Editor’s Note: At the time that this article was published, October 6, there had been no statement released to the Bryant student body regarding the sexual assault on September 25. Since then, it was discovered that a technical difficulty had prevented the informative email that was sent to faculty, staff, and alumni from reaching students. Fortunately this error was realized and the email was resent by President Machtley on October 7. At this time the entire student body received this important email. The contents of the email include an explanation of the incident, list of on-campus resources, and declaration that sexual assault will not be tolerated at Bryant University. Her Campus Bryant is grateful to President Machtley for sending out this email, and pleased that communication pathways are now open.
– Grace Morgan, Her Campus Bryant Editor-In-Chief
On the very early morning of Thursday, September 25, 2014 something happened on Bryant University’s campus that Bryant does not seem to want to talk about. Daniel Jaramillo, a junior and international student enrolled at Bryant, was accused of breaking into a woman’s dorm room and sexually assaulting her. Jaramillo was chased out of the room by one of the girls in the suite and was found by DPS and arrested by Smithfield Police. He was arraigned and charged at Third District Court with burglary, second-degree sexual assault, and disorderly conduct. He was held without bail until his hearing, which was originally scheduled for October 9th, but the date was pushed to October 1st.
At Jaramillo’s bail hearing, the judge set bail at $50,000. Conditions include not being allowed on the Bryant University campus, having no contact with the alleged victim, mandated substance abuse counseling, and his passport has been surrendered.
While the court system seems to be taking this case seriously, Bryant University has yet to comment. The fact that our school has not made a statement addressing the sexual assault is as much of a crime as the incident in the eyes of Her Campus. Late in the day of the assault, students received an email via Bryant Alerts stating the following:
“Early this morning, an incident occurred in one of our residence halls. A Bryant student unlawfully entered the room of other Bryant students. DPS was called and quickly located the responsible student who was then turned over to the Smithfield Police Department. The responsible student is now separated from campus. Thankfully, this isolated incident has been resolved and we feel there is no ongoing threat to our students.”
There has been no further information since that last report. While we are pleased the offender will not be back on campus anytime soon, we are not satisfied with how our school has dismissed this opportunity to discuss the importance of not tolerating sexual assault. While this incident was disturbing and the victims did not know their offender, we are sure that just like any other college campus, sexual assault and harassment happens more frequently than we acknowledge it.
By not acknowledging that an incident of sexual assault happened on campus, it sends the message that Bryant is not willing to take a stand against the issue. Upon Her Campus Bryant’s further research we reached out to the Hochberg Women’s Center on campus. The Women’s Center has not taken action because there is no director of the office since the retirement of trail blazer, Toby Simon, last spring. We also learned that no one is taking any steps necessary to replace her.
While we understand the need to keep some bad press quiet, we feel that it is more important to raise awareness about the issue at hand.