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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
World
Tim Hanlon

Student wants apology after exam made HIV-positive character with her name kill man

A student claims she has been picked on with her name used in her law exam where a right wing character kills a man, gives another HIV and is thrown out of a window to her death.

Freya Leach, 19, and other second year law students at the University of Sydney were reportedly given an end of semester paper where they had to consider the criminal liability of the fictional people involved.

But Freya believes she was targeted because there is a character in the exam who is a student with her same name Freya.

Ms Leach is believed to be a member of the Conservative club and the Young Liberals and in the test her namesake’s character kills a left-leaning student.

So she feels that she has been picked on for her political views.

The University of Sydney has reportedly said the use of the namesake was complete coincidence (Getty Images)

In the test it describes a character called Daniel who tells a student called Adam to “f*** off you woke p****”.

Then the test, reports news.com.au states: “Unfortunately for Adam, however, he has not realised that a sporty-looking Mercedes car is approaching rapidly from the right. By a total coincidence, the car is driven by Daniel’s friend, Freya.

“(Adam) is clipped by Freya’s car one metre from the centre of the road. He falls, smashes his head on the ground and dies instantly. As Freya speeds away from the scene, she hears her phone beep. It is a text message from Daniel, which reads simply ‘Great job ;-) One less illiberal liberal!!!!’”

Also in the test, the character Freya has unprotected sex with Daniel without saying she has HIV and has a fight with a woman before being thrown out of a window to her death.

The Sydney Morning Herald has reported that there were four students on the course who had the same names as characters in the test.

And Ms Leach said she had been contacted by other students who feel the character of Freya is based on her.

“The problem question uses my name and characterises me as a right-wing person who kills a left wing person. It then recounts a sex scene in graphic detail and says I am HIV positive,” she reportedly said in a complaint letter.

“After which point, I am thrown out of a window. Memes have already started to circulate, making fun of my character in the problem question and depicting me as having HIV. This exam has had made me feel unsafe to hold a diverse viewpoint at the University of Sydney Law School.”

She wanted an apology from the university and reportedly says that law school has been “incompetent at best, malicious at worst”.

The University of Sydney did apologise "for any offence or distressed caused" but said the name match-up was “entirely” a coincidence.

“This afternoon we received a complaint about one of our law assessments and have now responded directly to the student,” that statement said, reported news.com.au.

“We explained to the student that the fictional character in the exam scenario was in no way meant to reference or depict a real-life person, and the use of any first names shared by students was entirely a coincidence.

“In fact, the same name was also used in an exam drafted by the same academic in an assessment and class questions list in previous years.”

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