Partial
transcript of meeting between Dalecki and Ron Jacobus around Nov 2014
Note: Wisconsin State Statute 968.31 says:
“(2)It is not unlawful under ss.
968.28 to 968.37:
(c) For a person not acting under color
of law to intercept a wire, electronic or oral communication where the person
is a party to the communication or where one of the parties to the
communication has given prior consent to the interception unless the
communication is intercepted for the purpose of committing any criminal or
tortious act in violation of the constitution or laws of the United States or
of any state or for the purpose of committing any other injurious act.”
Note: Dr. Dalecki agreed that the transcript seems
accurate (Dalecki sworn deposition).
Background to this meeting: Deb Rice said in a public place, during a social gathering at which a graduate student was in attendance, that Dr. Burton “is suffering from a mental disease or words of similar effect and meaning.” She also said that “Dr. Burton had a prejudice against East Germans, or words of similar effect and meaning.” Dr. Dalecki sat at the same table and participated in the conversation. Dr. Dalecki did not correct Ms. Rice’s statements or reprimand her for making those statements in the graduate student’s presence. At the same social gathering the graduate student heard then-Provost Den Herder say that Dr. Burton was on a sinking ship by herself. (Dkt-52-Declar-Jacobus)
The graduate student later informed Dr. Burton of these statements.
Dr. Burton then filed a proper complaint with Interim HR director Lohmann against Deb Rice for spreading false rumors about her.
Instead of correcting Deb Rice’s rumors Interim Chair Dr. Dalecki decided that the real problem in this situation was that the graduate student talked to Dr. Burton. This seemed to violate his gag-order against Dr. Burton so he called the grad student into his office for a “mentoring session.”
The grad student recorded the meeting and gave the audio recording to Dr. Burton.
(The audio has been shortened by removing all but the underlined text below) (italicized notes are included to give context)
Click this link to begin shortened Audio: (A28b-Dalecki-GradStudentmeetingNov2014)
Click this link for the (full audio)
Dalecki: What I want wanted to chat with you about
was um. It kinda
came to my attention that, that, and this is always difficult to know where
one’s loyalties lie and what one should say, um. That you may have passed on something that
Deb Rice said to you to Dr. Burton.
Jacobus: hm
Dalecki: and, um, it seems like there are no other
alternative pathways by which that information could have been delivered other
than, than you and so it’s hard not to, uh, make the
conclusion that perhaps that’s what happened and, um, it’s since resulted in
about an hour and a half of my time being spent dealing with the problem that
erupted from it as well as future time that might be looking at
Note: Dr. Dalecki never asked the grad student if he was the
one who told Dr. Burton. Dalecki assumed
that it was him and continued as though his assumption could not be wrong.
Jacobus: Hum
Dalecki: as well as maybe costing you the trust of
somebody who kind of presumed that maybe what she passed on to you wouldn’t
necessarily move on to anyone else.
Note: The person whose
trust Dalecki is concerned about is Deb Rice, not Dr. Burton’s. In other words “the
grad student betrayed Deb Rice’s trust because he told Dr. Burton about the
false rumors that Rice had been spreading in a public place.”
And
uh it’s always difficult I know, because I can remember very vividly these
kinds of things that when you’re starting out graduate school that uh it’s not
exactly clear, kind of betwixt and between, you’re not really
a professional yet but you’re not really an undergraduate anymore. So, you’re sort of in this nether region
where it’s not clear what the rules are.
Jacobus: Yea
Dalecki: And there’s a certain amount of anomie that
exists and uhm..
I
know that Deb is pretty upset (deep sigh) um that she
felt like a conversation that had no particular reason to be passed on to
anybody would have moved on to the person.
Note: This is more evidence
that Dalecki was concerned about Rice’s feelings and not Burton’s.
And it isn’t exactly clear why necessarily
that would have happened or what would have been gained by it.
Note: Dalecki doesn’t
seem to believe anything could be gained by stopping Deb Rice from spreading
false rumors about Dr. Burton.
Jacobus: Hm
Daelcki: um and now we’re
dealing with (sigh) the fallout of that, so, (sigh). um I want to caution you, that uh, first
of all, um to be very very careful what you pass on
to other people. uh
Silence is usually golden.
And um It’s hard sometimes to see that there’s much benefit in um, in
acting as a conduit for anybody or for anything. Cause in the long run, that
stuff, it will come back and will ultimately to haunt you either in terms of
people will no longer include you, or, uh, or who knows what
Note: Dalecki seems to
be saying “if you pass information to the victim of a vicious smear campaign
you will be excluded, haunted and there will be other consequences too.”
and
uh I think that, uh, from what I’ve heard from people that you are astute
enough to know that you want to stay away from the politics of the department
(unintelligible).
