Content notice: This article discusses allegations of sexual assault, violence, and drugs.
In September 2026, a former Cornell University student identified publicly as Jane Doe filed a civil lawsuit concerning events she alleges occurred at Cornell’s Chi Phi fraternity house in October 2024.
The seven men named as defendants are:
- Matthew Ingalls
- Johnathan Newell
- Winston Lee
- Gillio Lopes
- Diego Sarabia
- Scott Norris
- Scott Kretzschmar
They have since become known online as the “Cornell 7.”
That label, however, should not obscure an important legal point: the lawsuit attributes different conduct to different defendants. Being named in a civil lawsuit is not the same as being found liable or guilty of a crime.
As of this writing, no criminal charges arising from the alleged incident have been publicly reported. The Tompkins County district attorney has, however, reopened the criminal investigation and announced plans to present the evidence to a grand jury.
What the Lawsuit Alleges
According to the civil complaint, as described by multiple news organizations, Jane Doe was 20 years old when she attended a gathering at Cornell’s Chi Phi fraternity house in October 2024.
The complaint alleges that she consumed alcohol before arriving at the fraternity and was subsequently pressured into taking ketamine, marijuana and high-proof alcohol. It alleges that she became incapacitated and was sexually assaulted over several hours.
At approximately 1:42 a.m., the complaint says, a crude message was posted in a fraternity Snapchat group suggesting that a woman upstairs was sexually available. Additional men allegedly entered the room after that message was sent.
The alleged events continued until approximately 5:45 a.m., when Doe reportedly lost consciousness.
These are allegations contained in a civil lawsuit. They have not been proven at trial.
The Original Report and Cornell’s Investigation
Doe reported the alleged incident to Cornell University police approximately three weeks later, on November 8, 2024.
Cornell subsequently imposed temporary restrictions or suspensions on certain students and opened a Title IX investigation in January 2025.
According to the university, its process involved:
- A months-long investigation
- Opportunities for the complainant and respondents to testify
- The presentation of evidence
- A multi-day hearing
- Sanctions that included expulsions and suspensions
Cornell strongly disputes claims that essay writing was the only consequence imposed. However, federal privacy law prevents the university from publicly identifying which student received which sanction.
Doe’s attorney has said that two students were expelled while others received less serious sanctions. Cornell has confirmed that expulsions and suspensions occurred but has not publicly disclosed how many students received each penalty.
The university closed the Chi Phi chapter in 2024, and the fraternity remains prohibited from operating on campus.
The Disputed Police Statement
The Tompkins County district attorney has described a six-page statement Doe provided to Cornell police in November 2024.
According to the district attorney’s summary, portions of that statement characterized some of the initial sexual activity as voluntary and consensual.
Doe’s attorney disputes the suggestion that her original statement materially contradicts the civil complaint. He argues that investigators failed to conduct an appropriate follow-up interview addressing intoxication, drug use, coercion, incapacitation and whether Doe remained capable of consenting as the night progressed.
That distinction matters.
Consent to one person is not consent to everyone. Consent to one sexual act is not consent to every act that follows. Consent given at one moment can be withdrawn, and a person who becomes incapacitated may no longer be capable of providing meaningful consent.
This is precisely why a social-media verdict—on either side—is no substitute for a complete and competent investigation.
The Ithaca Police Department has said the alleged incident was never reported to its officers, despite language in the lawsuit reportedly indicating that an Ithaca police investigation remained open. Cornell University police handled the original report, and the district attorney has now reopened the criminal inquiry.
What Some of the Defendants Have Said
Not every defendant has made a readily verifiable public statement.
Scott Kretzschmar’s lawyer says Kretzschmar briefly entered the room, did not touch Doe, did not have sex with her and left shortly afterward. His lawyer also says Cornell found him not responsible for sexual misconduct and that a hair-follicle test was negative for ketamine.
The lawyer acknowledged, however, that Kretzschmar participated in offensive Snapchat exchanges.
Scott Norris has publicly denied having sexual contact with Doe and denied taking drugs that evening. He acknowledged engaging in Snapchat communications and briefly entering the room.
Gillio Lopes, through his lawyer, has unequivocally denied the allegations and argued that the civil complaint differs from what was originally reported and investigated.
