After having released that statement, if these allegations regarding Cornell are true, namely:
They did not do a Title IX investigation
And/or they did not share the outcome of the investigation (at least to its victim)
Students were allowed to write essays in lieu of being expelled for sexual assault
then the President definitely should be removed, along with any other senior administrators who condoned and/or orchestrated the (in)actions, particularly when there was such an emphasis on law and order with respect to student protesters.
And although the DA’s statement (with a partial inclusion of Jane Doe’s statement) discusses why there were no governmental charges brought at that time, I strongly suspect that the standards in Cornell’s Student Code of Conduct were definitely violated as described in Jane Doe’s written account.
Under current New York law, if someone was drinking by choice when they were assaulted, prosecutors can decide not to pursue the case. This law provides prosecutors with an out when it comes to sexual assault—and statistics show they take it: In 2019, prosecutors dropped nearly half of all sexual assault cases in the Manhattan district attorney’s office. A bill proposed in the state legislature is looking to make it harder for prosecutors to throw out sexual assault and rape cases by prohibiting the use of intoxication of the victim as a defense.
“It’s a staggering injustice. Being unable to say no doesn’t mean you have no right to say no,” says Ann Olivarius, a leading women’s rights attorney and longtime advocate for survivors of sexual assault and gender-based violence.
Exactly! Or he could’ve just not gotten in his car and gone in another direction. Yes, the kids should not have been blocking his way, but backing up into them is NOT the right way to react and certainly doesn’t make him look like the bigger person. Two wrongs don’t make a right.
None of the individuals charged were offered the opportunity to write essays as a sole consequence of their involvement.
So an essay wasn’t the “sole” consequence. Maybe it was combined with a suspension. So what? The fact that anyone was instructed to write an essay as any part of this is horrifying and ridiculous. Did they write about forcing Jane Doe to snort ketamine off their appendage? I suppose not.
The harm is in the fact that five of these men continued their education, some graduated and gained employment, and Jane Doe remains traumatized after dropping out of college and still cannot sleep two years later.
I would like to know the composition and training of the faculty/staff involved in these hearings. More importantly, in what universe does it make sense to let a bunch of academics and administrators decide the disposition of an aggravated case of sexual assault?
I hope this case will blow open the ingrained misogyny in academic institutions once and for all. Women who go to college should not have to face a 30-40% chance of being sexually assaulted while a student. It’s so shameful. And shame on NY State legislators. Fix your laws now.
And I hope posters (besides me) will remind parents who post “I could never let my kid go to xyz college- it’s too dangerous” with the perceived danger being that the college is in the middle of a diverse city with “people who don’t look like us”… that an unspoken danger of those supposedly safe suburban, small town and rural colleges is that there are administrators who are skilled at explaining “You don’t want this assault to take over your life. Why not go home for the weekend, chill, and I’m sure by next week you’ll realize that reporting this to law enforcement is a really bad idea”.
The last time I participated in one of those threads I got some nasty PM’s. The gist was that NO responsible college administrator would try to hide student on student crime (false). And that my scenario (kid tries to report the crime, college musters every empathetic official to stop the report) never happens in these enlightened times (false) and that I have an agenda (yes, the truth. That’s my agenda).
The campus crime statistics are about as easy to manipulate as self reported data on “how much did you exercise last week”. Woman is assaulted two blocks from campus going back to her apartment- a building that the college does not own or manage? Good chance that gets buried in the overall statistics of that city, not a campus crime. Gang violence is bad when it’s committed by an actual “gang” but it’s ok when the “gang” is a bunch of frat boys?
The problem with forensics is that it’s time sensitive and perishable. A student going through campus channels is going to have taken three showers by the time an actual law enforcement professional who is not on the college payroll tries to collect evidence. And the real coverups happen when the student is advised “Why not take the rest of the semester off and get your head in the right space? I’ll tell your professors and you’ll have a clean withdrawal on your transcript” which gives everyone a chance to get their stories straight once the accuser has gone home.
This actually happens. And when it happens on a lush, suburban campus with no “scary” neighbors, there is a lot at stake for maintaining the colleges low crime stats. With any luck, the perpetrator (or multiples) are seniors and they’ll have graduated by the time the victim comes back to campus. Nice and clean.
If I have learned one thing over the last several years, it’s that college and university administrators have only one true mission, and that is to keep their donors happy. The more our kids are aware of that, the better.
It is a bit more expanded than that - they maintain the reputation of the university.
However, people are talking as though colleges like Cornell are, in any way or manner, representative of higher education in the USA as a whole.
There is a huge difference between private universities, which rely on donors, and public universities, which rely more on research money and tuition, as well as state support. I will also point out that the large majority of students at four year schools are attending public universities, and almost all students attending two-year colleges are attending public community colleges.
While “elite” expensive private universities universities like Cornell or Notre Dame or Duke, etc. often dominate the headlines and the discussions here, they enroll fewer than 10% of the student population. The “typical” college student is attending a public four year school which accepts more than 50% of their applicants, and relies on tuition and state funds to stay open.
Interesting response. I am reminded of the Duke lacrosse scandal. The Duke admin’s response was completely erroneous. Is Cornell getting it wrong too? Why such a defiant statement that seems to care more about defending the process versus the alleged severity of the crime?