Jacobus: Oh yea.
Dalecki: because frankly I think the politics are a
sign of a dysfunctional department not a functional one, but that’s being
addressed and I’ve been working on it for a year and a half and we’re not done.
Note: Dr. Dalecki
seems to think the dysfunction in the department comes from Dr. Burton. He seems to believe that treating Dr. Burton
unfairly and harassing her until she packs her bags and leaves is the way to
resolve the dysfunction in the department.
He seems to believe that Deb Rice was doing the department a service by
spreading false rumors about Dr. Burton.
Dalecki: Uh, And politics are
primarily a consequence of people who place themselves ahead of the mission of
the group. And when I see people who do
that I know what drives their behavior and it means I don’t trust them
necessarily to put that mission first because I can’t tell what they’re gonna
do.
Note: Dr. Dalecki
seems to be saying that he doesn’t trust Dr. Burton because he knows what
drives her behavior. He seems to believe
that she places herself ahead of the mission of the group. He doesn’t seem to trust Dr. Burton to do
what is best for the mission of the Criminal Justice department because he
doesn’t know what she will do next. Dr.
Dalecki doesn’t seem to understand that “JUSTICE” is central to the mission of
the Criminal Justice program.
And,
uh, I would think at this point that you would have seen enough from what has
gone on over the last six months to understand that there are deeper issues
here than you’re necessarily privy to and
Note: It seems Dr.
Dalecki knew that this conversation is something that needed to be “hushed up.”
Jacobus: Oh yea.
Dalecki: that the smartest move is to
Jacobus: Stay as far away a
possible.
Dalecki: Well, it’s , there’s
nothing you’re going to do that’s gonna make a difference except that if something
explodes in the face you’ll get hit by
shrapnel
Jacobus: Yeah
Dalecki: and the best thing for you to do is stay away
from where that happens. And um
I’ve
been doing, not necessarily chair stuff, in this department but similar kinds
of stuff for a long time and uh, one of the things that you learn in such
positions is that everybody else thinks they know what they would do in the
position but none of them know everything the chair knows. And if they knew
what the chair knew then they would, in some cases, shut the hell up and in other cases they’d cut the chair a break
because they know the chair is taking a hit for everybody.
Note: Dr. Dalecki
seems to be threatening the grad student that if he does not “shut the hell up” something will explode
in his face and he’ll get hit by
shrapnel.
Jacobus: Yeah.
Dalecki: (unintelligible)
Jacobus: No, and I think politics is a perfect way to make a, um, compare the two, because you often see that when somebody is running for something and they haven’t been in that seat they’ll kind of say the same thing when they get there and they change their mind when all of a sudden they’re on an intelligence committee or something and go woa ok, I better not do that. Yea.
Dalecki: That’s the
case here. And there are people who have drawn conclusions
about things who have no idea what they’re talking about and frankly they’re
less well thought of in some cases, because, they’re playing the fool because
they assume that what piece of the whole they’ve gotten represents the entire
whole and it does not.
Note: Dr. Dalecki
seems to be referring to Dr. Burton and call her a “fool” because she doesn’t
see the whole picture. He seems to
believe she has no idea what she is talking about.
And
ah, you will never know, no one will ever know because some of them are
personnel issues that you simply cannot be privy to and I know how that sounds
but that’s also the way it is.
Note: The way it
sounds is exactly the way it is: Cover
up. Harassment. Retaliation.
Discrimination.
and
um one should always take what anyone tells them with a grain of salt because
you don’t know what self-interest is driving those kinds of things.
Note: Dr. Dalecki
seems to be saying that Dr. Burton has some hidden “self-interest.” Her interest has always been to advocate for students rights, to gain fair treatment for herself and to
protect future advocates of students’ rights.
Her self-interest is evident. She
doesn’t want to be fired on trumped up charges.
and I, ah, would just caution you that you
think twice and maybe thrice before you pass information on to anyone uh, that
frankly they don’t necessarily need to know.
And, uh, in this case it may cost us a significant amount of time and
effort that ultimately won’t result in any changes but it will be a huge time
suck. and the last thing in the world I want and the last thing anybody needs
is for my attention to be distracted by stuff that really
doesn’t have to happen anyway.
So,
if I were you I might ah, think about going and having a conversation with Deb
and see if you can’t make amends
Jacobus: Ok
Dalecki: over that.
And she may just tell you to go to hell I don’t know, and say I have
nothing to say, I mean you have nothing out of it but um.
Note: It is obvious
that Dalecki does not care that Dr. Burton’s reputation was damaged by false
rumors. Dalecki’s
concern seems to be that the student had hurt Deb Rice’s feelings by snitching
that she was attempting to assassinate Dr. Burton’s character.