The absence of a public statement from another defendant should not be treated as either an admission or evidence of innocence.
Cornell’s Own Numbers Tell a Troubling Story
The broader campus data make this case difficult to dismiss as an isolated controversy.
Cornell’s 2025 Sexual Assault and Related Misconduct Survey found that:
- 35% of undergraduate women reported experiencing nonconsensual sexual contact during their time at Cornell.
- The corresponding figure was 8% for undergraduate men.
- In 2023, the figure for undergraduate women had been 23%.
- 52% of Greek-affiliated undergraduate women reported sexual assault, compared with 29% of women who were not Greek-affiliated.
- For 86% of female respondents who experienced sexual assault, the reported perpetrator was another student.
- Only 24% of women who experienced assault contacted a formal program or resource.
- Approximately 80% instead told a friend.
- A fraternity chapter house was identified as the location in 17% of reported experiences.
Those figures require an important qualification. The 2025 survey had a response rate of only approximately 15% overall, with an undergraduate response rate of approximately 13%.
Cornell cautioned that the low participation rate and differences in respondent demographics limit the certainty of comparisons between survey years.
Even allowing for those limitations, the results depict a serious problem.
Cornell’s federally required campus-security reports provide another measurement: incidents reported to authorities rather than experiences disclosed through an anonymous survey.
| Reported on-campus offence | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rape | 25 | 28 | 23 |
| Fondling | 24 | 22 | 21 |
These numbers should not be mistaken for the total number of assaults. Many people never make a formal report, and an incident recorded in one year may concern conduct that occurred earlier.
Survey data and police statistics measure different things. Neither gives us a complete picture.
Why Do Some Men Believe They Can Act This Way?
The easy answer is “bad parenting.”
Parenting unquestionably helps shape a person’s understanding of empathy, consent, respect and accountability. But research does not support one tidy explanation for sexual violence.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention identifies overlapping risk factors at several levels, including:
- Hostility toward women
- Sexual entitlement
- Acceptance of beliefs that support sexual violence
- Heavy alcohol or drug use
- Peer groups that normalize aggression
- Weak institutional sanctions
- Social norms supporting male superiority
A risk factor is not destiny, nor does it excuse anyone’s choices. It helps explain the environment in which misconduct may become more likely.
Research has also found an association between fraternity membership and a greater likelihood of sexual aggression, even after accounting for pre-existing factors such as binge drinking, previous aggression and a preference for casual sex.
That does not mean every fraternity member is dangerous. It suggests that both the people attracted to certain groups and the culture operating within those groups may matter.
A fraternity environment can bring together:
- Status competition
- Loyalty to the group
- Control over alcohol and access to parties
- Objectification of women
- Pressure to demonstrate sexual success
- Bystanders afraid of being considered disloyal
- Private communications in which cruelty becomes entertainment
Once one participant begins treating a woman as an object rather than a person, the group faces a decision.
Someone can interrupt what is happening—or everyone can collectively redefine it as normal.
That is where individual character collides with institutional culture.
The Confidence of Getting Away With It
I have long believed that people who commit crimes often act from the assumption that they will not be caught.
It does not matter whether someone is committing insider trading from a corporate office, shoplifting something they can afford or selling drugs on a street corner. The circumstances and consequences may be dramatically different, but the underlying calculation can be remarkably similar:
I will get away with it.
Research on deterrence partially supports that instinct, but with an important refinement.
According to the US National Institute of Justice, the perceived certainty of being caught is generally a more effective deterrent than the theoretical severity of the punishment.
A severe penalty has little deterrent effect when someone believes the chance of investigation, identification and enforcement is practically nonexistent.
That idea becomes especially relevant when alleged misconduct involves a group.
If a room contains numerous participants and witnesses, each person may believe that responsibility will be dispersed:
- Someone else started it.
- Someone else did something worse.
- Nobody will speak.
- The messages will disappear.
- She had been drinking.
- The institution will protect its reputation.
- Lawyers will find inconsistencies.
- Time will weaken the evidence.
Perceived impunity may not come from believing the conduct is lawful. It may come from believing no one will ever be able to prove what happened—or who did what.
