UVA To Perform Background Checks On Students After Yeardley Love Death (NEWS, VIDEO)

In the wake of Yeardley Love's alleged murder at the hands of her ex-boyfriend, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell has arranged a meeting with University of Virginia President John Casteen to discuss how to protect students from violence through stronger laws.

The Baltimore Sun reports:

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell and university President John T. Casteen will discuss potential legislation, McDonnell's office said Thursday. Among the topics may be legislation requiring police to report student arrests to the university.

The governor reached out yesterday after Casteen acknowledged the school had been unaware that senior George Huguely, the suspect in the beating death of lacrosse player Yeardley Love, had had several run-ins with police before Love's death. A new police report involving Huguely surfaced yesterday.

The University of Virginia will begin performing background checks on all of its students. Under school policy, UVA officials should have known about Huguely's arrest in 2008, during which he threatened to kill a police officer. But Huguely failed to report it, and no one checked up on him.

Casteen recounts the chain of questions about Huguely's past this week:

"I asked first of all whether our police department received any notice of that arrest, and the answer was no. Second, I asked [Athletic Director] Craig [Littlepage] if the coaches had any knowledge of it or whether it had been disclosed, and the answer was no, also. Finally, I asked whether students are required to self-report arrests, convictions, and so on. And there is, in fact, a regulation in the student code of regulations that requires that kind of report."

WATCH: ABC investigates the missed warning signs in Love's death.

Comments

[realitytrumpsbull]

10:19 PM on 05/09/2010

Given that a college or university environment is essentially prep school for the professional working world, maybe it's not too soon to start with background checks when a person is applying to college. Criminal behavior on campus, or in the surrounding community, even extending to the actions of faculty and teaching staff themselves, is not unknown. By having zero tolerance for it, and utilizing various means with which to avoid delivering felony-minded people into the halls of higher ed, administrators do themselves and the school and the larger community a tremendous favor, because to train criminals in subjects like high finance is to help set the stage for the next economic national disaster, to tolerate either students or teachers who are given to illegal conduct of any kind, to essentially give their conduct a 'pass', is to fail the rest of the student community. The law is the law, and college isn't too soon to start learning about it, or enforcing it.

[Emmaboverry]

12:41 PM on 05/09/2010

We need to balance individual privacy rights with community, a hard act but can be done. Teachers, coaches, administrators should have mandatory reporting requirements and a system of checks and balances, a real PLAN of action, should immediately be triggered when there's obvious signs of a threat.
A case in point: Niki Giovanni, VA tech teacher, reported her concerns about student who comitted mass killings there, but was ignored. No articulation between campus mental health services, campus police, off-campus LE, or student discipline.

It's not enough that the campus do a background check--it's what they DO with the info. When a student with a history of violence demonstrates this behavior again, protecting the community comes first.

And we have to do a better job of educating both men and women about risk factors and how to handle threatening situations. It is so sad that Yeardley was there behind locked doors, alone, without intervention. Whether or not Hugely should have been accepted to the college in the first place, given a spot on the team is open for debate. But certainly, given the prior run-ins with LE, and then beating up his team mate and THEN assaulting Yeardley, everyone around him should have been armed with a plan. The threat should have been DEALT with, all forces at hand marshalled to put a stop to it. This ticking time bomb needed to be defused on the spot.

[cdecisneros]

09:39 PM on 05/07/2010

Please see closing the barn door after the horses have escaped. Thank you

[Jo Le Tiel]

08:37 PM on 05/07/2010

Huguely threatened to kill a cop, and also busted down yet another students door in the middle of the night to beat him up because he kissed Yeardley Love. How does anybody get away with either of these actions without going to jail? Sounds like his parents had some rich lawyers. I hope he spends the rest of his life in jail, because he's obviously too dangerous to be in society. His parents must be in total denial about their demon seed. Too bad he had to end a life, as there were many warning signs he could do such a thing.

[nickclone]

06:52 PM on 05/07/2010

I have a DWI, does that mean I can never go to college? I guess I should just stick to crime...

[jscam87]

09:57 AM on 05/09/2010

That is where this is going...

[bronxwiseman]

04:47 PM on 05/07/2010

I think this is a tough one. As a minority, I was once victim of a false arrest I never bothered to clear up. However, having had a bunch of maniac psychos for roommates at college, it may not be a bad idea. At the least roommies should be notified of any psychotic drugs being taken. Some people deserve a second chance, some dont. The hard part is deciding who :(

[jscam87]

09:58 AM on 05/09/2010

All arrests on minorities are considered false in the US. Heck, you could get a scholarship out of it...

[Jordan Opalanie]

01:15 PM on 05/07/2010

I think that the university does not need to know about every single arrest that is effected on a student. Otherwise, those who have had mistakes happen in their lives or those with mental health issues would be excluded. Or perhaps those students who get arrested on a minor marijuana violation will be reported to the university!!!!

[MarieNat]

03:20 PM on 05/07/2010

I agree. But also, domestic violence is often unreported, so I'm not sure this is a solution to the specific problem at hand.