For nearly two years, the criminal question surrounding an alleged sexual assault at Cornell University appeared settled. Then the allegations became national news. On Monday, Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten announced that his office would revisit allegations that a former Cornell student was sexually assaulted by multiple members of the Chi Phi fraternity in October 2024.
The decision followed a September 14 civil lawsuit that brought new attention—and substantially different allegations—to the case. Although reopening the case does not prove a crime occurred, especially given that no criminal charges have been announced, the development raises a simple question. Why did it take this long and this much media attention for authorities to take another look?
Van Houten says his office declined to pursue charges after reviewing the statement the woman gave Cornell University Police in 2024. According to the DA, that account did not allege that she was unknowingly drugged, forced into sexual activity or incapacitated. He says the allegations in her new civil complaint are “dramatically different.” Obviously, the DA argues, if prosecutors are now dealing with information they did not have in 2024, reopening the case makes sense.
They can hardly be surprised, though, that doing so invites scrutiny of the original investigation. Van Houten has acknowledged that his office relied on Cornell police rather than conducting its own independent investigation. He also says prosecutors were not provided with an image of a fraternity Snapchat group chat cited in the lawsuit that allegedly contains a message inviting fraternity members upstairs for sex.
The plaintiff's attorney, meanwhile, says investigators had access to that material and failed to adequately follow up with his client. Those are pretty big discrepancies that go directly to what authorities knew, what they tried to learn and what ultimately reached the prosecutors who decided there was no basis to move forward. The facts—or, at minimum, the confusion over which facts were available to whom—made further scrutiny almost inevitable.
Here is what happened next: the allegations drew national coverage and public anger (Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez even discussed the case at an Ithaca town hall on Sunday) and, on Monday, Van Houten announced that the case would be revisited. Despite what that sequence suggests, there is no proof that media attention caused the reopening. The civil complaint contains allegations that the DA says differ significantly from the account prosecutors reviewed in 2024, giving his office an independent reason to reconsider the case.
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