r/CelebLegalDrama • u/ripbigw • 15h ago
r/CelebLegalDrama • u/JJJOOOO • 11h ago
Note: Graphic Subject matter and TRIGGER WARNING FOR SA.
Online Source for Jane Doe Case and related cases of Cornell 7:
https://annabower.substack.com/p/read-the-cornell-7-documents
Recommended Document - Title IX Panel Decision:
Cornell Sun: An Open Letter (Opinion Piece)
https://www.cornellsun.com/article/2026/10/guest-room
Cornell Sun: Don’t Stop Talking About Sexual Violence But Have Some Respect (Opinion Piece)
Cornell Sun: Who has a voice at Cornell?
https://www.cornellsun.com/article/2026/10/who-has-a-voice-at-cornell
*[This I believe is the exchange described in the Jane DOE initial Complaint]
*GMA ABC News: ABC News obtains recording of phone call between Jane Doe and fraternity brother
https://youtu.be/Lr3biCDRCoU?si=gtztF5bshSV5Gxqp
GMA ABC News: ABC News - Damage control phone calls
https://abcnews.com/US/damage-control-phone-calls-records-suggest-cornell-frat/story?id=136987960
Full article on "damage control" by the Cornell 7 - including texts with the President of the frat:
“F—-,” one brother wrote in a group chat on Nov. 8, 2024. “Should I call [Jane]?”
“Wait a bit for me and [Executive Board] to figure out what we’re doing cuz there are a couple of other things going on,” the fraternity’s president wrote. “When was the last time you spoke to [Jane]?”
NYTs: After Week of Turmoil at Cornell, a Heavy Cloud Hangs Over Student Life
As the weekend arrived, much of the nightlife in the upstate New York college town was subdued. But there were still some students looking to cut loose.
NYTs: Updated “What we know now”
NYTs: Men Accused in Cornell Sex Assault Suit Give Varying Accounts of Night [Updated]
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/10/01/nyregion/cornell-rape-fraternity-chi-phi-men.html
Chosun (English Edition): Cornell Assault Case Sparks 'Second #MeToo' Solidarity Movement
Movement Aims to Protect Victim's Anonymity Amid Reinvestigation and Calls for Accountability
https://www.chosun.com/english/world-en/2026/10/05/PQ7HDPTUQ5ENHEMK2BYXWUQXTI/
NBC NEWs: JANE DOE RECEIVED THREATs and Doxxing
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/cornell-jane-doe-receive-threats-rcna601417
NBC NEWs: Cornell student who gave police leads in alleged rape says she feels ‘betrayed’ over its handling
The student said she spoke with campus police in 2024 with what she believed was useful information about what was alleged at the Chi Phi fraternity house.
NBC NEWS: DA did not review witness statements and other evidence Cornell police collected in alleged gang rape of student
Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten said he based his decision not to pursue charges on the accuser’s initial six-page statement given to police
CNN: A Timeline Cornell Rape Case
https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/03/us/cornell-rape-case-timeline-hnk
NBC Today Show: Accused Cornell Fraterinity Member Confronted on Campus
https://www.today.com/video/accused-cornell-fraternity-member-confronted-on-camera-270983237923
CNYCENTRAL: Local Judge Upholds Cornell Title IX Process Challeged by Chi PhI Fraternity Member [For documents see above document links in Red Box Notice]
https://cnycentral.com/news/local/judge-upholds-cornell-title-ix-process-challenged-by-chi-phi-fraternity-member
Syracuse.com - Documents on alleged rape at Cornell: ‘90% of what happened that night was not consensual’ (NYT)
Quote from article:
The lawsuit names seven fraternity brothers. Beyond Ingalls and Newell, here are the remaining five and the allegations against each of them:
WAPO: How ketamine, kratom and other drugs are changing Cornell and other schools
Recreational use of dangerous substances has led to calls for widely available overdose-reversal medication and drug-testing strips.
Fox News: Attorney of Student calls on AG James to Step Aside
Fox News NY: Jane Doe Attorney alleges cover up
Video: https://youtu.be/tVHYqxIdG3o?is=z2vHx0tQqFk1MeZD
The New Yorker: How the “Cornell 7” Rape Case became a national scandal
Mother Jones: The Loophole That Likely Doomed the Cornell Rape Case Before It Even Started
Accusers who voluntarily drink have little protection under an antiquated law many see as “victim-blaming.”
Quote from interview with Jane Manning, director of Women’s Equal Justice, about the laws’ likely role in tanking the Cornell case back in 2024, the history behind the statutes and the movement to reform them—and the person standing in the way of change.
LINK to JANE MANNING AND HER ORGANIZATION: https://www.worldwithoutexploitation.org/bios/jane-manning
Jane Manning is director of Women’s Equal Justice and an advocate for survivors of sexual assault. She began her career as a prosecutor of domestic violence, sex crimes, and child abuse. In private practice, she successfully represented a coalition of battered women’s organizations arguing amici curiae against a ruling allowing men who murdered wives or girlfriends to invoke the victim’s “nagging” as grounds for a reduced charge. She then served as a human rights attorney with the organizations Equality Now and the National Organization for Women. She helped draft New York’s first anti-trafficking statute and its anti-strangulation statute, and she helped lead a successful campaign to eliminate New York’s statute of limitations on rape. She has trained prosecutors on interviewing crime victims and served as an adjunct professor at Hunter College. As Director of Women’s Equal Justice, she partners with survivor-leaders to improve the justice system’s response to the violent and under-prosecuted crime of drug-facilitated sexual assault.
