The individual responsible for inflating UC Davis forcible sexual offense statistics may be facing criminal charges for funneling university money into her private bank account.
Jennifer Beeman, the former director of the Campus Violence Prevention Program, told a co-worker that the money intended for the annual CVPP program, Women Take Back the Night, may have been used to pay her home mortgage.
UC Davis Police announced in October of last year that Beeman greatly altered forcible sexual assault numbers. Police also announced that Beeman had overstated her travel expenses. Although she repaid the $1,372 to the university, further investigations raised suspicions of Beeman’s financial dealings.
Beeman declined The Aggie’s request to comment on the investigations.
UC Davis Police Sgt. Paul Henoch filed a statement with the Yolo Superior Court last week that summarized police suspicions. In the statement, police requested a search warrant for Beeman’s banking account.
Auditors found that of the approximately $12,000 deposited into the account for Take Back the Night, Beeman had withdrawn $5,400 for personal use, according to Henoch’s statement.
Police also became suspicious of the auditors’ finding that Beeman had paid a woman named Granate Sosnoff roughly $540,000 to develop an anti-violence guide that was never completed. UC Davis Police Captain Joyce Souza said police had filed an affidavit to obtain search warrants for financial data between Beeman and Sosnoff.
Police are still waiting for the search warrant, Souza said.
“[When we get the search warrant,] we’ll be looking through a large amount of paper, records and data to filter through to try and find the main information we’re looking for,” Souza said. “The university is handling the situation in a very judicially careful way.”
Organizers of Women Take Back the Night, an annual event protesting violence against women, say that they are unsure whether the event will occur this year. They must first hire a staff member to help with their efforts. Former staff member Shauna Stratton retired from the position.
Take Back the Night is organized by Students Against Sexual Violence. President of SASV Aimee Carlisle declined to comment on the investigations and the account Beeman may have used to pay her mortgage.
LAUREN STEUSSY can be reached at campus@theaggie.org.
