One thing that has bothered me about this Chief Rodney Monroe thing is the anonymous tipster element. I always wonder about the motivations in those situations.
It has been reported that the tipster used the name “Harry Potter” when making the claim via email that Chief Monroe was not properly awarded a degree from VCU. Now we have some curious timing as well. On May 22nd VCU announced it was investigating a claim that it improperly awarded a BA. On the following day, Linda Spinelli, the program coordinator for the Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies at VCU retired from that position. The BIS program is the program under which Chief Monroe received his degree in May 2007. Spinelli had been in charge of it since September 2004.
VCU is a big place and coincidences do happen. But anyone looking to get to the bottom of this matter would seem to need to get Ms. Spinelli on the phone and determine her role — if any — in the current investigation.
