The University Judiciary Committee found a member of last year's Honor Executive Committee not guilty of violating Standard 11, which prohibits breeches of confidentiality and obstructing the operations of the Honor and Judiciary Committees.
Although the student was not found guilty in a UJC trial Oct. 6, this case suggests the UJC may serve as a check against potential injustice in the Honor Committee.
Honor Committee Chairman Hunter Ferguson said instances of the UJC monitoring the honor system and its Committee members occur very rarely.
In this month's case, a former member of the Honor Executive Committee was charged with "abusive use of the honor system functions," according to the standard complaint form obtained by The Cavalier Daily.
The accused former Committee member allegedly withheld "pertinent evidence and [used their] credibility and reputation within the Committee to press an initiation through the investigation, confrontation, and investigative panel" stages of the honor trial process, according to the complaint form.
The former Executive Committee member said when a member of the Honor Committee is accused of wrongdoing, the matter needs to be investigated.
"Anyone who holds public office needs to be held accountable for their actions," the acquitted student said.
A guilty verdict would be alarming, no matter what sanction the UJC administered, the acquitted student said.
"If an Honor Committee member were found guilty of wrongdoing, sanction or not, it would be a big deal," they said.
The acquitted student said there may be a better way to adjudicate similar cases in the future, but for now the UJC serves as an adequate forum for addressing abuses that sometimes may occur in the system.
"I don't know if the Judiciary Committee is the best remedy for [such cases], but it's the best we have," the student said.
But Ferguson said the UJC is not the only recourse for reviewing possible abuses.
"There are also internal ways the Committee could handle cases if an Honor Committee member or support officer acted unethically," he said.
In such cases the Honor Committee would gather five Committee members, including the chairman, to serve as a standards panel.
A margin of three-fifths is required for a guilty verdict and the panel has the power to remove a Committee member from office.
Because of confidentiality rules, Ferguson would not comment on whether such a panel was convened for this case.
The Standard 11 charge stemmed from an honor case last semester when the former Committee member filed honor charges against a student after claiming to see him cheat on an exam, according to the investigator's report obtained by The Cavalier Daily.
After initiating the case, the former Committee member tried to discourage an honor counsel from representing the student accused of the honor violation, according to the report.
The counsel then called Ferguson and said he thought the former Committee member was receiving special treatment because of their high-ranking Committee position.
The honor charges eventually were dropped in a pre-trial grievance panel.
UJC Chairman Brian Hudak declined to comment on the case because of confidentiality rules.
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