Once upon a time I would have agreed with this. However, in the past three years I have witnessed numerous prestigious universities sacrifice their reputations in the interest of donor relations (with the federal government being one of the key donors, among other headline-grabbing names).
Regarding the public vs private distinction, I wonder if there are any distinctions between how cases of SA are handled, between Title IX, campus police, disciplinary committees etc. It seems to me that private universities have a lot of discretion in their handling of these cases, which are adjudicated by “trained” faculty and administrators (what? why? This makes absolutely no sense to me).
Duke turned out to be fake. The Tompkins County DA said this in the paragraphs below (new allegations) but also noted he finds her credible. But what if Cornell didn’t drop the ball but that the students (she and they) had this activity with full consent or permission
Not saying her story isn’t true - but why now ? Everyone wanted to blame Duke. Turns out those kids were railroaded.
None of us know what happened. I hope they get it right for the futures of all involved. I don’t know what Cornell did but why kick students out if nothing illegal happened or if it was done with consent - and the article notes she took drugs and was never physically helpless.
From ABC News
“Van Houten said his office did not bring charges in 2024 because the woman’s statement to authorities did not allege she was drugged without her knowledge or that she did not consent to engage in sexual activities.
“She never says that she was drugged without her knowledge. She admits to taking drugs and alcohol voluntarily and with knowledge. She does not allege that she was forced to engage in any acts. She does not say that she was physically helpless or unconscious or incapacitated at any point during the time at the fraternity house,” Van Houten said.
He also said neither Jane Doe nor her attorneys ever contacted his office to ask for reconsideration of her case or to suggest that her sworn statement was inaccurate.“
One set of facts that has not been disputed is that Jane Doe was severely intoxicated, had consumed 10+ alcoholic drinks, marijuana, and ketamine. Is there a single, sane person who can read that sentence and conclude that Jane Doe was in a position to give consent?
“Van Houten defended his initial decision not to pursue charges in November 2024, when the accuser, identified as Jane Doe, first spoke to Cornell University police. She initially described her drug use and sexual conduct as “voluntary, conscious and consensual,” he said Monday, which led prosecutors and criminal investigators to conclude no crime had occurred.”
Whereupon, months later and with new evidence, he realized the inanity of his prior description, in that no conduct can be described as voluntary or consensual when one is intoxicated to the degree that Jane Doe was intoxicated.
He would not have reopened this case without reason, moreover he appears somewhat regretful in interviews that he did not pursue the matter more vigorously when it was first brought to him.
Sexual activity took place. This has been determined. Again, can any sane person make the case that a person can voluntarily consent to an all night marathon of sex with multiple unknown partners when they have consumed enormous amounts of intoxicants?
Mr. Van Houten said he would now reopen the investigation “recognizing that the process of healing from trauma is personal and different for every human.” A senior female prosecutor has been assigned, and any additional allegations from the lawsuit will be considered. ABC News first reported Mr. Van Houten’s comments on the investigation.
Jane Manning, a former prosecutor and director of Women’s Equal Justice, a nonprofit which serves survivors of sexual assault, said it appeared that prosecutors had decided there was no case based only on the initial police paperwork, a practice she said was common but is “unacceptable.”
It’s “basic due diligence” for a prosecutor to interview a complainant before deciding whether to prosecute, she said.
Another likely complication was that New York law defines rape narrowly, Ms. Manning said, excluding a person who is subjected to unwanted sex while voluntarily intoxicated unless they are fully unconscious at the time of the assault.
Clearly something serious happened - the police were contacted, the frat was shut down, two students were expelled. And unless you have actually suffered this kind of trauma and understand what someone’s initial response might be, I don’t think the Monday morning quarterbacking here is useful. I happen to be aware of a rape on another campus a couple of weeks ago. The woman is not even reporting it to the cops because she is so traumatized about it and doesn’t want to have to relive the trauma by facing any questions about it. I would hope that if she ever reaches the point that she feels she can face trying to get justice, she doesn’t have to deal with random men on the internet saying “why now”. There is a reason that the statute of limitations for rape has been eliminated in many states.
This case is going to a grand jury, let’s see what they say. They will have more information than we will sitting here reading bits and pieces of news stories.
Again, we weren’t there - we always put consent on women. What if the guys didn’t give consent ? What if all were heavily intoxicated.
There was a reason criminal charges didn’t come. Will they now ?
I’m not ready to say Cornell dropped the ball. I don’t know.
But it’s scary we often read about crazy stuff like this on college campuses and perhaps it happens in other places too although you don’t have that aggregation of young people.
You think Cornell or x school kids - great homes, lots of smarts. Girls at any school are warned. Blue lights prevail.
And all this stuff, criminal or not, continues to happen. Sickening. And sad.
My kid’s college recently (not sure if in response to this) ran an awareness campaign about sexual assault and consent. One thing they made very plain is that a drunk/intoxicated/high person is incapable of giving consent.
If Cornell (and the DA) originally thought it was consensual, the expulsions/suspensions could have been based on the under age alcohol use and distribution and drugs admitted by some of the students. That alone could have created the “consequential” punishment and the fraternity closure.
The punishments seem paltry because they were for the lesser offenses, I suspect.
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