[ad_1]
A week after Joichi Ito, the director of the MIT Media Lab, apologized for his ties to Jeffrey Epstein, a financial financier in New York, the president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology announced that the university would investigate his relations with Mr Epstein.
In an e-mail sent Thursday to the President, L. Rafael Reif, told the University that his university had received about $ 800,000 in donations from Epstein over a 20-year period. The money went to the Media Lab, an elite research center led by Dr. Ito, as well as to a member of the M.I.T. faculty group, physicist Seth Lloyd. Mr. Ito also sits on the board of the New York Times Company.
Mr. Epstein was detained at the Metropolitan Correctional Center before committing suicide on August 10. He had long been accused of sexually assaulting girls. In 2008, he pleaded guilty in Florida to making charges of soliciting prostitution from a minor.
Acknowledging an "error in judgment," said Reif, "in hindsight, we acknowledge with shame and distress that we have allowed MIT to help raise its reputation, which has diverted its attention from his horrible acts. "
The fact-finding mission announced by Mr. Reif will be supervised by the school's provost, Martin A. Schmidt, an electrical engineer who has been a faculty member for more than three decades. A spokesman for Mr. I. refused to comment further.
Mr. Lloyd added that articles on Mr. Epstein published in The Miami Herald over the last year, in which several women said that Mr. Epstein had sexually assaulted them, "opened my eyes".
Between 2008 and 2016, Mr. Epstein was a source of funding for his projects described in 19 articles, acknowledged Mr. Lloyd, all published except one after Mr. Epstein pleaded guilty, according to an analysis. by Robert Rutledge, Associate Professor at McGill University.
"I helped Mr. Epstein protect his reputation and I deprived his victims," Lloyd wrote in his message.
The Media Lab found itself in crisis. Two scholars working there have announced that they will drop Epstein's revelations. Some students have asked the director of the multimedia laboratory, Mr. Ito, a venture capitalist and a qualified fundraiser to leave the company in 2011.
Ito disclosed the donations – but not their amount – in an apology published on the Media Lab's website on August 15. In the statement, he revealed that he had taken Mr. Epstein's investments for the lab and for his own investment funds. . He also stated that he spent time in Mr. Epstein's residences.
Mr. Ito, who is also a professor at the school, said on the excuse that he had met Mr. Epstein in 2013, years after his release. He did not respond to requests for additional comments.
On Thursday, Mr. Reif described "the essential facts, to the best of our ability," with MIT receiving approximately $ 800,000 from Mr. Epstein's foundations, either at the Media Lab or Mr. Lloyd, who met with Mr. Epstein. at least as early as a 2004 dinner in Monterey, California.
Although Mr Ito and Mr Lloyd made a public apology, Mr Reif said in his e-mail: "I think the situation also requires a broader and deeper institutional response".
[ad_2]
Source link