One of the men named in the Jane Doe lawsuit against Cornell University is suing the school, asking a court to remove his name from the litigation and expunge his academic record. The plaintiff, a former member of the Chi Phi fraternity, admits he was inside the fraternity house on the night of the alleged October 2024 rape but denies taking part in any assault.
According to court documents filed in Tompkins County, the man — listed as John Doe — says Cornell violated its own policies when a university hearing panel found him responsible for "Attempted Sexual Exploitation." He says he was never formally charged with that specific infraction and therefore could not properly defend himself against it.
He also alleges that during his appeal of Cornell's findings, one member of the hearing panel participated via Zoom while driving a car, rather than paying attention to key testimony.
The countersuit puts Cornell's internal disciplinary process itself on trial. The sanctions against the accused students have been contested for weeks: Jane Doe's attorney has said two of the seven accused students were expelled while the others received lesser punishments, including suspensions, workshops, or written assignments. Cornell has countered that "none of the individuals charged were offered the opportunity to write essays as a sole consequence of their involvement," and has declined to confirm individual outcomes, citing federal student privacy law.
The Chi Phi national fraternity has said that three days after Doe filed her police report, the Cornell chapter voted unanimously to remove the accused members from its rolls and asked the national organization to permanently expel them, which it did. The university closed the chapter in 2024, and it remains barred from campus.
The case stems from October 19, 2024, when a 20-year-old sophomore alleged she was drugged with ketamine, alcohol, and other substances and then raped by seven members of Chi Phi. She told campus police she was "100 percent confident" she had been raped — a statement that did not appear in the materials Cornell police transmitted to the Tompkins County District Attorney's office.
In November 2024, District Attorney Matthew Van Houten declined to pursue criminal charges without interviewing the victim or requesting the full transcript of her police interview. The case stayed dormant until September 2026, when Jane Doe filed a civil lawsuit and the student-run Cornell Daily Sun published details that drew national scrutiny.
Under pressure, Cornell president Michael Kotlikoff agreed to an independent review of the university's response. On October 1, Governor Kathy Hochul signed an executive order removing the case from local jurisdiction and appointing Attorney General Letitia James to lead the criminal inquiry. On October 2, James announced her office had assumed control of the active investigation, with authority to present evidence to a grand jury and pursue prosecutions if warranted.
A parallel dispute over evidence continues: Cornell says its police department provided prosecutors with a screenshot — of a defendant advertising "free pussy," referring to Doe, in a Chi Phi Snapchat group — along with all other investigatory material. Van Houten told ABC News and CBS News that his office never received the screenshot or the full interview transcript, calling it "a critical piece of evidence."