DENVER — The essay that thrust University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill into the center of national debate is protected under the Constitution, interim Chancellor Phil DiStefano announced Thursday.

But allegations of fraud — including claims that Churchill fabricated history, plagiarized work and misrepresented himself as an American Indian — will go before a faculty committee charged with a thorough investigation.

"We have concluded that the allegations of research misconduct, related to plagiarism, misuse of other's work and fabrication, have sufficient merit to warrant further inquiry," said DiStefano, head of a three-member panel that issued its report Thursday after seven weeks of investigating the controversial professor.

CU's Standing Committee on Research Misconduct will investigate the allegations and "inquire into whether professor Churchill committed research misconduct by misrepresenting himself as an American Indian to gain credibility and authority for his work," DiStefano said.

The committee could take as long as seven months to complete its work. The chancellor will then decide whether to begin dismissal proceedings, which could involve another lengthy faculty review.

The examination began Feb. 3 after a national controversy erupted over an essay Churchill wrote Sept. 11, 2001, that appears to sympathize with the World Trade Center attackers. The essay compared the center's victims to notorious Nazi technocrat Adolf Eichmann for their role in driving foreign policy that Churchill said killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children.

Churchill has said his political speech is protected not only by the First Amendment but also the school's academic freedom rules. He has also denied accusations of fraud and plagiarism.

Gov. Bill Owens said Thursday that he thinks Churchill should be fired but that the committee referral "demonstrates that the university is taking the allegations seriously."

Churchill could not be reached for comment Thursday. He is scheduled to speak in San Francisco today.

Protected speech

DiStefano's panel studied the Sept. 11 essay and more than 100 other writings, speeches and recordings. In its 12-page report, the group said Churchill did not advocate "imminent and concrete violence."

The panel said Churchill's speech is protected under the Constitution, including the following remarks:

A 2004 interview in Satya magazine, when Churchill said: "I don't want other people in charge of the apparatus of the state as the outcome of a socially transformative process that replicates oppression. I want the state gone: transform the situation to U.S. out of North America. U.S. off the planet. Out of existence altogether."

A 2001 essay in which Churchill wrote: "Those committed to achieving fundamental change rather than cosmetic tweakings of the existing system are thus left with no viable alternative but to include the realities of state violence as an integral part of our political calculus."

A Feb. 12, 2005, segment on "At Large w/ Geraldo Rivera," when Churchill said: "I've even had people argue that those in the Pentagon were innocent bystanders, as well. I mean, my God, if you can't hit the Pentagon, what can you hit?" and, "but as it stands, it was absolutely necessary, and it was absolutely empowering, even if they get beat, that they actually drew blood where it counted."

A talk in Seattle in 2003, when a man asked Churchill how to "move so they don't see us coming." Churchill responded: "You carry the weapon, that's how they don't see it coming. ... You don't send the Black Liberation Army into Wall Street to conduct an action; you don't send the American Indian Movement into downtown Seattle to conduct an action. Who do you send? You, with your beard shaved, your hair cut close and wearing a banker's suit."

Ethnicity investigation

Churchill, a 14-year ethnic studies professor and longtime author on American Indian issues, has asserted his Indian ethnicity in books, CU applications and his curriculum vitae. He holds an associate membership to a tribe that did not require proof of ancestry.

Leaders in the national American Indian Movement have disputed his ancestry for years. Churchill — backed by noted activist Russell Means and others — has said he shouldn't have to prove his blood line like a dog or a horse.

In its report, the panel cited "serious doubt about his Indian identity."

After Indian leaders complained in 1994 that Churchill lied about his heritage to get a tenured professorship, school officials determined that "university policy permitted self-identification."

Now the misconduct committee will be asked to look at whether Churchill has "attempted to gain a scholarly voice, credibility, and an audience for his scholarship by wrongfully asserting that he is an Indian."

Academic allegations

The report reviewed academic fraud claims made by John LaVelle, a law professor at the University of New Mexico; Thomas Brown, an assistant sociology professor at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas; and professor Fay Cohen of Dalhousie University in Canada.

Cohen has alleged that Churchill plagiarized her work in a 1992 book of essays, but Churchill said he was only a "copy editor" for the book and did not write the piece in question.

LaVelle says, in part, that Churchill has misrepresented an 1887 federal law as requiring proof of blood lines for tribal membership.

Brown alleges that Churchill misrepresented prior research to back up his theory that the U.S. Army deliberately distributed smallpox-infested blankets to Indians in 1837.

Churchill has said his research is sound.

The panel's report said the committee should investigate whether Churchill engaged in research misconduct and, if so, it should "make recommendations regarding possible disciplinary action ranging from warning to dismissal."

Contact Camera Staff Writer Elizabeth Mattern Clark at (303) 473-1351 or clarke@dailycamera.com.