It’s been debilitating,” Bennett said during a news conference at the time.
Professor Harsha Ram, who teaches Russian literature, said during the conference that faculty members were “utterly appalled, dismayed and aghast at what has been unfolding.”
At the time, the school released a statement saying, “The university is aware of the concerns from students and others regarding the time it takes for the faculty discipline processes to be completed. ... We understand and share those concerns.”
At least one other former student subsequently came forward with complaints about Wentworth, and he was finally placed on paid involuntary leave in June 2016 after a faculty investigation concluded there was probable cause he had violated the faculty code.
Documents obtained last year by the Bay Area News Group found that 19 employees of the university, including six faculty members, violated the school’s sexual misconduct policies from 2011 to 2016. Three of the six resigned, and the other three remained on the faculty. None were fired.
Berkeley recently reached a settlement with Sujit Choudhry, the former law dean who was allowed to remain on campus even after a school investigation substantiated sexual harassment allegations. The settlement allows Choudhry, who is officially on a two-year sabbatical, to keep research funding and submit travel expenses. In March, a former student filed a lawsuit accusing Berkeley philosophy professor John Searle of sexual harassment.
“Over the past several years, the university has intensified and reformed its response to sexual misconduct; improved educational efforts aimed at faculty, staff and students; expanded its investigative capacity; and enhanced support and services offered to survivors,” the school said in its statement.