UCLA professor emeritus pleads no contest to sexual assault charges

This post was updated May 6 at 6:14 p.m.

A UCLA professor emeritus pleaded no contest to two charges of sexual assault of children under 14 years old.

Thomas Fairleigh Denove, a professor emeritus in the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television, was arraigned Nov. 9, according to court documents. He was charged under Penal Code 288(a) for one count and for 288.5(a) for two counts. Both are felony offenses. In addition to the two no contest pleas, Denove pleaded not guilty to the second charge under 288.5(a).

Penal Code 288.5(a) states a person who has recurring access to a child under 14 years old and engages in three or more acts of substantial sexual conduct with the child for three or more months shall be punished by a state prison sentence of six, 12 or 16 years.

Penal Code 288(a) states a person who willfully commits any lewd act upon a child under 14 years old with the intent of gratifying sexual desires shall be punished by a state prison sentence of three, six or eight years.

Denove’s bail was set at $1 million, which he posted in Sept. 18 and later increased by an additional $1 million, which he posted Nov. 29.

UCLA spokesperson Tod Tamberg said in an email statement the university was not aware of the charges against Denove until Wednesday evening, when the Daily Bruin brought the issue to their attention.

He added Denove retired in December, one month after his arraignment.

He also said the registrar’s information about Denove’s courses is incorrect. Early Thursday, the UCLA registrar indicated Denove offered a class in fall quarter 2018 and was scheduled to teach a class during the 2019 summer A session. He was removed as the instructor listed for the courses between the initial publication of this story and Thursday evening. Denove is still listed on TFT’s faculty page and the UCLA campus directory.

“Denove is retired, has no teaching responsibilities at UCLA, and will have no involvement with the university while this matter is under review,” Tamberg said.

Denove is scheduled to be sentenced May 21.

Senate bill introduced to combat homelessness by securing federal funds

Local governments in Los Angeles may receive additional funds to help fight homelessness if a Senate bill passes.

The Fighting Homelessness Through Services and Housing Act would give $750 million in grants to local governments each year for the next five years in an effort to combat homelessness. It would also require a 25% match from nonfederal funds to cover other services for the homeless population.

The bill was introduced by Democrat Congressman Ted Lieu, representative of California’s 33rd district, which includes Westwood, along with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Rep. Steve Stivers (R-Ohio).

Almost a quarter of the 550,000 homeless people in the U.S. live in California. Lieu said in a previous statement a homelessness relief bill was needed to break the cycle of homelessness through housing and social services.

Feinstein also said in the statement she thinks homelessness should be addressed at the root of its various causes, including mental illness, drug addiction and poverty.

Andrew Thomas, the executive director of the Westwood Village Improvement Association, said he thinks any national bill that involves local governments in efforts to tackle homelessness is beneficial.

“Nobody knows the homeless situation better on the ground, in the city, better than the local representatives,” Thomas said. “Whether it is the city council or the local representatives, we are intimately involved with homelessness here.”

Thomas added he thinks there is a desire to address homelessness in the Los Angeles community, as the city and county offer resources to match money given through federal grants, thus increasing aid to the homeless population.

Several students said they think resources should go to areas in the fight against homelessness that do not currently receive sufficient support.

Isita Tripathi, a second-year neuroscience student and a programming director for the Hunger Project at UCLA, said after working with nonprofits through the Hunger Project, she understands why federal funding is important.

“Nonprofits are constantly struggling and are often understaffed, offering different niche services which makes it difficult as a homeless individual to know where to go for support,” Tripathi said. “Grassroots groups recognize this problem and are in the process of pushing local governments to pay attention to this crisis and provide a sense of stability so that the services the populations utilize can be further built upon.”

Shreya Banerjee, a fourth-year molecular, cell and developmental biology student, said she hopes the money will go toward areas that are not already covered by existing resources such as Medicare.

“There is a need for the funding to cover root causes of homelessness, such as mental health, addiction and basic lack of care,” Banerjee said. “Funds towards mental health and addiction counseling and podiatry would go a long way in helping the overall problem of homelessness.”

Thomas added he thinks more needs to be done to address homelessness in Los Angeles.

“California has a higher homeless population than any state in the union, and Los Angeles has a greater homeless population than any other county in California,” Thomas said. “There is a lot of work to be done here.”

Digital LSAT expected to improve test-taking experience, increase accessibility

Students taking the Law School Admission Test will soon have to take the two sections of the exam in two separate sittings under the new digital format.

This is one of a number of changes to the exam as it moves to its new digital format.

