EXCLUSIVE: Media Matters confirms student at center of Fox fueled Jennings controversy was of legal age
October 02, 2009 1:40 pm ET by Karl Frisch
For several days now conservatives in the media have been on a witch-hunt for Kevin Jennings, the U.S. Department of Education's director of the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools. Led by Fox News, the right-wing media have claimed that 21 years ago, when Jennings was a 24-year-old teacher at Concord Academy in Massachusetts, he "cover[ed] up statutory rape" by not reporting to authorities a conversation he had with a student who told him about being involved with an "older man."
They have attacked Jennings with homophobic, anti-gay rhetoric, falsely accused him of covering up or encouraging "statutory rape" and asked for his resignation or firing.
Media Matters for America has exclusively obtained the Massachusetts drivers' license of the student confirming that at the time of the incident, he was at least sixteen years of age -- the legal age of consent in Massachusetts.
Jennings' 2006 memoir, Mama's Boy, Preachers Son, makes clear that he began teaching at Concord Academy, the student in questions school, in late August or September 1987.
Additionally, in his 1994 book, One Teacher in Ten: Gay and Lesbian Educators Tell Their Stories, Jennings described the student as "a sophomore boy who I came to know in 1987, my first year of teaching at Concord Academy, in Concord, Massachusetts."
The following scanned image of the student's current drivers' license has been heavily redacted to protect his identity.
This should put to rest claims made by Fox News and other conservatives that Jennings covered up "statutory rape" or "molestation." To continue reporting such reckless speculation is at best willful disregard for the facts and at worst journalistic malpractice.
For more information, visit our Kevin Jennings news feed.
Previously:
EXCLUSIVE: Statement from former student at center of Fox-fueled Jennings controversy
Right-wing caricatures of Jennings undercut by broad support he has received
Conservative media unleash anti-gay rhetoric in attacks on Jennings
Hannity and Fox News defended Hastert during Foley scandal
Despite evidence to contrary, Fox News machine claims Jennings "cover[ed] up statutory rape"
More witch-hunting: Fox News targets "safe schools czar" Kevin Jennings
Media Matters: The Palin chronicles
The Friday Rush: A series of conflicts
Contrary to media hype, Sarah Palin is very unpopular
More likely, they will ignore any evidence - their viewers don't have any use for the truth, anyway.
Our side has been targeting tea partiers? Yeah, right. Of course you provide no link nor any proof of this. No proof that it was a liberal who attacked and killed a righty because they were a righty.
Your head is so far up your butt I have to wonder when the last time you saw daylight was, but you ain't looking at reality right now, that's for sure!
The subject is the age of the kid when he talked to Jennings. He was 16. We know that now, but previously there was one thing that said he was 15 and 2 other pieces of info that documented that he was actually 16, and therefore the age of consent. FoxNews failed to tell their listeners about that conflicting info and the weight each piece of evidence should be given. They ignored the evidence. But the MSM didn't ignore the 9/12 marches. They just didn't promote them, or lie about the attendance, or rely upon some college student to provide them with a really bad guesstimate of the attendance.
I think it's funny (yet sad) that we're splitting hairs over the age of a KID (your words, but true). It still stinks whether he was 15 or 16.
And actually, no, it doesn't "still stink". We give teenagers certain rights at certain ages. In his state, the LAW (yeah, you know that thing that your side is so willing to ignore when it suits your needs) says that at 16, children have reached the age of consent. It's an arbitrary age, but it is the law. A similar law in my state says that kids over a certain weight don't have to sit in a booster seat any more. One pound less, and they do, but get to that magic weight, and they don't. We have all kinds of arbitrary ceilings or floors in our laws - that's what happens when a country decides to subvert anarchy!!!!
I think a 16 year old is a kid who has reached the age of consent. He's not an adult, so not sure why you think that spitting back the word "kid" at me is going to have any impact on me. He's a kid who has reached the age of consent. We give 16 year olds enough credit to have enough common sense to decide who they want to have sex with because any older doesn't make sense for multiple reasons. For similar reasons, we allow states to try some juveniles, but not all, for serious crimes in adult court, because we believe that some older kids have made conscious decisions to disobey the law and should be punished for it.
