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    "original_url": "https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/10\/01\/nyregion\/cornell-rape-fraternity-chi-phi-men.html?emc=edit_nn_20261002&nl=the-morning&segment_id=227407",
    "parsed_content": "Cornell Rape InvestigationWhat We\u00a0KnowTimelineSpecial ProsecutorTakeaways From Inquiry\u2018Jane Doe\u2019Men Accused in LawsuitAdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTSupported bySKIP ADVERTISEMENTMen Accused in Cornell Sex Assault Suit Give Varying Accounts of NightTheir accounts, detailed in hundreds of pages of investigative files obtained by The New York Times, were disjointed and sometimes contradictory. All the men denied any wrongdoing.Listen \u00b7 9:07 min Share full articleAt the Chi Phi fraternity house at Cornell University, a student identified as Jane Doe said she was raped multiple times in October 2024.Credit...Heather Ainsworth for The New York TimesBy Maia ColemanClaire Fahy and Michael C. BenderOct. 1, 2026Leer en espa\u00f1olSee more of our coverage in your search results.Encuentra m\u00e1s de nuestra cobertura en los resultados de b\u00fasqueda. Add The New York Times on GoogleAgrega The New York Times en Google In the weeks after a Cornell University student reported being raped at a fraternity party on campus, most of the men she accused were questioned by university officials about their actions that night.Their answers, which have not been previously reported, were detailed in hundreds of pages of confidential investigative files obtained by The New York Times.The woman, who left Cornell and last month filed a lawsuit against the university, the fraternity and seven of its members, and her sorority, said she was plied with drugs in October 2024 after a night of heavy drinking and sexually assaulted multiple times at the Chi Phi fraternity house.But in hours of interviews and a statement collected during Cornell\u2019s administrative investigation over the winter of 2024, all the men denied any wrongdoing. Four acknowledged having sexual contact with the woman but said that their interactions had been consensual. The others denied participating in sexual encounters.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTOne said that he, in fact, was \u201ca victim of sexual misconduct\u201d because the woman had given him oral sex when he was \u201ctoo incapacitated\u201d to consent.All their accounts differed, frequently contradicted each other and generally ran counter to the statements given by the woman to the Cornell police in 2024. The majority said they did not think the woman appeared intoxicated.Most of the interviews, which were conducted by the university\u2019s Title IX office, focused not on asking explicitly whether the men had raped the woman but rather on more quotidian questions: where they had been that night, what they had said and why they had found themselves in the bedroom to begin with.None of the men has been charged with a crime \u2014 the local district attorney declined to pursue a criminal case after reviewing the Cornell police report about her complaint in 2024. But each was identified by name in her lawsuit filed on Sept. 16 and accused of sexually assaulting her, and the district attorney, Matthew Van Houten of Tompkins County, has since said that his office would again consider whether charges were warranted.Since the woman, identified in her lawsuit as Jane Doe, sued the fraternity members, the men have largely remained silent. Lawyers for at least three of them have issued statements denying criminal wrongdoing.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTLawyers for six of the men did not respond to requests for comment.Jeremy Saland, who represents the seventh, Scott Kretzschmar, acknowledged that his client had participated in a group chat that described the sexual encounters in lewd terms but had otherwise done nothing wrong.\u201cTaking part in an offensive conversation is not the same as taking part in a rape,\u201d Mr. Saland said, adding that he had reached out to the district attorney and was confident Mr. Kretzschmar would be exonerated. \u201cPlease let the process work before recklessly proliferating or coming to a wrongful conclusion about him.\u201dIn the statements detailed in the investigative records, Mr. Kretzschmar and the other men described their recollections of the night of the party in their own words.ImageThe allegations have roiled the campus and ignited a nationwide dialogue about privilege and consent.Credit...Heather Ainsworth for The New York TimesThey said their interactions with Jane Doe began when one of the men, Matthew Ingalls, asked if she wanted to have a threesome with him and another fraternity member, Jonathan Newell.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTThat request later spiraled into a series of sexual encounters, they said. It was Mr. Newell who, not long into their encounter, fired off a Snapchat message to dozens of other members advertising \u201cfree pussy\u201d in the bedroom, according to Jane Doe\u2019s lawsuit.Mr. Newell told investigators that he was invited by Mr. Ingalls to participate in the threesome, saying he assumed Mr. Ingalls had asked for permission, the records show. Mr. Newell said that he and Mr. Ingalls had drunk a lot and consumed marijuana and ketamine, causing both to throw up.The other men involved that night said that Jane Doe and those around her did not seem overly inebriated and that they themselves had not had too much to drink.\u201cThey weren\u2019t slurring their speech,\u201d said Winston Lee, one of the accused men. \u201cThey seem perfectly normal.