The Law School Admission Council, the organization that administers the LSAT, announced it would change the test to a digital format in October. Beginning in July, the LSAT will be delivered on tablets instead of booklets. The tablets will be provided to test takers at the test center and will contain the same multiple-choice questions as the paper examination.

LSAC said in an email statement that administering the two sections of the exam separately will shorten the amount of time test takers have to spend in one sitting.

LSAC added that by recording the scores immediately after the exam is completed, these changes will help discourage cheating and the manipulation of exam scores.

Troy Lowry, senior vice president of technology products and chief information officer at LSAC, said field testing has shown test takers find the digital LSAT easy to use with general feedback being positive. The test might also speed up score delivery time, thus giving law school applicants more time to focus on the next steps in their application processes, he added.

“The digital test will mean no answer sheets, no bubbling in little ovals and no risk of misgrading and will help relieve some of the anxiety in taking the test – anxiety about errors due to having put all answers on the answer sheet,” Lowry said.

Lowry said the digital LSAT would allow LSAC to gather more information on the test-taking process and help it make improvements.

Axel Sarkissian, president of the Pre-Law Society at UCLA, said the new changes will have both positive and negative impacts, and it is important to know how it will affect the law school admissions process.

Sarkissian said he thinks students will likely take the test more frequently given the increased accessibility of the new digital format and the removal of a cap on how many times they can take the test after 2017.

“The more times you take it your score goes up because this is an exam that can be learned, but the downside is that there will be more higher scores out there when you apply to law school and make it more competitive,” he said.

Rachel Sheffield, director of academic support for LSAT preparation company TestMasters, said the changes to the LSAT will be very beneficial to test takers because they will increase the quality and streamline the administration of the exam.

“Students would come to me to complain that the proctor had cut off their time by a minute or two and they were very frustrated,” she said. “In this new format, every single tablet has its own time and students will know they have 35 minutes to the second.”

She said the digital practice tests will allow TestMasters to collect more data on students’ performances and provide more personalized advice to students.

“A lot of people who have taken the exam know how you take the exam is a big part of the exam itself and can play a pretty big role, so it will take some getting used to and when you prepare for the exam you will probably want to take a few practice ones on a tablet or something that mimics that experience,” Sarkissian said.

LSAC said in its statement the organization released two practice exams Tuesday to help students get acquainted to the new digital platform.

Westwood has seen nightlife shuttered by local competition, city regulations

Westwood has always faced legal hurdles to expanding its nightlife scene and providing students entertainment after 10 p.m.

Organizations like the North Westwood Neighborhood Council have supported the establishment of businesses in Westwood to improve the nightlife scene – such as Rocco’s Tavern and Broxton Brewery – to serve customers from dinnertime onward.

However, these businesses tend to operate individually and don’t create a larger identity for Westwood, said Andrew Thomas, executive director of the Westwood Village Improvement Association.

“What we don’t have is a synergy between businesses that are here that would create a scene,” Thomas said.

Compared to the current situation of Westwood, the neighborhood boasted a stronger nightlife scene in the past. Westwood of the 1970s and the 1980s served as an entertainment hot spot for Los Angeles and attracted more visitors from all over the city than any other area in LA, Thomas said.

In later decades, however, regions of LA such as Hollywood created more businesses and attracted large portions of Westwood’s regional audience, a phenomenon the neighborhood was not prepared to face.

“That competition absorbed (what) I believe to be a large portion of the regional people who would come,” Thomas said. “The other big hit is that there are regulations in the books that make it prohibited for us to have entertainment uses.”

The zoning guidelines for Westwood contains certain regulations that prevent the establishment of businesses such as bowling alleys and even the use of certain items in restaurants.

“You look at our zoning, and we can’t have pool tables,” Thomas said. “Why on earth can you not have pool tables?”

Some students said they feel like their options for going out are limited by the lack of entertainment venues in Westwood.

Sina Keramat, a first-year financial actuarial mathematics student, said he goes into Westwood around once a week to grab food with his friends but wishes the neighborhood had more entertainment options beyond restaurants and theaters.

“I would want to see more of a hangout place geared towards college students, like a recreation center with more games and not necessarily just sports,” Keramat said.

Pritish Patil, a first-year psychobiology student, said he frequents Westwood around four to six times a week and believes the neighborhood could use some more entertainment.

“I don’t know if entertainment is what (Westwood) is made for, but maybe a bowling alley or something like that would be nice,” Patil said.

Restrictions on venues in Westwood also extend to alcohol licenses and the establishment of bars. Michael Skiles, president of the NWWNC, said the previous Westwood Neighborhood Council implemented many requirements and conditions for businesses to obtain a Conditional Use Beverage permit, which is required for establishments to sell alcoholic beverages.