For you to think that your belief that 16 year olds are too young to have sex, when the law says that he had reached the age of consent, is ridiculous and bordering on traitorous. We are a nation of laws, and if you think a law is misguided or dangerous, then you should work to change it, but until it's changed, you should abide by it! The law is that that 16 yr olds in Massachusetts have reached the age of consent! Why are you so unpatriotic that you would diss a law that's fairly standard across the USA? Ages of Consent in the USA
"Quit waving the Constitution in my face! It's just a g0dd4mn piece of paper!"
The quintessential view of the law from the conservative side of things. If it helps you, fine. If not, throw it out! Right? Very very far Right.
Keep enjoying the brain numbing you get from Fox..pretty soon you will be convinced by Fox that you really are you.
You are disputing the protection of the student's identity. It's not the same, and it's off topic, and it's wrong.
And, is giving bad advice to an imaginary prostitution ring illegal? Considering the ACORN employees did nothing to further the enterprise, and did not contribute to it materially, I do not see a violation of the law. Some ethical problems, yes, but no legal ones. Also, the actual news story would've been an ACORN employee manual that says company policy is to set up child prostitution rings, thereby making the ACORN executives guilty of a criminal conspiracy. That never surfaced because it simply does not exist. ACORN is a non-story blown out of proportion by the far right who will stop at nothing, including INVENTING facts, to smear a President with whom they disagree.
BTW, it doesn't matter what the driver's license above says. It's been confirmed that the young man was a legal adult. This is a non-story.
fairliberal, I think you need to read this article. It describes you and a couple of other phony conservatives who post here to a "T."
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-gabler2-2009oct02,0,7817347.story
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Beautiful. Just... perfect.
The DEMOCRATS can count on your vote next time around, then?
The videos show nothing but bad journalism, and the inability to conduct a proper investigation.
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You FAIL.
ACORN, which has a lot of volunteers, and people with minimal training, has some workers caught being unethical, and apparantly that's endemic of the entire organization.
In Abu Gharib, run by the military, with strict training and severe disciplinary standards, soldiers were caught torturing and abusing prisoners. Apparantly, though, those were the actions of "a few bad apples", and had nothing to do with orders from the civilian leadership.
Ain't double standards grand?
And if you walk into a hundred or so offices and ask the same sorts of questions, then what difference would there possibly be in the behavior of those that break the rules? Three or four people who did so out of however many places they went to does not support a theory of criminal enterprise.
Did it ever occur to you what an invasion of privacy it would have been for MMFA to post his NAME, FACE, ADDRESS, etc... you witless bafoon?
Or did YOU want to call him up and harrass him? Send him a gay-bating letter, maybe? Maybe that's why you're so dissappointed by the evidence they prvide. No, we're sorry, putting people's personal info online w/o their permission is something CONSERVTAIVES do. We actually respect things like people's privacy and, you know... the LAW and junk. Moron.
Do you EVER think, at all, before you post?
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Becasue you really make it easy, Fair.
What are you asking for, a BIRTH CIRTIFICATE?!
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If you can prove it's a fake, the knock youself out. Otherwise LET ME DO IT.
This isn't that hard, dex.
I am sure Joe the plumber disagrees with that statement after the dimocratic party trashed his privacy. After all he had the audacity to ask the chosen one a question.
I do have one question though, what is a bafoon?
As far as the story Joe told goes, information such as yearly income is certainly appropriate to uncover. On the other hand, information besides the DOB is not necessary here. What would it possibly prove, since his age is the only thing in dispute here?
And that drivers license could belong to anyone as it was presented by MMFA. And that DL would never be accepted as proof of anything by the left if the situation were reversed. In your opinion do you think, the left would accept that DL and anonymous statement by Brewster as proof of anything?
And BTW, in my opinion, Jennings did nothing wrong here, his advice if it is true, was appropriate, perhaps he could have done more, but I don't believe he did anything wrong. This is an issue that the right is wrong on.