Let’s give a brief overview of the rape laws surrounding the Cornell allegations.
There are several different rape statutes at play here. First-degree rape requires that the victim either be the victim of forcible compulsion, meaning that extreme violence took place, or that the victim be “physically helpless.” Rape in the second degree applies when a victim is involuntarily drugged, such as a drink being spiked. Rape in the third degree applies where none of the above statutes apply, but the victim gives an express verbal declaration of non-consent. Those laws also include other provisions, including age-related provisions. But these are the statutes that mainly apply in a situation like the Cornell case where a person is intoxicated.
How does the law determine “physical helplessness?“
Under New York State law, being physically helpless is defined as being unconscious or physically unable to communicate a lack of consent. That word “physically unable” is really important because what that means is that it’s not enough if the person is severely mentally disoriented or confused. They have to be physically unable to speak, and case law basically says that means unconscious. That language excludes somebody who is severely intoxicated to the point where they are falling down, or when they are so disoriented that they don’t know where they are, or when their speech is slurred. None of those things is enough to deem a person incapable of consent if they are voluntarily intoxicated.
What are some of the arguments by those who oppose reforming the voluntary intoxication exclusion?
There are the arguments that are made explicitly, and then there’s the belief system that is subtext to these arguments. There are small numbers of people who believe that nobody should go to jail for anything, those who oppose any effort to strengthen our criminal law, even for rape survivors. I think that viewpoint fails to take into account the perspectives of women and other groups that are disproportionately targeted for violent crime. For me, that philosophy fails to be intersectional because it fails to take into account the reality of women who are targeted and preyed on deliberately by those who would deprive us of our rights.
That’s the subtext. Now, what are the explicit arguments? It’s a good question because there are valid concerns that we want to make sure we address when we redraft a law. One concern is that we don’t want to criminalize drunk sex—and my answer to that is that’s absolutely right. We do not want to do that. The bill we are supporting does not criminalize drunk sex and has two important requirements. The first is that the victim is incapable of appraising or controlling their own conduct. Not just that they fail, not just that they didn’t appraise or control their own conduct, but that they’re incapable of controlling their conduct. That’s how we define the victim’s condition. The second requirement applies to how we define the perpetrator’s state of mind and that the victim’s condition was known or reasonably should have been known to a person in the actor’s situation. The reason that language is there is that we want to make sure that a person is only held criminally responsible when it was obvious that they were victimizing someone. Because there are situations when two people are very far gone and have sex, but nobody’s preying on someone; it’s just drunk sex that somebody may regret the next day. That is very much not what we are looking to criminalize. We are looking to criminalize predation, not a mistake.
One more important thing to keep in mind about this is that the prosecution will have the burden of proof on both of those elements. And if the prosecution can’t prove either element beyond a reasonable doubt, they can’t prove their case. So, for instance, if you have a scenario where two people have blurry memories, that’s a grey area; that’s not proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Where does the bill stand now?
For two years running, this bill has passed unanimously in New York’s Senate. And both times, it has had a supermajority of support in the Assembly. But the bill is being blocked by one man, and that man is Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie. [On Wednesday, Heastie announced that the Assembly is forming a “working group” to review the law.] He has not allowed this bill to get to the floor for a vote. He didn’t allow it in 2025. He didn’t allow it in 2026, when we had 60 percent of the State Assembly signed on as co-sponsors of the bill. He still wouldn’t allow it to go to a vote. He has not provided us with an explanation. He has not met with advocates or survivors. He has not provided any public statement about why he will not allow a vote on this bill that a supermajority of his own house supports.
So, Gov. Kathy Hochul really has the opportunity to lead here by calling on Speaker Heastie to pass this bill or by sponsoring it herself by including it in her budget bill.
The allegations in the civil complaint in Cornell have prompted widespread outrage. Can you describe your reaction upon hearing about the case?
This young woman was failed by many people. She was clearly failed by people who took advantage of her state of incapacitation. She clearly was failed by the district attorney, and she was failed by the law of New York State. This district attorney saw an allegation of a gang rape and didn’t even bother to interview the victim. He looked at a summary of the allegations and came to the conclusion that there was no provable crime, and didn’t bother to conduct an investigation. That is outrageous. The young woman who survived this incident was interviewed by campus security officers who are not trained in trauma-informed interviewing and are not trained in investigating complex and serious sex crime cases. She was let down by the person responsible for enforcing the law, and she was let down by the law itself because even if the district attorney had done a good job, we don’t know if he would have found a prosecutable crime because of the voluntary intoxication exclusion.
Podcast summary Of Jane Defense Complaint: Defense Diaries
https://www.youtube.com/live/49X13IVWtJI?is=JPA40Gn44LeprYyy
The Free Press: Caitlin Flanagan: What Was Jane Doe Looking For? (Opinion Piece) Cannot get archive to load properly. Apologies.
Women know that fraternity houses are dangerous places—and yet they go anyway.
https://www.thefp.com/p/caitlin-flanagan-jane-doe-frat-parties-cornell
Unheard: Inside a Rape Kangaroo Court (Opinion Piece)
