BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) — A former LSU student speaks out about the lawsuit she filed along with others in federal court against a large number of state and local officials for failing to prevent sexual assaults on college campuses.
“I came to LSU wanting to be a Tiger through and through, right? Obviously, that did not happen,” said former LSU student Mayumi Dickerson. “My mom and my dad dropped me off at LSU with the understanding that I was going to be protected… you send your kid off to college thinking that there is a system in place to help you, to help you grow and mature, and that didn’t happen here.”
Her team of attorneys stood by her side at the Louisiana State Capitol. They said with school starting they wanted to sound the alarms once again.
“If the University of Louisiana System and LSU is not the worst, it’s definitely in the top tier,” said Attorney Bakari Sellers. “There is a cancer and a problem in Louisiana with the way that women are treated, with the way that abuse victims are treated and with the fact that their voices are not heard.”
“For over six years, these survivors were the victims not only of assault but of systemic failures which a 2015 Louisiana law was designed to combat,” according to a statement from the Strom Law Firm. “The law, Act 172, was expressly designed to prevent sexual abuse on college campuses by mandating communication, cross-training and coordination between Louisiana’s public post-secondary institutions and law enforcement.”
The suit names the following persons and entities as defendants:
The Lousiana Board of RegentsThe LSU Board of SupervisorsUniversity of Louisiana System Board of SupervisorsLafayette Consolidated GovernmentLafayette Police DepartmentFormer Lafayette Police Chief Thomas GloverUL-Lafayette President Dr. Joseph SavoieLSU President William F. Tate IVFormer LSU President F. King AlexanderFormer LSU President Tom GalliganLouisiana Tech President Les GuiceOther police chiefs in the jurisdictions of Jane Does 1-100
In Dickerson’s case, her alleged attacker was able to transfer from school to school, allegedly leaving a trail of victims in his wake.
“This has been a rough seven years, just knowing that no one has been held accountable, that universities can just pass on the problem from university to university and the assailant can get the degree that I have been struggling to get.”
BRProud reached out to LSU for comment and they replied that they don’t comment on pending litigation.
