Swat Leads to Discrimination Complaint Against Professor : Education: Black student says he felt humiliated. Instructor downplays what he calls a test of wills over a failing grade.

An African American Cal State Fullerton student said Thursday that he is filing a discrimination claim against a political science professor who struck him on his bare behind with a ruler as punishment for dropping a class.

Keary Johns, 23, said he was desperate to keep a failing grade off his record so he could graduate this month when he agreed to drop his sweat pants before Prof. Emeritus Julian Foster.

Johns said that he broke away in tears after the first blow, and said the professor later tried to downplay the incident by remarking that black fraternity members go through much worse--even branding each other--during hazing.

“There’s no way he would have done that to a white student,” Johns said. “When he hit me, he stripped me of my manhood. It hurt.”

Foster said Thursday that he “lightly swatted” Johns once with a ruler on April 27, but Foster said the incident started out as a joke and has since been blown out of proportion. Foster, who is white, insists that race played no role.

“I wish to God I had never done it,” Foster said, “His being black had nothing to do with it.”

Foster, who had been on the school’s faculty since 1963, also said he made the comment about black fraternity members, but insisted that it is being taken out of context.

The professor recently offered through his attorney to apologize and pay Johns $500 if the student dropped his complaints. The offer was refused.

Johns and Santa Ana civil rights attorney Ron Talmo said they will file a claim today against the professor and the university, alleging discrimination and assault and battery, and seeking $1 million in damages. The claim is a precursor to a lawsuit, and is the first step in legal action against the school.

An attorney for the university could not be reached for comment Thursday. Sandra Sutphen, chairwoman of the political science and criminal justice division at Cal State Fullerton, said she could not discuss the student’s allegations because she was unaware of the complaint.

The incident took place just as the nation’s attention was turned to Singapore, where an American teen-ager was awaiting a lashing with a rattan cane for a vandalizing spree.

Talmo and Johns are also involved in other legal action against the university. The lawyer is representing Johns and other students in a lawsuit alleging the university unfairly stripped him and other football players of financial aid they were entitled to after the school dropped its football program at the end of the 1992 season.

Both sides said the dispute between Johns and his professor began in early April, when Johns went to see Foster about dropping a political science class. Johns said when he returned two weeks later, Foster told him he must be punished for his actions and offered two choices: Six whacks with a long ruler or a class failure.

The student said Foster ordered him to pull down his sweat pants and brace himself over a chair.

“I still couldn’t believe he was going to go through with it, but then he smacked me, hard,” Johns said. “But I couldn’t take it. I felt so humiliated. I stood up and said ‘Go ahead, fail me.’ I started to cry and he sat me down, trying to calm me down. And then I left.”

Johns said he had submitted to the punishment because his grade-point average was already hovering near failure, and an incomplete grade in Foster’s class would jeopardize his chances to graduate on time. Foster ultimately allowed Johns to drop the class without being penalized.

“I was in a bind. I needed to graduate,” said Johns, who said he fled the room after the first blow because the humiliation of bending over a chair, with his bottom exposed to the professor, became too much.

Foster, however, said Johns first asked him for a grade of D, even though Johns never attended class.

Foster, 67, said he planned to allow Johns to drop the class, but first lectured the student that he needed to “begin behaving like a responsible adult, instead of some child who needed a swatting when he broke the rules.”

The student then began laughing and said he would take a whacking if it meant he could drop the class without consequence, Foster said. The two then began trying to “outbluff” each other, he said.

“I said it at first to get through to him, to let him know he was acting childishly,” Foster said. “I wanted him to say “I’m sorry” and apologize for his behavior.”

Instead, Foster said, Johns astonished him by partially pulling down his sweat pants.

“When I flicked him with the ruler, I was kind of saying, “Get out of here, you won,” Foster said, adding that the blow was very light.

“But his demeanor changed immediately. He began saying ‘You hurt my pride.’ And I told him I never intended to do that.”

Johns left and talked to his African American studies professor and later returned to confront Foster.

“That’s when he tried to laugh it off,” Johns said.

“He said ‘You know, It’s my understanding that black fraternity members do much worse to each other, they even brand each other, I hear,’ ” said Johns, who does not belong to a fraternity. “Then he said, ‘I’m sorry you couldn’t handle it.’ ”

Both say that Foster then signed the documentation Johns needed to drop the class.

Johns participated in graduation ceremonies last week, but still must take a math class this summer to complete his undergraduate studies.

Attorney Frederick T. Mason, who represents Foster, said his client did a “foolish” thing but never intended to harm or insult the young man.

“Dr. Foster made a mistake, but it’s being blown out of proportion,” Mason said. “The young man consented. It was not racially motivated.”

He said that his client had agreed to pay Johns $500 to make the complaint “go away,” not because it had merit.

The student’s father, Walter Johns, said Thursday he was shocked to learn his son was struck by a professor.

“This was an abuse of power,” said Walter Johns, who lives in Lancaster. “If I had another son, I wouldn’t want to send him there. To do that to a grown man is just degrading.”

’ I was in a bind. I needed to graduate. ‘

Keary Johns, CSUF student