Gina Grant
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Gina Grant (b. 1976) is an American woman who gained notoriety for receiving early admission to Harvard University, only to have it rescinded when it became known that she had killed her mother and had omitted this fact from her college application.
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[edit] 1990 Killing and Aftermath
Because Grant was a juvenile when the crime occurred, the criminal records are sealed. However, the Lexington Count sheriff, James Mett, who handled the original case released Grant's name immediately after her arrest. Thus, the facts of the case are available in copious newspaper and magazine articles published in the early 1990s.
On September 13, 1990, in Lexington, South Carolina, when Grant was 14, she bludgeoned her mother 13 times with a lead candlestick, crushing her skull. She wiped up pools of blood from the kitchen floor and hid the candlestick and bloody rags in a closet. She and her then-boyfriend tried to make the death look like suicide by sticking a carving knife into the side of Grant's mother's neck, and wrapping her fingers around the handle.
Grant changed her story several times. Initially, Grant told police that her mother attacked her while holding a knife and then stabbed herself in the throat. When the candlestick was discovered, Grant changed her story, first to say that her boyfriend had done the killing and then to say that she had committed the killing in self-defense. Grant was charged with murder.
In mitigation, evidence suggested that Grant's mother was an alcoholic (she had a blood alcohol level of .30 when she died), and Grant claimed she had been physically abusive. Grant pled guilty to voluntary manslaugher and was sentenced to a year in juvenile detention, with probation until age 18. Her boyfriend pleaded no contest to being an accessory to voluntary manslaughter after the fact.
Grant was given permission by the juvenile court to relocate to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to live with a paternal aunt and uncle. She began attending Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School in 1992, where she excelled academically, tutored underprivileged children, and was co-captain of the tennis team.
[edit] Admissions rescission
Grant's crime became the subject of national headlines when, in January 1995, she was given early admission to Harvard University. Ironically, Grant had used the death of her parents (Grant's father died of cancer when she was 11) as a 'hook' in her Harvard application. Grant reportedly told the Harvard interviewer that her mother had died in an accident; on the application, when asked if she had ever been convicted of a crime, Grant checked "no." Her lawyer later argued that educational institutions are forbidden by Massachuesetts state law to ask about criminal matters that do not result in "convictions". Juveniles found guilty are "adjudicated delinquent" rather than "convicted."
After Grant was featured in a Boston Globe Sunday Magazine article about underprivileged students who succeeded despite their circumstances, an anonymous party faxed Harvard copies of old news articles about the murder. The next day, Harvard rescinded Grant's admission; though the college did not comment on the specific reasons for rescission, it claimed the right to rescind admission if a student "engages in behavior that brings into question honesty, maturity or moral character."
Some campus publications and newspapers sided with Grant, citing the Grant's mother's alcoholism and Grant's allegations of physical abuse. Grant's attorney stated that Grant was not obligated to disclose an event that occurred when she was a juvenile and which was sealed upon turning 18. Some in the press, including editorials in The New York Times[1][2] and the Chicago Tribune[3], criticized Harvard for being unforgiving in rescinding its offer. Grant herself made no appearances, other than issuing a brief statement: "I deal with this tragedy every day on a personal level. It serves no good purpose for anyone else to dredge up the pain of my childhood. In addition, I have no wish to defame my mother's memory by detailing any abuse."[1]
Ultimately, Grant attended Tufts University and graduated in 1999. She has never spoken publicly about the 1990 murder or her Harvard rescission.
[edit] See also
- Blair Hornstine -- Student whose Harvard admission was rescinded after it was revealed that she plagiarized articles for a newspaper.
- Kaavya Viswanathan -- Harvard student accused of plagiarizing passages in her novel.
[edit] References
[edit] Sources
- "Harvard reverses admission offer", Anne Thompson, Yale Daily News, April 10, 1995.
- "Teenage Rampage", Mary Ellen Mark, Sunday Times magazine, August 27, 1995.
"Rejecting Gina", Jane Mayer The New Yorker'', June 5, 1995