That does not mean there is one universal “criminal mind.” People offend for different reasons, and not every offender consciously weighs the risks and rewards.
Impulsivity, entitlement, intoxication, hostility, peer approval and opportunity may all play a role.
The common factor may not be identical psychology. It may be the absence of an effective barrier.
Why Institutions Hesitate
Universities have several legitimate and sometimes competing obligations.
They must support complainants, provide a fair process to accused students, respect privacy laws, cooperate with police and avoid declaring anyone guilty before the evidence has been properly assessed.
Those responsibilities are real.
But institutions also face powerful incentives to minimize public scandal:
- Protecting the university’s reputation
- Reassuring prospective students and parents
- Retaining alumni and donor support
- Limiting civil liability
- Avoiding conflict with influential fraternity networks
- Preventing damaging allegations from dominating search results
Those pressures do not prove that Cornell corrupted or deliberately undermined this particular investigation.
They explain why independent oversight and meaningful transparency are essential.
Cornell says it conducted a comprehensive investigation, held a multi-day hearing, imposed expulsions and suspensions and permanently closed the fraternity chapter.
Doe’s representatives argue that the consequences were inadequate and that law enforcement failed to conduct a sufficiently thorough investigation.
Both positions deserve careful examination. Neither should be reduced to a slogan.
What Meaningful Accountability Would Look Like
Accountability does not require abandoning due process. It requires a process worthy of public confidence.
That means:
- Trauma-informed investigations conducted by people trained to understand fragmented memory, intoxication and delayed reporting.
- Prompt preservation of evidence, including messages, photographs, surveillance footage, access records and forensic material.
- Individualized findings, so each person is judged according to the evidence concerning his own conduct.
- Protection against retaliation for complainants, witnesses and fraternity members who intervene or cooperate.
- Transparent aggregate reporting showing the number of complaints, findings and sanctions without exposing confidential identities.
- Meaningful consequences for active bystander participation, including encouraging an assault, summoning others, recording it or helping conceal it.
- Independent review when the university, police and prosecutorial authorities disagree about what occurred.
- Prevention that addresses power and group behaviour, rather than another compulsory presentation students can click through without absorbing.
The Question Beneath the Case
The Cornell case is not only about whether seven named men committed the particular conduct alleged against them. That question must be resolved through evidence and a fair legal process.
The larger question is what happens when an environment teaches people that reputation is more valuable than intervention, loyalty more important than conscience and uncertainty more convenient than accountability.
We should resist the internet’s habit of convicting people from screenshots and headlines.
We should be equally resistant to institutions using procedural language as a substitute for explaining whether their systems actually work.
Due process protects everyone.
So does a competent investigation.
The public should not have to choose between them.
Stay curious. Look closer. Keep the conversation going.
— Laurie
Sources and Further Reading
Reporting on the Lawsuit and Investigation
- CBC News — Cornell sexual-assault case and the seven named defendants
- CBS News — Details of the Cornell University rape allegations
- CNN — Cornell University sexual-assault lawsuit
- The Cornell Daily Sun — Cornell, Chi Phi sued over alleged gang rape and drugging
- The Cornell Daily Sun — District attorney reopens the criminal investigation
- The Cornell Daily Sun — Cornell confirms expulsions and disputes claims that essays were the only punishment
- The Cornell Daily Sun — Ithaca Police say the alleged incident was never reported to their department
Cornell Data and Reports
- Cornell Presidential Task Force on Campus Sexual Assault — Final Report, March 2026
- Cornell Chronicle — 2025 survey on campus sexual assault and harassment
- Cornell Chronicle — Sexual-assault task-force findings and recommendations
- Cornell Office of Civil Rights — Sexual-assault survey data and statistics
- Cornell Division of Public Safety — Annual Security Reports and Clery Act statistics
Research on Deterrence and Sexual Violence
- National Institute of Justice — Five Things About Deterrence
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — Sexual Violence Risk and Protective Factors
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — Preventing Sexual Violence
- Treat and colleagues — Fraternity Membership and Sexual Aggression
- Steele and colleagues — Risk and Protective Factors for Men’s Sexual-Violence Perpetration at Higher-Education Institutions