Liberty U. Professor Charged with Sexual Assault (of Student) and Kidnapping

Liberty University has yet another scandal to deal with… and, once again, a student’s life was at risk.

Professor William Atwell, who taught American Sign Language at the fundamentalist Christian school, was recently arrested on separate charges of sexual battery and kidnapping.

According to the Roys Report, there’s a discrepancy about when the incidents occurred. Court records say the assault happened on September 15 while the alleged kidnapping happened on November 19. Jail records say both incidents happened on September 15. Either way, he wasn’t arrested by campus police until November 20.

It’s not clear why that two-month gap existed when something happened in September, but he was in the classroom that entire period, as one student noted:

Liberty put out a statement saying they take seriously the allegations of “inappropriate sexual contact with one of our students,” but they’re not addressing the glaring holes in process here other than to say Atwell has been suspended pending the outcome of the case.

Given all the other lawsuits the school is facing right now from women who claim the school looked the other way when they were sexually assaulted, you’d have to be a pretty awful parent to ignore all these reports and send your daughter to this school anyway. But religious dogmatism is a hell of a drug.