No, the statement is from Tom Mars and He is using that manual to justify how Anderson reported procedure. I would bet my life savings that Anderson never once read the S/A Handbook. Mars’s job is to find any possible way to find his client innocent.
In this case it is a very weak argument and, because most aren’t well versed in the internal machinations of higher education, it makes a useful argument in public to mount pressure to just settle the buyout argument to end the stream of constant public statements. The end goal is just to get that portion of the buyout that USU is willing to part with.
When Mars took on Kansas he took it to court and had a whole trail proving what Kansas did.