According to an application for the permit, conditions include the prohibition of any happy hour-like promotions and of dancing “on the premises at any time.” Additionally, the establishment must primarily be a full-service restaurant.

“Those conditions collectively insisted you could never have a bar or a club or anything approaching that in a traditional sense,” Skiles said. “The most exciting venue you could have would be one where you could order drinks with your meal.”

The Westwood Village Specific Plan, a legal document part of the LA General Plan, provides guidelines and regulations for the maintenance of current buildings and the construction of new buildings in the neighborhood. The Specific Plan was implemented Jan. 30, 1989, and has been amended twice in the past 30 years.

The Specific Plan, when first created, was tailored to a Westwood with far fewer UCLA students and a much smaller LA region. Despite the large growth of the UCLA and LA communities, the Specific Plan has not been adapted to accommodate a newer population, Skiles said.

“Changes should have happened decades ago,” Skiles said. “I don’t think that it has really been (Councilmember Paul Koretz’s) priority to get Westwood to the front of the line to get the attention of (the Department of City Planning).”

Koretz’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Skiles said Koretz provided some support to change the plan but the bulk of the changes will happen years from now.

“We’ll probably be able to get a full-plan rewrite by about 2025 or 2026,” Skiles said. “In the meantime, (Koretz) has worked with a bid on one small Specific Plan change that encourages fast casual restaurants in Westwood.”

Although the plan has not been altered to allow for greater nightlife in Westwood in the past, Skiles said he hopes the bid will be passed by the end of the year with the support of the NWWNC.

Panelists promote different methods to navigate on-campus sexual violence cases

Experts on sexual violence said colleges should use alternative methods, such as restorative and transformative justice, to address sexual violence on campus.

The Campus Assault Resource and Education program hosted an event Tuesday featuring a panel of speakers who discussed their experiences working with restorative and transformative justice for college students, followed by a Q&A session. CARE is an on-campus program that aims to provide a confidential place for survivors of sexual assault and similar crimes to speak about their experiences without filing a formal report.

Restorative and transformative justice are alternative options when navigating the aftermath of sexual violence in lieu of incarceration, in which survivors work with family members, friends and other members of the community to address the violence.

According to the Centre for Justice and Reconciliation, restorative justice involves stressing accountability and sometimes facilitating meetings between the perpetrator and the survivor.

On the other hand, transformative justice allows communities to prevent violence, said LeAnn Pham, a fourth-year political science and Asian American studies student who attended the event.

“Transformative justice is seeking incremental cultural change before the violence happens,” Pham said. “There is more counseling and a facilitator with the emotional capacity for people to come to an agreement.”

It can be difficult to alter one’s perception of justice, said Grace Hong, panel moderator and a professor of gender studies and Asian American studies at UCLA.

Hong said her first instinct when hearing about the Larry Nassar case at Michigan State University was anger. Nassar was the former physician of the United States national gymnastics team who was accused of sexually assaulting over 265 women and sentenced to prison for 40 to 175 years.

“My first instinct is, ‘Throw them in jail and toss them in prison,’ … when you hear about something that’s so violent and has affected so many people,” Hong said.

Hong said it is normal to feel anger and other emotions when using transformative justice to talk about these topics and to heal from them.

Xhercis Mendez, an assistant professor of women and gender studies at California State University, Fullerton, was another panelist at the event and said many problems with sexual assault on campus happen because university administrators don’t pay enough attention to the issue.

“The way the university pays attention is when it is in crisis mode,” Mendez said.

The event was focused on topics different from the traditional avenues for criminal justice, such as the Title IX office or the police, in case people are looking for different options for sexual assault and related crimes, said Alicia Oeser, director of CARE.

“I wanted to bring these speakers into our community because I think there is a really important piece that people are hungry for, a better way of engaging with others,” Oeser said. “People are hoping for something else.”

Michaela Banchero, a second-year psychobiology student, said she liked how the speakers gave students a platform to discuss these ideas.

“I really liked that they tried to give students a platform because often the university doesn’t enable us,” Banchero said.

Pham said she thought the event was informative and enjoyed it as someone who studies both restorative and transformative justice, but said she thought some of the theories discussed in the panel may have confused students.

“One of the panelists talked a lot about theories,” Pham said. “That’s great, but when talking to a lot of students there is not enough time to explain the theory all the way.”

Mendez said she wanted to emphasize that restorative justice takes a safe community and open-minded people to function properly.

“Restorative justice is something that you have to come to voluntarily, and we have to create those conditions,” Mendez said.

