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USF Dean Faced Firing Had He Not Resigned

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By ADAM EMERSON | The Tampa Tribune

Published: March 20, 2009

Updated: 03/20/2009 03:57 pm

TAMPA - Had Abdul Rao not resigned from the University of South Florida, the university would have fired him due to his "lack of judgment" in taking a student's bicycle, according to a report released today.

"Even interviewees expressing respect for Dr. Rao indicated that they had difficulty coming to terms with the actions they had witnessed," noted USF investigators in an internal review of the incident.

"There is no question that Dr. Rao's ability to serve as a senior administrator would have been substantially compromised for some time by this incident."

The comments serve as the strongest indictment yet by USF, which cut ties with Rao after a surveillance video of the bike theft attracted widespread attention on YouTube.

Rao and man he described as his handyman were caught on a security camera removing the bike from a loading dock at the Byrd Alzheimer's Center. Rao said he thought the bike was abandoned and he wanted to lend it to his handyman. The bike's owner said it was locked and that Rao was caught stealing it.

Rao, a senior associate vice president with USF Health, resigned in February, agreeing to give up his $384,000 contract in exchange for a $50,000 settlement. Days later, he rescinded his resignation, saying he had not been given enough time to think through such a serious decision.

But the university would not reconsider the resignation.

Expecting litigation, administrators conducted an investigation anyway. They interviewed Timothy Boyd, the bike's owner and doctoral student at the Byrd Alzheimer's Center, as well as his mentor, Huntington Potter, a scientist at the Byrd Center.

The report shows that Rao, aware of Boyd's anger, urged Potter to talk his student into withdrawing his complaint with the police. Potter said that "his advice to Mr. Boyd was to be honest," according to the report.

Administrators also said that Boyd should not have received a copy of the security video without following the university's public records policies. Boyd got the video by downloading it onto a portable flash drive, according to a report, but the student says he didn't post it on YouTube.

University police turned their investigation into the theft over to the state attorney's office for review. No decision on charges has been made.

Rao declined to be interviewed by university investigators.

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