A tenured Columbia University professor’s retaliation against a female researcher who denied his sexual advances could cost him $31 million, a Thursday report revealed.
A Manhattan jury convicted Columbia economics professor Geert Bekaert of retaliating against his junior researcher, Enrichetta Ravina, after she declined to have a sexual relationship with him, according to New York Post.
Ravina’s attorneys claimed that the professor deliberately stalled the project with which he was helping her when Ravina rebuffed his advances. Bekaert referred to the researcher as “insane,” “unstable,” “schizophrenic,” “incredibly evil,” an “incredibly mean b” in emails to coworkers.
Ravina said that the professor talked about pornography and why prostitution was important. The researcher is requesting a $31 million payout.
Bekaert is not the first Columbia community member to come under scrutiny for sexual misconduct in 2018. A Columbia student who had received a Nobel Peace Prize nomination for anti-sexual violence activism got arrested in June on charges of child pornography and attempted child sex crime. (RELATED: Anti-Sexual Violence Nobel Nominee Arrested For Child Porn)
“The jury found that Columbia neither discriminated against Ms. Ravina nor retaliated against her through its actions,” Columbia spokesman Robert Hornsby told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “The University’s decision to decline Ms. Ravina’s tenure appointment was not called into question.”
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