Bruins finally bested by Golden Bears in third matchup of season

The third time was the charm for the Golden Bears.

UCLA had beaten California in its previous two matches this season, but in their third meeting of the season, No. 4 seed Cal (14-12, 4-4 Pac-12) bested No. 1 seed UCLA men’s tennis (17-5, 8-0), knocking the Bruins out of the Pac-12 tournament and denying them a chance at repeating as tournament conference champions.

UCLA and Cal first faced off at home Feb. 8, when the Bruins defeated the Bears by a score of 4-2. After losing the doubles point, UCLA rebounded in singles, capturing four out of the six matches.

“Losing the doubles point always puts the pressure on us in singles,” said coach Billy Martin after the match. “I was pleased with (freshman) Govind Nanda winning that match for us under pressure, and the great leadership from (senior) Maxime Cressy and (sophomore) Keegan Smith. A great win from (junior) Ben Goldberg, and I’m hoping it gives him a lot of confidence.”

Goldberg said the Bears doubles teams demonstrated that they should not be underestimated, despite the team being unranked at the time.

“They won the doubles point at USC, and their lineup features many good players at all different spots,” Goldberg said after his win. “They have the team’s and my full respect.”

The next meeting between the teams was March 30 in conference play. The Bruins won by an identical score of 4-2.

The Bruins came away with the doubles point to begin the match, and wins from Cressy, Smith, and Nanda clinched the victory for UCLA.

Goldberg was not able to repeat his performance against the Bears, losing to Ben Draper 7-6 (5), 6-3. Aside from Goldberg, it was the same singles players who won the match for the Bruins on both occasions.

The Pac-12 tournament matchup was the third meeting between the Bears and the Bruins. Like the February meeting, the Bruins dropped the doubles point, with the doubles team of sophomore Bryce Pereira and freshman Patrick Zahraj falling in a tiebreaker on court three, 7-6 (4).

At No. 1 and No. 2 singles, Cressy and Smith faced the same opponents as they did in March – Yuta Kikuchi and Jack Molloy, respectively. The two had won their singles matches against Cal in each of the previous meetings this season. On Saturday, the two matches were left unfinished – with the Bruins leading on both courts when they were called.

Nanda faced off against the Bears’ Paul Barretto – the same opponent as in the March match. Nanda claimed a 6-3, 6-2 victory during that meeting. On Friday, Nanda fell by a score of 6-4, 6-4 to Barretto.

Losses at No. 5 and No. 6 singles gave the Bears the win. Goldberg faced a different opponent than in his matches in February and March and was defeated 6-3, 6-2. Zahraj, at No. 4 singles, was the only Bruin to pick up a singles point.

“It’s good to get these matches out of the way now, rather than the NCAA matches,” Pereira said. “All of the guys know what this feeling is right now, but we need to use it as fuel for the regional rounds coming up. We just have to get in the proper mindset.”

The Bruins will enter the NCAA tournament as the No. 11 seed. They will face Grand Canyon at home Friday and, should they win, will face the winner of Oklahoma State and Ole Miss on Saturday.

Jaylen Hands, Kris Wilkes to compete at their second NBA Draft Combine

Jaylen Hands and Kris Wilkes are getting ready for the next step.

The two guards both elected to forgo their final two years of NCAA eligibility in favor of the 2019 NBA Draft earlier this offseason. After participating in the NBA Draft Combine in 2018, Hands and Wilkes have both been invited back to Chicago for a second chance.

Hands shot 4-of-7 from the field in the scrimmage at last year’s combine, but his three assists and four turnovers highlighted NBA scouts’ concerns about his ability to run an offense. He also, ironically, had the smallest hands of anyone in Chicago that week.

With Aaron Holiday gone, Hands had to run the point for UCLA men’s basketball this season. Hands’ passing numbers saw a boost – with his 6.1 assists per game leading the conference – but he recorded 4.1 turnovers per 40 minutes, compared to a mark of 2.9 his freshman season.

Hands was able to become a higher-volume shooter this season as well, attempting 1.7 more 3s per game while keeping his efficiency constant.

Wilkes shot over 50% in his scrimmage at the 2018 combine as well, going 6-of-11 with 12 points in 27 minutes. The wing shot 10-of-15 from deep in the shooting drills, and his jump shot had been praised for being NBA-ready.

But despite returning to finish as the fourth leading scorer in the Pac-12, Wilkes’ 2-point and 3-point percentages both dipped this year.

At the moment, center Moses Brown – who entered the draft without a personal, public announcement – has not received an invite to the combine.

The combine will take place from May 15-19.