This
is sort of a mentoring conversation between you and I, um. No one else is privy to it and it’s not a
designed to be a horrific kind of
thing but rather to be little bit of advice. and I recall when I was a master’s student
like you
Note: Wow. This is not mentoring. A mentor is defined as “A trusted counselor
or guide.” The graduate student did not
trust Dr. Dalecki as evidenced by the fact that he recorded the meeting and
shared it with Dr. Burton. This is not
mentoring.
Jacobus: (Laugh)
Dalecki: I made a mistake and rather than cut me off
at the legs and let me crawl away
bleeding I was given a chance to demonstrate that it was a one-time affair
and all of that. And, um, If you find yourself unable
to maintain a professional discretion about what people say then it’s probably
best to remove yourself from the situations where you’ve been (unintelligible
sounds like “learning”) because that’s not going to help anybody, and in the end you will get caught in the
shrapnel. Because the explosion that occurred and I’ve
been in departments where they do occur and some where they don’t occur. They’re never
pleasant and never particularly functional.
Note: This sounds
threatening, not mentoring.
I’ve served in, one two three
four, five, four
or five departments in my life. Two of
which have been a blessing and some of which have been less so. And you can assess sometimes, the degree to
which someone’s interests are the mission or their own by the number of times
they use the word “I” in their conversations.
And the more they do, the more my experience says, tells me where the
person’s real loyalty lies. (unintelligible) That’s just my sense of (unintelligible) I
don’t know, you know, whether, ah, that makes any sense to you or not but it’s
kind of a word of advice that as you get older and you meet more people and you
get burned a few times. (unintelligible)
Note: Count the number
of times Dr. Dalecki says “I” or “me” in this conversation.
Jacobus: (laugh)
Dalecki: what uh is
Jacobus:
Kinda the reality is of those situations
Dalecki: and it makes the world sound worse than it really is but the reality is there are people out there who
like to do stuff for themselves. that I
got defeated on city council by a person who’s sole
reason for being on city council was to make sure that city employees had 40
hours a week instead of 37. And then of
course they got back and discovered that he didn’t have the money to do it.
Wanted to take a shot and and they also had to defend
the fact that (unintelligible) 37 hours to the amount of work produced by the city employees hadn’t
changed any. Which tells me they were
being overpaid for three hours. So, but
I mean I just kinda laugh at that stuff because in
the end the people who made the decision got the government they deserved.
Jacobus: (laugh)
Dalecki: And those who voted for me and didn’t get me…
well, I’m sorry.
Jacobus: That’s the way it falls sometimes.
Dalecki: Well, I’m glad to be here I don’t know if
it’s good or bad but the net result is that uh they picked the government they
deserve, so.
So,
uh just kind of a word to the wise. I
would uh watch the
Jacobus: Yea, certainly whatever has been going on
here. Uhhm these people I respect them. Different areas or whatever, I don’t really know where the stuff falls out and where the chips
end up so, yea. I’ll just try to ah stay out of everybody else’s hair.
Dalecki: Well, you don’t you don’t know the whole
story
Jacobus: no, and that’s what I’m saying, yea.
Dalecki: I suspect you’d be amazed by it all and um
all I can do is try to treat people fairly and if they can’t deal with that
then that’s how it is. And ah and I
think I do try to do that it’s up to them whether they will recognize that or
not and, ah that doesn’t mean everybody is treated the same all the time
because a lot of people confuse egalitarianism or equality with everybody is
the same thing all the time the same way which is not how it is.
Note: Dr. Dalecki
seems to be saying that Dr. Burton does not deserve to be treated the same as
others. He seems to be admitting that he
treats her disparately from others in the department. He seems to be saying it is ok for people to
spread false rumors about Dr. Burton.
Jacobus:
no
Dalecki: and it gets spread out when I have the time
and ability to do it. Um so.
Watch,
um, when someone says something to you it’s generally private information. Now I know you could say “well,you didn’t tell me not to say it” but then that
results in something else which is, which is, ok you know somebody
(unintelligible) will never say anything because they can’t be trusted to
exercise professional discretion in terms of what they heard.
Note: This sounds a
lot like a secret “code of silence.”
And
sometimes people just rant sometimes people just gotta
get something off their chest and once it’s done it’s done.
Note: Dalecki seems to
be saying that Deb Rice’s false rumors are ok while he is “correcting” a
student who told the truth to one person.
That
doesn’t mean it has to be passed on to anybody in
particular and end up when you do those sorts of things deciding to cast your
lot in with one side or another when in fact (unintelligible) the side you should cast your lot in with
is the person who is paying you.
Note: Wow. Dr. Dalecki flat out said that loyalty is due
only to “the person who is paying you.”
