Ex-Medgar Evers College Professor Claims E-Mail Destroyed Her Shot At Tenure
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A former professor says she was denied tenure and fired because of a salacious anonymous e-mail sent to the school.
It alleges, among other things, she had sex with students.
Now, she's asking a court to make Yahoo! reveal who sent that e-mail, reports CBS 2's Pablo Guzman.
"I've never slept with a student. I've never slept with anyone at Medgar Evers College. I have a significant other that I live with," Dr. Zulema Blair said Wednesday.
Blair, 38, was speaking about alleged intimacies, because she says an anonymous e-mail sent to Medgar Evers College torpedoed her chance for tenure.
"It was an e-mail that was sent around, stating that I had slept with a student -- a former student of mine, and I had pretty much given him a grade for it," Blair said.
Attached to the legal claim her lawyer, Michael Borrelli, filed in court, is the e-mail. The following is an excerpt:
"You can't turn a whore into a house-wife, but you can definitely turn one into a Dean....a woman of such arrogance, and ignorance.....Zulema Balir."
The legal filing asks for action against Yahoo!.
"We need that account to stay like it is. Once we get that order, and Yahoo! is prohibited from doing anything to that account, we then ask the court to compel Yahoo! to turn over all information associated with this account," Borrelli said.
At Medgar Evers, Guzman happened to find a student at random who had Dr. Blair as a professor.
"As far as a person goes, as far as the way she helped me, she dealt with me, she sat down, she guided me. That's enough. She's a great person," Kenneth Falk said.
Essentially, that this Yahoo! action is a first legal step, suing the City University of New York could be next.
Sources familiar with the situation said Dr. Blair's tenure problem was not related to an e-mail, but had more to do with requirements at CUNY being changed.
Please offer your thoughts in the comments section below.