If McCain hadn't done that, and people had started asking questions about Joe's background, that would have been completely ridiculous. That would just be trying to shut down questions. But that isn't what happened. If Democrats pushed someone onto the public scene and a little research showed that person was completely full of crap, you can't tell me that Republicans wouldn't have the right to point it out.Some liberals might doubt that evidence, but I would argue against them. It's pretty obvious why his identity should be protected, given the circumstances, and considering the behavior of people like Michelle Malkin. So the fact that other information is unrevealed is not suspicious. News agencies can verify details. FOX contacted him themselves, and he told them he was 16 at the time. Did they have the wrong person? Do you expect that they wouldn't ring all the alarms should they find out that statement is not true? And as pointed out, MMfA would be risking a hell of a lot for very little in return. That doesn't prove anything in and of itself, but it's a pretty strong indicator.I appreciate that.
One question, if the Kennedy's don't have to obey the laws of Mass. why should anyone care about them?
And the previous poster was talking about Maryland, not Massachusetts. Do keep up. If you don't know that the law on videotaping was violated in Maryland, then you have no business commenting on something that someone says about it.
There, all fixed for you. And just remember, fairliberal, one of the first rules of written debate is not to deride someone else's intellect when your own post is riddled with errors. Please remember that next time.
It seems possible now, as I suggested previously, that the teacher was simply speaking in a previous talk he made about how sophomores are typically about 15 years old, and not directly saying that this sophomore was 15.
If you are truly the student, I am sorry that you have had to get involved with this if it is causing you any discomfort. I appreciate your getting involved though, so that we could have definitive proof. I have been advocating for the idea that you were 16 in the spring of 88 all along, based upon the info we had from the letter from the attorney and the info that when he saw you 5 years later he said that you were 22.
If she lied about stating that the kid's age was 16 (and his age could be confirmed - we can almost always in this day and age confirm someone's age if they were born in a civilized country in the last 100 years), then she could get disbarred for that.
Attorneys don't assert as evidence things that cannot be confirmed. Jennings must have told her that he didn't believe he had a reasonable doubt that abuse was ongoing, so she put that info as well as the kid's age in the cease and desist letter.
B - Relationships don't happen overnight. The boy just turned 16 when he reported his relationship to Jennings. Did the boy decide to have a relationship with an older man as a birthday present?
C - Massachusetts law mandates teachers report sexual activity between an adult and child under 18 during the years 1987 to 1995 while he was at the Concord School. Jennings failed to do what was required of him by law.
OK, try and twist those facts to support your lean.
And you're wrong that Massachusetts law requires the reporting of any sexual activity of kids under 18. It requires reporting of reasonable suspicions of abusive relationships. See, MMFA has already debunked this junk. I am not sure why you think you can get away with coming here after all the junk arguments have been refuted and start up with them again, but you can't.
Oh, and the boy turned 16 in the summer, and the next spring is when it happened. The kid stayed out late one night, and the teacher talked with him the very next day! It was months and months after he turned 16. You don't have a leg to stand on here. You are the one who has been caught twisting facts to support your partisan slant.
Nicely done, Dell.
-The guy had a one night stand with someone he had met at a bus station and he told Jennings the next day.
- The guy was of legal age when he had sex with the older person.
http://mediamatters.org/blog/200910020029
Either Jennings or Brewster, or both may have grounds to sue.
I'm not a lawyer, but I'm willing to bet one or both of them will seek the advice of one.
Let's just see what happens, ok?
It does suck that that's how it works, and I'm very sure that Sean and Glenn and the gang are very aware that it works that way. They feel safe because they know if they come under fire, they can just play dumb and there's not much to be done about it.
I am also not a lawyer, but we've seen more bizarre things happen in the area of lawsuits.
It all depends on who has the deeper pockets (funding for the plaintiffs could come from donations), and if there's an aggressive lawyer out there who wants to make a name for himself or herself to set precedent up to the SCOTUS.
Fox made claims that have proven to be untrue. But just a High-School level of research could have proven otherwise. Sloppy journalism, or motivated reasoning that caused them to purposely leave out some important details of the case. Would this be libel? Who knows. I'm not sure if that has been tested in the courts yet. Analogy - we have the right to bear arms, but we don't have the right to point a loaded weapon at just anyone - the former is a right, the latter is sloppy and dangerous.