\u201dAnother fraternity brother, Gillio Lopes, who, along with Mr. Newell lived in the room where the sexual encounters took place, said that he had \u201ca pretty solid recollection\u201d of the night because in his view he had not drunk that much \u2014 roughly six beverages, he estimated, in the form of three Keystone beers and three vodka-and-Hawaiian Punch mixed drinks.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTWhen asked about his involvement with Jane Doe, Mr. Lopes said that she initiated their sexual contact and did not ask for his consent \u2014 a statement flatly at odds with her account of the night.Mr. Lopes left around 2 a.m., he said, after he said he became \u201cuncomfortable,\u201d and went with three friends to McDonald\u2019s. He said he did not tell them about what had transpired, in part because he was \u201cadmittedly a bit embarrassed about what happened,\u201d according to the interview records.Mr. Lee also said that Jane Doe initiated sexual activity without asking. He said he snorted a line of ketamine off her body and she tried to initiate sex.\u201cI kind of took a step back because I didn\u2019t want to engage in anything like sex,\u201d Mr. Lee said. \u201cI thought it wasn\u2019t the time for that.\u201dBut later that night, Mr. Lee said he asked for Jane Doe\u2019s consent before engaging in a threesome with her. He recalled telling Jane Doe that \u201cif you\u2019re uncomfortable with any of this or you won\u2019t want to do this, that\u2019s perfectly fine. We can call it a night.\u201d He said Jane Doe replied: \u201cWe\u2019re all consenting adults here.\u201dAdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTAnother of the men, Mr. Kretzschmar, told interviewers that he and his friend Scott Norris entered the room after reading Mr. Newell\u2019s Snapchat message, which he said had left him \u201cbefuddled.\u201dHe said Jane Doe was not slurring her words when they arrived and that she did not appear drunk. He said he asked her \u201cif she was all right just because the nature of the text, and there was one female in the room with a couple dudes.\u201d\u201cWe were just checking out to see if everything was OK, and it was,\u201d he said, later adding of Ms. Doe: \u201cAnd if she wasn\u2019t, I\u2019d like to think that I would have helped out and did something about it.\u201dMr. Norris, in his interview, said he had been \u201csomewhat concerned\u201d when he received Mr. Newell\u2019s Snapchat message, but assumed it was \u201ccrude humor.\u201d He said he did not do any drugs in the room and did not have sex with Jane Doe.\u201cShe was conversational with people, and that alleviated whatever concerns I had from the text before,\u201d Mr. Norris said, adding that he stayed in the room for only five minutes and that all the men in the room were completely or partially clothed for the duration.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTIn her interview with the police, Jane Doe said that Mr. Kretzschmar and Mr. Norris were \u201cmore like voyeurs than anything,\u201d the records show.Diego Sarabia said he entered the room after 2:30 a.m. and was shocked by the scene before him: Several fraternity brothers were there, and one was standing behind Jane Doe, although Mr. Sarabia refused to say whether the person was naked or dressed.\u201cI was immensely concerned since I\u2019ve never seen anything like this in my four years at the house,\u201d he said, according to the records.But he said his concerns were allayed when \u201call the people in the room\u201d told him to come in.\u201cI remember the girl in specific saying something along the lines of, \u2018This was normal in the medieval times,\u2019\u201d he said. Jane Doe said at one point he insulted her before grabbing her and kissing her.Jane Doe, a sophomore at the time, was also interviewed at length by Cornell\u2019s Title IX investigators, as were about 20 other people, including her friends and other witnesses to the night and its aftermath.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTShe described a horrific night in the fraternity room where she could not reach her phone. She said she was given large amounts of drugs and alcohol and repeatedly raped by men she barely knew or had never met, the files show.\u201cI was super drunk,\u201d she said.Still, she said, she came to understand what had happened to her. When she gave her account to a police investigator three weeks after the party, she was unequivocal: \u201cI can say with 100 percent confidence I was raped,\u201d she said.Cornell said on Monday that it gave the men \u201ca range of sanctions, which included expulsions and suspensions.\u201d Thomas Giuffra, Jane Doe\u2019s lawyer, has said that only two of the men were expelled, which his client does not consider justice.Jay Root and Hurubie Meko contributed reporting.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENT",
    "published_at": "2026-10-01T16:38:22+00:00",
    "author_name": "Maia Coleman, Claire Fahy, Michael C. Bender",
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    "ai_headline": "Men Accused in Cornell Sex Assault Suit Give Varying Accounts of Night",
    "ai_simplified_title": "Cornell Fraternity Members Give Varying Accounts of Alleged Rape Night",
    "ai_excerpt": "Men accused in a Cornell University sex assault lawsuit provided conflicting accounts of the night in question, detailed in confidential investigative files. While all denied wrongdoing, their statements often contradicted each other and the accuser's testimony.",
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