A woman is suing her college for allegedly forcing her to question and be cross-examined by her rapist, The Journal News newspaper reported on Monday.
In her suit, Sarah Tubbs, 22, accused Stony Brook University in New York of making her personally confront her alleged attacker during a disciplinary hearing despite having no prior legal training, according to the paper. Tubbs had initially reported the rape to the university in order to have disciplinary charges brought against her rapist.
Tubbs’ lawsuit was seeking to end the practice of forcing victims to “prosecute their own cases and to cross-examine and be cross-examined by their assailants” at such hearings, the paper reported.
According to the lawsuit, the alleged rape occurred on Jan. 26, 2014 after Tubbs went to the man’s dorm room and changed her mind about having sex with him. The Journal News did not identify the alleged rapist because no criminal charges had been brought against him.
The lawsuit also said that when Tubbs attempted to file a complaint with campus police she was told she didn’t have a case. An officer also told her the district attorney’s office would probably agree “because she did not scream ‘No,’ or violently fight back.”
So, instead of pursuing charges against her assailant, Tubbs sought a university disciplinary action. She told the paper she wanted “some type of justice” and wanted the man to “know he did something wrong.”
During the hearing, Tubbs said she was required to make her case against the man. She said she wasn’t allowed to bring her therapist to the hearing and was only separated from the man by a paper screen. Tubbs also said there were no police or security officers at the five-hour hearing, which took place in May.
“I would say the hardest part was hearing his voice because it’s the voice I hear in my flashbacks,” Tubbs told the newspaper. “One of my biggest concerns … was that he would get aggressive and retaliate.”
After the hearing, Tubbs’ alleged rapist was found not guilty. According to Tubbs, she was given an appeal in August but has yet to hear from the university and has been unable to make contact.
“I don’t think it’s the rape that makes the person a victim,” Tubbs said. “I think it’s the systemic failure that makes someone from a survivor to a victim. … I can honestly say I won’t stop fighting until those systems change.”
One should be very careful to note here that this system she was subjected to is royally FUCKED regardless of whether her accusations are true or not and that the analysis in no way requires taking her side or not with respect to whether she was raped. I don’t know and I don’t care whether she was actually raped or not or just believes she was or whatever…that school needs to cut the shit because those hearing rules are blatantly designed to deter these kinds of accusations by letting the alleged victim know that, regardless of whether they were victimized by the accused, they’re certainly going to be victimized by the process of bringing their accusations and seeking redress. Despicable.
Rape is a serious felony and should be a police matter. College disciplinary committees are for academic violations, like plagiarism, not serious felonies. And of course at a trial the accused’s attorney will have the right to cross-examine her, but under the control of a judge.
The police should handle rape. However, that being said, many cases in which the police handle rape will not bring the kind of woman-centric approach that “rape” victims want. If it’s “he-said-she-said”, it’s probably going nowhere. The main problem in the whole situation is that I believe (and I have heard that there is some evidence) there are serial rapists out there in college-land. The standard “each case by itself” approach of law does not allow cops to take other cases into account. That means that many serial rapists get away with serial rape. The discussion in the article does not lead to the confident feeling that she has a case. If you don’t fight back, you are not going to get a conviction. Rape is not something you figure out a couple hours later.
I was unaware that it was up to campus police to offer legal opinions or make determinations regarding prosecution. They must have to pay their security people a lot, what with them needing law degrees & all.
What the school did is appalling but none of it would have happened if the “officer” did his damn job & took the complaint.
Like homicides and kidnapping, sexual assault is too serious a felony to be left to non professionals to investigate. Rape investigations are not solved by statements alone. Physical evidence needs to be gathered that would support one or the others’ statements. Photos of injuries/bruises can show how these originated and support one or another’s statement(s). Sensitive expert questioners need to conduct witness/victim/alleged perp interviews. Only trained police investigators can do this.
The mere fact that a school would leave this investigation to a possible crime victim shows it does not take this crime seriously. No one so close to such a traumatic event should be put through this… And if the Campus police are not doing this than they are worthless as a police agency, too close to the institution’s administration to do an independent neutral sleuthing.
Some seemingly tiny seeming detail could break such a case. For example, suspect says it wasn’t him because he’s been home for “hours”, but the car he drove is very warm on the hood. Often when police confront him with this fact he changes his story, and this leads to further lies being exposed.