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VOLUME XLVIII | IS S U E 4 | PE PPE RDIN E - GRA PH IC.C O M | SE P T E M B ER 2 0 , 2 0 1 8
'She was a person of integrity': professors speak out about pepp alum, kavanaugh accuser
Courtesy of AP Photo Supreme Court Nominee Accused | Christine Blasey Ford, who has come forward with sexual assault allegations against Brett Kavanaugh, is an alumna from Pepperdine's Graduate School of Education and Psychology. C hanna steinmetz soci al media man age r KAY IU WONG AS SI STANT N E WS E DITOR Just four days before the Senate Judiciary Committee planned to vote on Brett M. Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation, Pepperdine alumna and former Seaver College professor Christine Blasey Ford came forward Sunday to publicly accuse the federal appeals judge of sexually assaulting her 36 years ago. Ford is a professor at Palo Alto University who teaches in a consortium with Stanford University. She was a 1991 graduate from the Graduate School of Education and Psychology with a master’s in Clinical Psychology, according to Public Relations Manager Alex Forero. Ford later worked as a visiting professor at Pepperdine from 1995 to 1998. Distinguished Professor of Psycholo-
gy Cindy Miller-Perrin worked at Seaver College while Ford was a visiting faculty member. Although Miller-Perrin said she knew Ford only through her time at Pepperdine, she complimented Ford’s character. “I found her to be a very competent individual,” Miller-Perrin said. “I liked her as a person. I thought she was a person of integrity.” Professor of Economics Ron Batchelder, who was also a colleague of Ford, described her as a “very nice person who was a joy to be around.” Ford’s allegation came into light last week when Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) revealed she had a letter containing information about Kavanaugh that she referred to the F.B.I., according to The New York Times. Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, did not reveal the letter’s details or the identity of its author. However, anonymous officials leaked that the letter involved sexual misconduct between Kavanaugh and a woman when they were both in high school.
Ford spoke out for the first time in an interview with The Washington Post that was published Sunday. She told the Post that she is the author of the confidential letter and that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her during a house party in suburban Maryland. Ford told the Post she believes the incident occurred in the summer of 1982, when she was 15 and Kavanaugh was 17. Ford, now 51, said Kavanaugh and his friend, Mark Judge, were both "stumbling drunk" when they pushed her into an upstairs bedroom. Kavanaugh allegedly pinned Ford to a bed, tried to remove her clothes, began to grind his body against her and covered her mouth with his hand when she tried to scream, the Post reported. “I thought he might inadvertently kill me,” Ford told the Post. When Ford’s story first came out, Batchelder said he had no idea it was about his former colleague. “I was watching the news on TV, and I was like ‘Oh my God, that’s
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“It can’t be an easy thing to do, and there are a lot of costs to what she'S doing.”
-CINDY MILLER-PERRIN, PSYCHOLOGY PROFESSOR Chrissy!’ I was completely stunned,” Batchelder said. Kavanaugh has since then denied Ford’s claims. "This is a completely false allegation," Kavanaugh said Monday in a statement distributed by the White House, according to The New York
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Kiley d i s t e l rat h copy e dito r Whole Foods, "America's healthiest grocery store," is coming to Malibu with an estimated opening date of March 13, according to the Southern Pacific Region Whole Foods Market. Although Whole Foods will offer another option for groceries, it has taken nearly 12 years to get to this point. Whole Foods is a major part of a larger development project called the Park at Cross Creek Shopping Center. The center will sit on the corner of Cross Creek Road and Civic Center Way. Senior Bailey Jurik said she was excited for Whole Foods.
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Sam Finnegan | Assistant Photo Editor Food Fight | Whole Foods is set to open March 13, despite community push-back. The grocery store will be located at the corner of Cross Creek Road and Civic Center Way in Malibu. “I love Whole Foods," Jurik said. "I’m sad that I won’t be able to experience it since I am a senior this year." Discussion of Whole Foods coming to the area began as early as 2006. However, construction started in Oct. 2017, following a battle over Measure R, according to The Malibu Times. Measure R, also referred to “Your Malibu, Your Decision,” was an initiative that sought
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the preservation of the “unique oasis [Malibu] in the midst of urban and suburban sprawl and generic development,” according to the Los Angeles Times. The measure’s mission statement closely resounds the mission and vision statements of the city. Mayor of Malibu Rick Mullin, summarized the city's statements. “The mission statement of the city and the vision state-
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ment centers around the preservation of the natural resources and memorializes the fact that what's unique about the town is not ... the stuff that man makes, it’s the natural world itself," Mullin, a supporter of Measure R and a preservationist, said. "It is the mission of the city government itself and really it says the people of Malibu to try and preserve [the natural land] as much as possible.”
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