Oct 12, 2007 9:09 am US/Central
Va. Law Student Faces Discipline After Web Entry
Student faces disciplinary action over Robertson `satire'
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) ―
A Regent University law student says school officials have threatened to discipline him for posting an unflattering photo of founder Pat Robertson on the Internet.
The picture, posted on Adam M. Key's Facebook social-networking page, shows Regent's founder and president making what appears to be an obscene gesture. The second-year law student copied it from a YouTube video in which Robertson scratches his face with his middle finger.
Key said officials at the private Christian university in Virginia Beach demanded that he either publicly apologize and withhold public comment about the matter, or submit to the law school dean a legal brief defending the posting. He chose the latter, arguing that his posting was satire protected under the First Amendment.
"I believe they're wrong from a legal standpoint," the Houston native said in a telephone interview Thursday. "But also, it's important in the Christian faith to be able to criticize our leaders."
According to Key, dean Jeffrey Brauch rejected his written legal brief and he now faces disciplinary action -- perhaps even expulsion -- under the university's Standards of Personal Conduct.
"I will pay any price to defend free expression -- especially against anyone who wants to take it away in the name of God," Key said.
A Regent spokeswoman told The Virginian-Pilot newspaper, which first reported the conflict, that she could not comment because of privacy laws. University spokeswoman Sherri Stocks did not return phone messages left by The Associated Press on Thursday.
Robert M. O'Neil, director of the University of Virginia's Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression, said Thursday that Regent probably has a legal right to discipline Key because private institutions are not constrained by the First Amendment.
However, he said in a telephone interview with the AP that disciplinary action might not be in Regent's best interests. He said most private universities "pride themselves on making a voluntary commitment" to free speech rights, even if they are not legally bound to do so.
"I do think this is an institution seeking recognition and acceptance within a broader academic community," O'Neil said. He said that "a declared respect for student speech and faculty academic freedom would be important" in achieving that acceptance.
Key, a bearded and heavily tattooed 23-year-old Lutheran who received his undergraduate degree from Stephen F. Austin State University in Texas, said he has considered transferring from Regent and was even accepted at the University of Houston last summer. He said he didn't because Houston is more expensive, and because a professor told Key that Regent needed someone like him to shake up the conservative campus and spur change.
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