I agree that this would be a tough hill to climb. But if not this case, sometime in the future, we'll see a case like this probably to the SCOTUS to further define what is, or is not libel.
I admit, it's a bit of wishful thinking on my part, that this would be that case. ;-)
http://www.nytimes.com/1991/01/04/news/how-the-supermarket-tabloids-stay-out-of-court.html?pagewanted=all
http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/tabloid2.htm
So how are you defending them when they selectively only repeated some of what was said that supported their attack and they selectively ignored that which totally demolished their baseless smear?
Giving only a part of the story and a part of the evidence to support a baseless smear is something they could sue about. I doubt they will, since one also has to prove tangible damages and I'm not sure that those could be proven, at least not at this point in time. But that doesn't mean that the fact that they repeated only one of many things that Jennings said is a defense by any stretch of even your twisted imagination!
Don't you drones ever get tired of the hypocricy on both sides? Can you guys even see it? Or are you guys like the fish, upon being told that he's surrounded by water, replies, "what water?"
Foley was actively pursuing these young pages who he was supposed to be protecting. Foley was the sponsor of a bill which prohibited the activity in which he was engaging at the time he was sending sexually explicit messages to these young men.
Jennings was a 24 year old counselor who simply counseled a young man to practice safe sex when the young man told him of his activities. Jennings did not approach this young man for sex.
Try again when you understand the issue.
Jennings protected the kid by giving him attention and advice.
It would be your side that participates in the vast majority of hypocritical action we see nowadays.
You would be like the fish who, when surrounded by dishonest reporting from your side, falsely claims that the other side is just as bad! As though wrong acts by 'our' side invalidates any ability for us to criticize your side. You have no evidence that we don't call out our own side when they misbehave, but Jennings didn't misbehave.
So yeah, you didn't see MMFA justifying the behavior of a predator. Why would we? We didn't justify any bad behavior from Jennings either though.
Why do you drones assume I am conservatives because I yank on your chain? I'm actually the only true classical liberal on this site.
Modern liberalism is a rejection of classical liberalism. Modern liberalism rejects the concept of law based on the concept of the individual. It is statism wrapped in collectivism. Not everyone fits so neatly in your simplistic notions of "left" and "right."
Gerry Studds did not rape anyone - he was with a teenager who was of the age of consent who had consensual sex with Studds. But what Studds did was wrong - he too used his position of authority, but it was consensual. He was reprimanded.
Foley ran like a scared child and hid after he resigned. He knew he had done terrible things and there was no defense.
And the Republican leadership of the House knew what was going on too, and they didn't stop it nor make it public knowledge - they let it go on for years until the truth was uncovered.
But this was comparing Foley and Jennings. Foley was the predator. He was the bad guy preying upon ex-pages. Jennings was not the predator. It was a terrible, fatally flawed analogy. Very typical of hypocritical righty's, but wrong nonetheless.
Not for lack of trying!
Fox spelled backwards is XOF who was the goddess of lying in old Conservative folklore. Honest!!
Didn't Jennings himself say the kid was 15?
Your standards are incredibly low for conservatives. But given their history, that's understandable.
Jennings did say something about a sophomore being 15 in one speech. Clearly, though, the student wasn't 15.
We don't know if he said it simply as a mistake - he meant to say 16 and said 15 as a slip of the tongue. OR
If he was thinking of saying "15, 16" and left off the 16 part. OR
If he was trying to give the audience an idea of the typical age of a sophomore in high school, which is 15 at the beginning of the year and 16 at the end of the year. Turns out, this student was already 16 when he started his sophomore year, but a typical sophomore would be 15, and based upon context in that audiotape of Jennings, it easily could be that he was simply talking about sophomores at the beginning of the school year in general being 15, and not talking about this student in particular at all! OR
Any number of other reasons. We don't know why he said 15. The problem all this week was that FoxNews never told their listeners/viewers that there was conflicting info about the age of the kid, and there was very persuasive info that indicated that the kid was 16, and only this one comment that indicated the student might have been 15. They didn't provide their listeners with the full info that they deserved, and that was because it didn't serve their purposes if the kid was 16!
