DENVER (CN) — A Colorado State student who claims he was falsely accused of rape says a "Dear Colleague" letter from an assistant secretary of the Department of Education encourages colleges to deny male students due process.
As universities' responses to rapes, sexual assaults and harassment have become nationwide news, increasing numbers of young men have sued their colleges, claiming they have been suspended or expelled, though the women acknowledged that the sex was consensual.
Colorado has seen at least two such discrimination lawsuits in the past three years.
In 2015, the University of Colorado Boulder paid a $15,000 settlement to a student whom its campus judicial process found guilty of sexual assault two years earlier.
The John Doe student claimed the school did not advise him of the services and resources available to him when he was accused, and that the process and investigation was one-sided and biased against him as the male perpetrator. The college settled after the alleged victim came forward and acknowledged she had not been coerced into sex.
Last week, a similar federal lawsuit was filed against Colorado State University at Pueblo and the U.S. Department of Education.
Grant Neal, a student athlete, say he was suspended from school for having sex with another student athlete, whom he was training.
Neal, who describes himself in the 90-page lawsuit as "a high profile football player," says a "peer" of his sexual partner saw a hickey on her neck the day after they had sex, and "took it upon herself to make an unsubstantiated report ... that Jane Doe had been raped by plaintiff, notwithstanding her lack of direct knowledge concerning the encounter."
The next paragraph of the lawsuit describes a frantic series of text messages from Neal's friend: "Jane Doe sent a text message to plaintiff at approximately 3:48 p.m. stating 'I need to talk to you ASAP after practice!!!!! Like in person even if we just talk in your car! Please!' She further texted 'I've been running around all day talking to so many people, trying to make things right!!! One of the other Athletic Training students screwed me over! ... She went behind my back and told my AT advisor stuff that wasn't true!!! I'm trying so hard to fix it all. I want to tell you what's going on. Please!'"
Neal says his friend told school administrators that the sexual encounters with Neal had been consensual, but nonetheless, he was himself suspended from school and stripped of two athletic scholarships.
Neal's lawsuit said the problems is systemic, and is caused in part by the April 4, 2011 "Dear Colleague" letter from Russlyn Ali, assistant secretary in the Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights.
The 19-page letter guides colleges through the process of handling sexual violence claims originating on campus, and explains the 1972 Title IX Education Amendment, which prohibits sexual discrimination in schools that received federal funding.
The CU-Boulder student who received the $15,000 settlement also mentioned the "Dear Colleague" letter. Like Neal, he claimed that the letter encourages universities and colleges to mete out harsh punishments to young men without due process.
The crux of the issue, Neal says, is the letter's "preponderance of evidence" requirement.