WACO, Texas (CN) — A Virginia woman claims in court that she was brutally gang-raped by two Baylor football players, but the university took no action and was deliberately indifferent to dozens of incidents of sexual harassment and assault within the football program.
Elizabeth Doe sued Baylor University in Waco, Texas, federal court on Friday. Doe said she chose to attend Baylor because of its strong emphasis on developing Christian faith and learning and its dedication to serving those in need. She hoped to pursue a degree in medicine and says she knew very little about the school’s football program.
The lawsuit describes how the Baylor football team under head coach Art Briles, who was hired in 2008, quickly changed from a perennial loser to one that dominated the Big 12 Southern Conference and became a national title contender.
Baylor’s sudden success saw alumni donations rise and its football players become “larger-than-life celebrities on campus,” the complaint states. Then-President and Chancellor Kenneth Starr reportedly proclaimed that Baylor was entering a “golden era.”
But while Baylor football players had tremendous success on the field, their off-the-field behavior became a problem.
“From 2009-2015, Baylor football players were responsible for numerous crimes involving violent physical assault, armed robbery, burglary, drugs, guns, and, notably, the most widespread culture of sexual violence and abuse of women ever reported in a collegiate athletic program,” Doe’s lawsuit states.
The culture of sexual violence at Baylor was a result of the recruiting methods used by Briles and his staff, according to the complaint.
“In order to ensure that a last place team could recruit the players needed to win football games, recruiting efforts used sex to sell the program,” Doe claims.
Doe says Baylor football coaching staff used a so-called “show ‘em a good time” policy in their recruiting efforts, which meant that football players could engage in certain behavior with no consequences. Such alleged behavior included players arranging for women, alcohol and illegal drugs for parties when recruits were in town; taking underage recruits to bars and strip clubs; and paying for off-campus football parties.
According to the lawsuit, Baylor football coaches encouraged these recruiting practices. For example, Assistant Coach Kendall Briles allegedly told a potential recruit from a Dallas area high school, “Do you like white women? Because we have a lot of them at Baylor and they LOVE football players.” (Emphasis in original.)
Football staff also arranged for women from the Baylor Bruins football “hostess” program to have sex with recruits on their official campus visits to help secure their commitment, Doe says. The Bruins program has an official policy of no sexual contact with recruits or players.
“Baylor had an unofficial policy of looking the other way when there was sexual intercourse between the Bruins and the football players,” Doe says. The complaint notes there is a well-documented connection between such hostess programs and sexual violence.
Doe also claims the university controlled the context of the rape and harassment. “Baylor paid for the off-campus housing, which was the location of most of the sexual assaults, by use of a housing stipend credited to the athletes’ accounts,” she says.
The lawsuit then goes into the striking details of the alleged culture of sexual violence at Baylor during Briles’ tenure.