So yeah, many people were duped by FoxNews when they only provided some of the info. That's indisputable by anyone with half a brain tied behind their back. Yet you dispute it! That's all we need to know - not that it's new news that your arguments are full of ****.
News sources don't get to rely solely upon one piece of information when there are multiple ones out there. FoxNews did just that though. They dishonestly duped their viewers, and if you think that's okay, you should be ashamed.
Jennings was not the person who described the "fisting", nor was he particularly pleased that the incident occurred. Calling it "fistgate" is cute, but it has nothing to do with Jennings (any more than inviting pornographers to receive a Gingrich award has anything to do with Newt).
There were no "divisive comments" made in a Baptist church. The comments were in jennings' own memoirs and they were followed just a little later by a description of how he returned to Christ and to the church.
You only heard the part of the story that was designed to outrage and inflame.
the "divisive comments" can be found with a google search. i may have read it wrong about it being in a church and, if so, that's my bad. regardless, it is divisive and not at all in touch with most americans.
He and his organization are divisive. I'm not going to lose any sleep over whether he resigns or not. I'm just saying the guy is poison for the President and he will the price for the questionable people he has chosen to surround himself with. you want the right to stop attacking? hire some frickin' normal people.
Also cough up what this "fistgate" thing is. Since it has gate at the end, I'll assume until further notice that it's a bit of hyperbolic over the top imaginary infringement on your delicate sensibilities.
So please do honor us with your very knowledgable account.
btw - "free speech" means freedom from government persecution and censorship. it has nothing to do with the consequences you suffer when you say something offensive to a whole lot of people.
Criminals, deviants and the like.
I'm amazed as well.
In the age of Google, there is NO excuse for stupidity?
Can you read and comprehend IF the information didn't come from WND, Limbo, Glenda, Insanity or RedState?
GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network) was ONE of THREE SPONSORS of a "teach Out" conference at Tuft University about TEENS and sexual behaivor.
And before you object to the need to discuss sex with teens, consider Grandma Palin.
Anyway, the conference was for students age 14 to 21 and a attending STUDENT asked what fisting was. The teachers answered the question.
And once again Kevin Jennings WAS NOT PRESENT at the conference and was NOT responsible for the content of the conference. GLSEN was simply ONE of THREE sponsors, NOTHING more!
They have free classes to help you with Google.
Addressing a church audience on March 20, 2000, in New York City - GLSEN Executive Director Kevin Jennings offer a ASSESSMENT OF HOW TO DEAL WITH RELIGIOUS CONSERVATIVES:
20% of people are hard-core fair-minded, pro homosexual people. 20% are hard-core anti homosexual bigots. We need to ignore the hard-core bigots, get more of the hard-core fair-minded people to speak up, and we'll pull that 60% of people in the middle, over to our side. That's really what I think our strategy has to be. We have to quit being afraid of the religious right. We also have to quit - I'm trying to find a way to say this. I'm trying NOT to say 'F---'em' which is what I want to say, because I don't care what the think! Drop dead!
You seem to make plenty of "judgements" about liberals, while ingoring a very basic teaching, "...Take heed what ye do: for ye judge NOT for man, but for the LORD, who is with you in judgement" (II Chronicles 19:6)
You keep talking about President Obama ( WTF Mr. Obama?) and the elections, but you've miss or ignored the Republican party and their need to play to their based, southern Whites. And how playing to their base, while alienating African Americans, Hispanics and others, will not win them elections.
[url=it was legal]http://masscases.com/cases/sjc/385/385mass521.html#foot2[/url]
I mean, really? When all the facts are against you're going to invoke the Soros bogeyman so you can stay in denial. Sad.
Also, kudos, cuz you know, LOLing is a great way to strengthen your argument.
And the man has come forward, you just chosse not to believe it's him. You even posted on the page with his statement.
http://mediamatters.org/blog/200910020029
Don't you ever get tired of being wrong all the time?
If you're finally acknowledging that the website was set up after O'Reilly made that comment, then "falsified" is a strange term, and it's completely irrelevant to this situation anyway. That would be mocking someone, not an effort to deceive.
Please elaborate.