Text messages exchanged after a night of drinking, drug use and group sex at Cornell University’s Chi Phi fraternity house show Jane Doe reassuring a fraternity member and asking him to help recover earrings she believed she had lost.
The messages, sent between October 21 and October 31, 2024, came less than 48 hours after the incident. Cornell’s Title IX investigation later found the man responsible for sexual assault and he was expelled, according to Doe’s lawyer and the New York Times.
The man, identified as MALE 2 in Doe’s civil lawsuit, has not been charged with a crime and has denied wrongdoing. He is one of seven men named in the lawsuit.
Messages exchanged after the Cornell fraternity incident
In the first message, MALE 2 apologised for what had happened, saying his memory was “kinda fuzzy” and that he and another man felt guilty for being too intoxicated to stop events from escalating.
Doe replied that her own memory was “super clouded” and that those involved had been “way too f—ing drunk and high”. She said she believed the sexual activity had not been illegal and wrote that she had enjoyed being with MALE 2 and MALE 1.
She added: “I don’t think we should feel any shame for the part,” before telling him she was available to talk because “that was a lot”.
The following day, the pair continued exchanging light-hearted messages about rumours surrounding the night. Doe described herself as being regarded socially as “a massive slut” and said she did not want to hear what people were saying.
She also suggested they smoke together again, but without “the extra 5 billion men and ketamine”. MALE 2 responded that he was giving up hard drugs.
Doe then mentioned that she had lost two earrings. MALE 2 said he would look for them after class, while Doe later told him that she had marked the incident on her “rice purity” score.
On October 24, Doe asked what had happened after someone suggested she speak to MALE 2. He replied that nothing had happened and said he had gone to another fraternity house prepared to be questioned and deny everything, but that nobody had raised the matter.
A week later, Doe returned to the subject of the earrings, saying they had been a birthday present from her mother and that she wanted them back. After she sent a photograph showing the missing items, MALE 2 said he would look for them immediately.
Thomas Giuffra, Doe’s lawyer, said the tone of the messages reflected what he called “classic symptoms of delayed recognition”, describing them as “a textbook response to sexual assault”.
