Knight v. South Orange Community College District, G058644 (Feb. 10, 2021)
A college disciplined a student after two other, female students complained that the student was following them, taking photos of one of them, and touching them. The college suspended the student but allowed him to attend classes while he contested the suspension. The potential suspension was eventually dropped, and, instead, a written reprimand was placed in the student’s record. The trial court granted the student’s petition for writ of mandamus on the ground that the college denied him due process by not allowing him or his counsel to confront and cross-examine witnesses at the disciplinary hearing.
The Court of Appeal held that while a student is entitled to some form of hearing and witness confrontation before he or she can be suspended or expelled, a student is not “entitled to the same level of due process before a written reprimand could be placed in his student record, if he suffered no other official detriment.” Requiring a college to provide a “trial-like hearing” before issuing a written reprimand “places too great a burden on the college when compared to the minor detriment to” the student. The court noted that had the student been suspended, he would have been entitled to confront and cross-examine the witnesses.
