Talking Truth with Jordan Holm

It’s not every day that I have lunch with someone who was recently released from prison. Last week, I met up with Minnesota native Jordan Holm, who I first introduced here in “Was Justice Really Served?,” which has been the most-read post in this blog’s short history. When I wrote that piece, the information was mostly collected from FreeJordan.org, so I was thrilled to talk to Jordan in person.

We met at the Uptown Cafeteria and Support Group in South Minneapolis, a kitschy new diner with a long menu of comfort food. I hadn’t seen Jordan since he was in high school, and he just celebrated his 29^th birthday this month—the first he’s been able to spend with his family and friends since going to prison in 2003. He is a modest, thoughtful young man, and with distinctive brown curls, caring eyes, and a warm smile, he is rather good-looking, too. Oh, and talented. He is currently ranked fourth in the U.S. in Greco-Roman wrestling at 84kg (185 lbs).

Since Jordan has maintained his innocence since the beginning, I wanted to know more about his decision to keep relatively quiet. When he was first accused of sexual assault back in 2002, he found the allegations so ridiculous that he just assumed things would get straightened out quickly. On the night of the alleged assault, nobody believed the accuser. Her boyfriend—who was in bed with her when she said the assault happened—called her terrible names, and everyone else who was at the college party thought she was acting crazy, too. “I just felt horrible for her,” Jordan said, “You know, why is she doing this?”

Because Jordan was a scholarship athlete at the University of Northern Iowa, the athletic department quickly got involved. The morning after the incident, Jordan and the few teammates who had been with him at the party in Iowa City were told not to tell anyone. Jordan was given clear instructions not to speak to the police, who wanted to question him that morning, until athletic department staff could hook him up with an attorney. Speaking to the media was also out of the question.

When he went down to the police station after the meeting, he was told that he’d be free to go to breakfast with his friends shortly, but he ended up being held in jail overnight since he wouldn’t talk. He called his mom from the station and told her everything, so the police heard most of his story anyway. When he first met with his attorney, Jordan told him that anyone he knew would vouch for his character and agree that the allegations were ludicrous. He was told not to worry about the case and to focus on school and wrestling.

For the first few months, he operated under the assumption that the truth would come out, so he willingly followed the advice of the athletic department and his attorney to keep quiet. However, as he started to become frustrated with the process, he wondered whether it wouldn’t be better to speak out. “I was saying, ‘I want to shout it from the rooftops,’” he said, “‘This isn’t right!’” Tired of waiting quietly, he decided to run for student body president.

As his legal case went on, members of the athletic department staff became increasing paranoid that the story would leak, so at the prompting of his coach and his attorney, he was told to stop his campaign. At the time, it looked like Jordan might win, but not even his running mate—one of his best friends—knew about the charges he faced.

Why such paranoia about media coverage? At the time, Iowa City was—as Jordan’s attorney put it—“out for blood” after a University of Iowa basketball star, Pierre Pierce, got off on sexual assault charges with only probation, counseling, and community service. After Pierce was allowed to return to the team, protests were regularly held at Hawkeye games. “People were yelling ‘No means no’ at the games,” Jordan explained.

Public opinion of student-athletes wasn’t exactly high, but at times, Jordan considered calling the media himself. Nobody was jumping up to defend him publicly since everyone who knew about it had been told to be quiet. “I was sick of letting a crazy accusation dictate my life,” he said.

Jordan’s trial took only about six hours total over the course of three days during the summer of 2003. On the day that he was convicted, he had just started his fourth year of college. “I had a quiz in Humanities that afternoon,” he remembered. He was a serious student who was scheduled to take the MCAT that spring, and he planned to make it for the quiz after what he assumed would be a verdict of “not guilty.” When thinking about that day, he grew quiet. “They say that your memories are tied to emotions,” he reflected, “Like your first kiss—you remember that, but you don’t remember your tenth kiss, right?”

*****

Continued in “Talking Truth with Jordan Holm, Part 2.”

Have you ever had to keep quiet about something you felt passionate about?
What’s your take on how this was handled?

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