Synopsis/Details
DETAILS
Based on real events, EDUCATED GUESS tells the story of an immigrant student held in a makeshift basement jail and the
conflicted professor who risks his career to defend him. The setting is the fictional Adams College, a highly regarded
private college known for wealth, exclusivity, excessive fraternity parties, and ham-fisted attempts to reconcile with
its bigoted and self-serving past. This is a legal drama with no clear laws, an investigative procedural with no formal procedures, and a courtroom thriller with no court. Instead of detectives, we have a power-hungry campus safety officer with unclear authority. Instead of prosecutors, we have self-righteous, careerist administrators. Instead of attorneys, we have a hesitant professor with a checkered past. And instead of a defendant, we have a student stripped of his civil rights in a legal gray area.
SYNOPSIS
The Deans receive an anonymous allegation of domestic violence perpetrated by an international student, Seewoo. His
girlfriend, Vera, denies the charge outright. But former Sheriff’s Deputy, Ronnie, has been brought in by the school
to clean up their historically callous mishandling of such matters.
Under pressure from the Donors and President to avoid seeming too lenient, the Deans want Seewoo off campus while the investigation proceeds. But he refuses to leave the country. Lacking alternatives, they allow the aggressive Ronnie to confine him to a guarded basement room while she interrogates, leaving Vera cut off and in the dark. Roh, a student-turned-dean, objects to the confinement but finds her power limited. She seeks out Norm, her old professor and Seewoo’s former advisor, for help. Norm is hesitant. But after seeing Seewoo’s condition in the basement and speaking with his own incarcerated brother, he changes heart and negotiates for custody, bringing him to stay in his house.
In the first hearing, Vera’s statement acquits Seewoo. But the school can’t accept what they consider a humiliating failure and a potential threat to student safety – invoking a newly designed proceeding that extends the investigation. Norm is furious. But the Deans and their legal counsel use veiled threats and bureaucratic trickery to neutralize his interference. At Norm’s house, he helps Seewoo process the inanities of American justice, and while doing so, rediscovers mistakes from his own past. Roh, still uncomfortable with the proceedings, learns she must play ball to keep her job. And Vera – enraged at the school’s dismissal of her claims – attempts to circumvent the process and discover the true source of the allegations.
The day of the hearing, Norm is pulled over under dubious circumstances. Meanwhile, Vera finds an exonerating eyewitness and steps in for Norm with a lacerating defense. She rebukes Ronnie and the deans for their prejudiced handling of the case. But Ronnie nimbly discredits the witness, and an exhausted panel expels Seewoo. Roh and Norm, careers on the line, both reach dead ends. And when Vera finally learns the source of the allegation and duplicity of her purported ally, it’s too late.