He seems to be saying that lying for your boss is ok. He seems to be saying that any truth that
embarrasses your boss is to be kept quiet no matter who is harmed by the
cover-up. This statement speaks to the
culture of UW Platteville’s administration.
Jacobus: yea. or just out of the lot altogether
Dalecki: Yea. (unintelligible) Well,
Jacobus: (laugh) yep so
Dalecki: so, that’s what I wanted to to, chat with you about. But, When
you get a chance I mean she might not want to talk to you I don’t know. Go talk to Deb and see what she has to say about it so,
Note: Again, Dalecki
encourages the student to apologize to the person who spreads false rumors.
Jacobus: ok
Dalecki: um so, that’s all I had.
Jacobus: Ok, yea, it was actually, I don’t want to depart too far off the subject but there was a, I read somewhere about the emails that go from somebody lower to somebody higher and that the lower individual is usually, typically, when they feel unconfident about the position, will use “I” and “me” more than anything else, to a superior.
Dalecki: Well, that may be true of emails but I’m talking about in general.
Jacobus: yea, no, I just thought, that was something I came across probably six months ago. I thought huh, that’s interesting so to have you bring it up again um gives it another context.
Dalecki:
(unintelligible) The people who I like are the “we” and the “us”
people. The “I” and “me” people, in my
experience, are, tend to be less uh focused on mission and I’ve had enough
experience with people to say that’s the way to bet. It’s not an absolute, nothing’s an absolute.
but There’s another
element too, which is (unintelligible) that if everybody felt compelled, say,
to write an email to the Provost you’d never get anything done. Most problems could be solved at the local
level all people need to do is simply talk about it and (unintelligible). Some people have a propensity to do
everything by email, which is a huge time suck as well. The nuances of personal face to face
communication are lost. The ability to
ask clarifications are lost. 99% of
problems can be solved quickly and easily simply by people who will trust each
other and engage in a collegial relationship with each other.
Note: This reminds me
of a movie scene I saw a long time ago (Trustinme).
Those who tend not to do that tend to have
more difficulties and that’s also something that’s true. So, being a colleague means focusing on the
mission and helping everybody with their job and I’ve been in collegial
departments where it’s almost a delight to be there, because you know people
have your back. And I’ve been in
departments where you didn’t turn your back because you didn’t know who was going
to plunge a knife into it.
Note: Dr. Dalecki
seems to be saying that Dr. Burton has not been “collegial” because she has not
trusted the people who routinely plunge knives into her back.
Jacobus:
oh yea.
Dalecki: and it’s much more fun to be in the former
than the latter. And one thing we don’t
want to do in this department is contribute to any propensity for people to do
that. And this department’s had issues, I’m not here
because it’s an accident. The Dean
didn’t just suddenly say “oh boy let’s change chairs.” Anybody who’se got
enough experience in either politics or academia or anything else knows that
those things don’t just happen.
Note: Dalecki seems to
be saying that there is severe dysfunction in the Criminal Justice
department. He is not wrong.
Jacobus: yea, I think we know.
Dalecki: and I didn’t go looking for this job she came
and asked me. So, I have theories as to
why she might have thought I was suitable for the position.
Note: What are Dr. Dalecki’s theories as to why he was asked to be Interim
Chair of the CJ department? Those
theories might shed light on issues.
That’s up to her whether it would be
consistent with what she really did, I don’t
know. But um, be careful in terms of
where you affix, um, loyalties. It’s
fine to be loyal, its another thing to be
(unintelligible sounds like “blindly”) loyal.
And um the one thing you don’t want to do is end up with difficulties so
if I were you I would try to steer a course down the middle as much as you can. And, uh, that’s the best advice you can
probably give anybody.
Jacobus:
yea I think so
Dalecki:
So, hopefully you’ll take that the right way
Jacobus:
(chuckle)
Note: The graduate
student seems to have chuckled because of the obvious irony in Dr. Dalecki’s last statement.
Dalecki: and uh recognize that maybe you made a
mistake, so
Jacobus:
hm
Note: The graduate’s
response seems to indicate that he did not believe he made a mistake.
Dalecki:
You know what we do with mistakes? – (Dr.
Dalecki points to a sign on his wall that reads, “Mistakes: 1) Own them, 2) Fix
them, 3) Learn from them”. This was done in a manner that clearly demonstrated
he wanted me to recite them out-loud from off the sign.)
Jacobus: (reading
from the aforementioned sign Jacobus recited:) Own em,
Fix em, Learn em
Dalecki: Then learn!
Jacobus:
Alright.
Dalecki:
ok.
Jacobus:
alright.
End of Audio
Note: Soon after this
meeting the graduate student was fired from his position.
Another version of this audio can be found at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIfsQXNzvKU This is a video with the transcript onscreen.