Lawsuit against ND concerning 2016 rape allegations against a football player

[Emcee77]

http://www.wndu.com/content/news/Rape-allegations--480855381.html

Anyone following this? Sad stuff, and disappointing vis-a-vis the player, if even partially true.

The lawsuit doesn’t identify the player, but it provides enough facts that anyone who follows the program closely can deduce who it is. (There weren’t that many 6’5” 270-lb. players who got suspended in April 2016 and subsequently transferred out...) I never heard why he left (and I don’t think many of us much cared at the time) so I was totally blindsided by this.

 

[dublinirish]

apparently he never actually enrolled at oklahoma

 

[wizards8507]

Universities shouldn't have their own police departments and they shouldn't be responsible for investigating alleged crimes.

 

[goldandblue]

Got it.

 

[SouthSideChiDomer]

This one has been out there for a while. Either that or the whole "holding up the transfer" thing was in multiple cases, as well as the fact that she withdrew from the university.

 

[IrishLion]

"If you just drop the lawsuit, we can get your attacker off campus quicker."

That's some f*cked up shit on ND's part, if true.

(And yes, this is how most major institutions handle this situation. That doesn't mean that it's not f*cked up and disappointing. The mental/legal gymnastics put the onus on the victim to proceed in ways they might not want, and it's terrible.)

 

[ulukinatme]

If the player in question is guilty, I'm not surprised. It just reaffirms what I said in his thread.

 

[Veritate Duce Progredi]

Does this player's name rhyme with Lamp Lankenflip?

 

[dublinirish]

Does this player's name rhyme with Lamp Lankenflip?

Yesh.

 

[IrishLax]

This is very old news, every single detail.

 

[Emcee77]

This is very old news, every single detail.

No. It's coverage of a court hearing that happened yesterday. A friend and colleague of mine is involved in the case, which ND is seeking to dismiss, and there was a hearing on the motion to dismiss yesterday. So that is recent news.

The events that serve as the basis for the lawsuit happened in 2016. Maybe that's what you mean? It may well be true that those events were well-known long before this lawsuit was filed, although I didn't know of them. I checked the player's thread before creating a new one, and there's nothing about this in it. (This is the sort of thing that I would ordinarily put in a player thread, but the lawsuit doesn't identify the player, and although it is easy to work out who it is, it felt wrong to identify him explicitly, since the allegations are of course unproven.)

 

[T Town Tommy]

Since we live in a guilt before innocent society today, for most people it won't matter what the facts are. Throw in "he played football at ND" and it becomes an even bigger circus.

If the player did what was alleged then he should receive just punishment. If he didn't then he should be exonerated. Sadly, I trust the judicial system today about as much as I do politicians.

 

[IrishLax]

No. It's coverage of a court hearing that happened yesterday. A friend and colleague of mine is involved in the case, which ND is seeking to dismiss, and there was a hearing on the motion to dismiss yesterday. So that is recent news.

The events that serve as the basis for the lawsuit happened in 2016. Maybe that's what you mean? It may well be true that those events were well-known long before this lawsuit was filed, although I didn't know of them. I checked the player's thread before creating a new one, and there's nothing about this in it. (This is the sort of thing that I would ordinarily put in a player thread, but the lawsuit doesn't identify the player, and although it is easy to work out who it is, it felt wrong to identify him explicitly, since the allegations are of course unproven.)

This is exactly what I meant. Everything presented in the article is something we already knew from the filing. It might not be in his thread, but it was discussed on here when the suit was first filed. I'll see if I can find the thread.

EDIT: It was buried in the General Team Info from September -- http://www.irishenvy.com/forums/notre-dame-football/67037-general-team-info-124.html#post1923874 -- I think most everything I said in this post at the time still holds true.

 

[stlnd01]

Universities shouldn't have their own police departments and they shouldn't be responsible for investigating alleged crimes.

Exactly. NDSP can handle parking tickets and rent-a-cop level campus security, but I think all involved are better off if they’d leave sexual assault allegations to the professionals.

Also: That story was really poorly written. Never actually said what she’s suing Notre Dame for. Bungling the investigation? Naming her as the victim? Pressuring her to drop charges?

 

[IrishLax]

Since we live in a quilt before innocent society today, for most people it won't matter what the facts are. Throw in "he played football at ND" and it becomes an even bigger circus.

If the player did what was alleged then he should receive just punishment. If he didn't then he should be exonerated. Sadly, I trust the judicial system today about as much as I do politicians.

I'm also not one to do the "guilty before innocent" thing, but here's my recap of things as I understand them...

1. It seems more likely than not, based on what I've heard behind the scenes, that he's -- at minimum -- guilty of some misconduct. I don't think his "guilt" is central to this lawsuit.

2. There is nothing the University or the law can do to punish someone if the victim refuses to cooperate with the investigation. That's true of every rape case.

3. He was suspended immediately pending investigation of the complaint.

4. The victim said she wanted him gone, and alleges someone from the University said the fastest way to do that would be to get him to transfer. Is this nefarious? Maybe, or maybe it was someone simply trying to find the most expedient way to get him off campus which was the victim's goal.

5. The law exists to punish rapists with prison. I don't know why Title IX has turned schools into de facto courts of law trying to adjudicate these matters... it is an untenable
situation that will never be "fair" because that's not how universities are supposed to function.

 

[IrishLax]

Exactly. NDSP can handle parking tickets and rent-a-cop level campus security, but I think all involved are better off if they’d leave sexual assault allegations to the professionals.

Also: That story was really poorly written. Never actually said what she’s suing Notre Dame for. Bungling the investigation? Naming her as the victim? Pressuring her to drop charges?

I think it should be clarified now that NDSP is irrelevant to this case.

This is a Title IX matter like what happens everywhere from Yale to Michigan Tech, and universities are forced to handle these kinds of complaints with some form of Title IX compliant "court." They, often, get sticky. In fact, ND is also being sued by a male student who says he was unfairly punished by ND's kangaroo court. So per ongoing lawsuits, ND is simultaneously vindictive against male students and unfairly supports accusations from females and not fighting hard enough for justice for their female students. Maybe -- just maybe -- the truth lies somewhere in the middle and ND is trying to do the best job they can to be "fair" within given constraints.

 

[IrishSteelhead]

This is very old news, every single detail.

Tell that to BSPN, who will have this story on par with Baylors saga by 5 PM.

 

[stlnd01]

I think it should be clarified now that NDSP is irrelevant to this case.

This is a Title IX matter like what happens everywhere from Yale to Michigan Tech, and universities are forced to handle these kinds of complaints with some form of Title IX compliant "court." They, often, get sticky. In fact, ND is also being sued by a male student who says he was unfairly punished by ND's kangaroo court. So per ongoing lawsuits, ND is simultaneously vindictive against male students and unfairly supports accusations from females and not fighting hard enough for justice for their female students. Maybe -- just maybe -- the truth lies somewhere in the middle and ND is trying to do the best job they can to be "fair" within given constraints.

Fair enough. I’m not as up to speed on this stuff as I used to be (though I still think NDSP is useless). But regardless which arm is doing it - campus police or the Title IX office - it’s fairly messed up to have universities investigating potential criminal activity.
Universities are not law-enforcement entities, but rather image-conscious institutions with valuable assets (like a famous football program) to think about. Nor are they accountable to the public in the ways law enforcement is. And, worse, they - apparently, allegedly - sometimes do stupid things like identify a sex assault victim to their alleged assailant when the victim expressly does not want them to.