The Finnish astronomers were released in the harassment demonstration case | Science
Speaking out against harassment is in the public interest and should be encouraged and not punished, a Finnish court said today. This message was part of the rejection decision criminal charges against two astronomers who had objected to the hiring of a US scientist who had committed gender-based harassment in a previous academic position.
“I hope that this case will become a precedent,” says Syksy Räsänen from the University of Helsinki, one of the accused.
Räsänen and Till Sawala, also from the University of Helsinki, were involved in the campaign, the aim of which was to overturn the decision made by the University of Turku almost 5 years ago to hire astrophysicist Christian Ott as a postdoc. Before that, Ott had been a faculty member at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), when the university determined in 2015 that he had molested two graduate students. The case received extensive media attention.
Ott resigned from Caltech in August 2017 and in January 2018 signed a 2-year employment contract at the Tuorla Observatory in Turku. The news of his appointment sparked widespread protests in Finland and beyond, including a letter organized by Räsänen and Sawala to Turku’s senior administrators, urging him not to be hired. A week later, Turku terminated the contract.
Ott then sued Turku for breach of contract and eventually received more than $150,000 in damages from Turku and Stockholm University, which in December 2017 had agreed to take him on as a postdoc before withdrawing the offer. In October 2018, Ott filed a criminal complaint against Räsäse and Sawala in Finland, which led to a police investigation.
Last year, prosecutors charged Räsänen and Sawala with “gross defamation” and “gross dissemination of offensive information [Ott’s] privacy.” Today’s verdict came after a 4-day trial at the Turku district court last summer.
The 25-page ruling largely supports what the scientists did in trying to block the hiring. The defendants succeeded in “systematically bringing information about harassment and discrimination … to the attention of a large number of people,” the judges wrote (translated by a lawyer for one of the defendants). “This is not prohibited, let alone a crime. On the contrary, this can be considered a matter of public interest [that] you have to be able to talk openly.”
Räsänen and Sawala say they are “relieved” by the acquittal and believe the judges are sending a broader message to the scientific community. “No one should have to fear fines or imprisonment for simply speaking out against harassment based on widely and reliably reported facts,” says Räsänen.
“It’s been a very long and arduous process,” Sawala adds. “Going forward, we really need to focus on the effects of harassment and how to prevent it, not the rights and privileges of the person who harassed students.”
Ott declined to comment, saying he first had to “review and analyze” the judge’s decision once the English version was available.
In their decision, the two district judges stated that Räsänen had misused the word “sexual harassment” in three social media posts that described Caltech’s finding against Ott. But the mistake was not defamation, they said, because there was no malicious intent and because Räsänen stopped using the phrase, which appeared in several news stories, after learning it was incorrect.
“There were good reasons to consider that [those reports] to be truthful and trust the news in question,” the judges decided. As a result, the judges noted that “defendants have not intentionally presented any misrepresentation or innuendo” about Ott.
In dismissing the charges, the judges also rejected Ott’s demand that the defendants pay him compensation for the alleged loss of income and suffering caused by the alleged negative publicity. Otti’s request to have all the accused’s writings on the matter deleted was also rejected. Exoneration also means that the state pays the court costs of the accused.