All William Hudson, Justin Jordan and Oliver Brown had wanted to do back in 2006 was find out if lax security at Texas Southern University had been partly to blame for the shooting death of a female student.

But in that course of that unrelated and now-forgotten investigation, they stumbled onto evidence of widespread fiscal malfeasance at the predominantly black school. The three young men, all students at TSU, went to the authorities with what they found, which is what good citizens do. They also went public, which earned them the enmity of the university administration and a good portion of their fellow students.

History has proved the “TSU 3,” as they have come to be known, were heroes, but they paid a stiff price for their heroism. They were suspended or put on probation by the university administration. Two of them were arrested on criminal charges that were dismissed the following day. The father of one of the students, an employee at Texas Southern, was ordered to write a letter condemning his son’s actions. He quit rather than do so.

Since the TSU 3 began their crusade, most of their charges have been right on the money. Former TSU President Priscilla Slade was indicted on charges of using hundreds of thousands of university money to finance her own lavish lifestyle. Her first trial ended in a hung jury, and she cut a deal to avoid a second.

Financial records found by the TSU 3 in an abandoned truck described payments to employees not listed in the official university budget. The university’s chief financial officer has been convicted of misusing university funds, and a TSU vice president is under indictment.

Gov. Rick Perry demanded and got the resignations of every university board member, and the university is struggling to rebuild its shattered reputation.

Sadly, the story of Texas Southern is not an unusual one. As a state-supported school for minority students, it came into being as a means of enforcing racial segregation, and was, like most such schools in the South, a victim of longtime neglect by the Legislature and by state education officials. As such, it became a magnet for unscrupulous and inept college administrators like Priscilla Slade.

Predators like Slade thrive on the indifference of white officialdom and the defensiveness of the black community, some of whom genuinely care about their revered black institutions and some of whom are simply trying to ride the gravy train.

The TSU 3 felt the sting of black disapproval as they mounted their lonely crusade. Many of their fellow students called them traitors, and they were ostracized on campus.

But Hudson, Jordan and Brown got a measure of justice Friday when a federal court jury in Houston found that the university had retaliated against the three young men with a disgusting array of undeserved punishments and false allegations. It decreed that the men receive $200,000 in actual damages, and it will begin considering punitive damages on Tuesday.

Here’s hoping the jurors think big.