SHELLMAN

Terrorism expert resigns amid sexual harassment investigation

Summer 2008 terrorism workshop to take place at University

By: JUANITA COUSINS

Posted: 3/18/08

An international affairs professor has resigned after a University investigation of sexual harassment complaints against him.

Assistant professor Stephen Shellman told The Red & Black on Monday he tendered his resignation on March 7, but it will not take effect until the end of April. He declined to comment further.

Known for his expertise in terrorism, Shellman also is a faculty associate in the Department of Government at the College of William & Mary. Efforts to reach acting department chair Clay Clemens were unsuccessful Monday.

School of Public and International Affairs Dean Thomas Lauth declined to comment Monday because "the matter is still pending with legal affairs."

Open records manager Mitch Clayton wrote in an e-mail to The Red & Black on March 11 that the documents are exempt from release until the investigation has been concluded.

Shellman co-directs the Summer Workshop on Teaching about Terrorism, an annual short-course which "introduces academics to new and innovative techniques utilized to teach terrorism and provides access to high-level officials working in the intelligence, and [counter terrorism] fields," according to its Web site.

The free workshop is open to college-level faculty and graduate students. Terrorism experts teach the sessions and undergraduate students from the University assist.

In 2007, the short-course was held at the University of Maryland, Morehouse College and Oklahoma University. This year's sessions are schedule to be held at the University of Georgia and the University of Oklahoma in June.

Shellman, a University alumnus who returned as a professor in 2005, directs the Violent Intranational Political Conflict and Terrorism Laboratory. He also is a recipient of the National Science Foundation grant to fund his Project Civil Strife and support a CURO summer fellow, according to a 2006 news release.

According to his University Web page that has been removed, Shellman teaches University courses on terrorism and political violence and focuses his research on forced migration and the effects of disease on national security.

He is a visiting fellow and post-doctoral fellow at the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism & Responses to Terrorism Center of Excellence of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security at the University of Maryland and consults for the United States Institute of Peace.

The professor, a former drummer for the bands World Soul and Glass, has performed in many downtown establishments including DT's, Flanagan's, the Georgia Theatre and the 40 Watt Club.

- Contributing: Kristen Coulter