Hey guys,

Okay I am still on a PC hiatus for the most part but I wanted to come back and ask the opinion of people here and what you would do if you were in my situation.

I was on another site, just perusing information about psychology doctoral programs, when I saw a thread about why a certain university has a bad reputation. I clicked on it and one of the posts on this thread had my T's name on it because she is a professor at this university as well as a T. I found out from this post that she, along with other professors at this university, is getting sued for mistreating a student!

I googled this lawsuit and found out that she was involved in punishing a student unfairly. I read that this student reported to a professor that one of her practicum sites had been engaging in unlawful behavior (photocopying measures illegally). She was really just asking the professor what she should do. They told her to keep just photocopying the measures. Then she brought it up again to this professor because she really wasn't sure it was legal (and she also wanted to tell the professor about some other shady things happening at this site). And THEN the professor reported her to the disciplinary board of the program FOR PHOTOCOPYING THE MEASURES that the professor had TOLD her she could photocopy!

I found out my T was the CHAIR of the disciplinary board who issued a severe reprimand to this student and that my T in particular recommended that this student seek out psychotherapy (and, inappropriately, announced the exact issues this student should address in therapy). IN ADDITION, I found out that my T later failed this student in a class unfairly, after this all took place. Something really fishy? This student's records in my T's class were whited out and replaced with bad scores. ??? There were other accusations against my T listed in the lawsuit that I read, like telling this student she was required to do certain things that weren't required of other students, generally being flaky and unavailable to this student, etc. Apparently this student later got expelled from the university.

Now, I don't know the outcome of this lawsuit -- the law proceedings are ongoing right now apparently -- but I do know that I am really troubled by reading this information about my T. So far, I have liked this T. But now.. to what extent can I really trust her? What parts of this story am I missing? Was my T really unethical like this? Or was this student problematic in other ways not mentioned in the lawsuit? Could any of these allegations be true?? I know that my T is only teaching classes at this university now and is no longer in an administrative role on the disciplinary board. Did she step down or was she demoted? Did this happen because the accusations are true?

I don't know what to do. I'm not sure how to bring it up to my T. It's not really my business, is it? But I'm worried it will affect how much I am willing to open up and trust this T now. These are pretty serious allegations against my T. Should I ask? How should I ask? Is it really my place? What if she refuses to talk about it?

I'm just not sure what behavior is appropriate in this case. Any help will be SO much appreciated.