Roommates of a Cornell University student who accused seven fraternity members of drugging and sexually assaulting her said she appeared to be in shock and took time to process what had happened, according to accounts given to investigators.
One roommate said she exchanged messages with the student at about 3.05am on October 20, 2024, asking when she would return home. The student replied that she was unsure.
She arrived at about 11.15am and told both roommates that she had had sex with several men and had taken ketamine. One roommate said she did not “really remember [Jane Doe] ever kind of citing that she had said yes to anything that occurred”.
However, the student did not initially use the word “rape” to describe the encounter, one roommate told investigators. The other said she appeared to be “in shock” at the time.
In the following week, as rumours circulated on campus, the student told one roommate: “If anyone asks about this, say it didn’t happen.” The roommate said she appeared to move from describing the incident as a “crazy thing that happened to her” to recognising that “it was something bad”.
About a week later, one roommate overheard a telephone conversation between the student and Matthew Ingalls, one of the Chi Phi fraternity members she had accused. The student had exchanged frequent text messages with him in the week after the alleged sexual assault.
According to the roommate, Ingalls apologised during the call and the student responded: “How could you let this happen?”
The roommate told authorities that she believed the student initially “wanted it to be consensual” before later reporting the encounter as sexual assault. She also said: “I’d have conversations and she would describe a part of what happened and I would tell her that that is what could be classified as rape.”
The Tompkins County district attorney has not filed charges since reopening the criminal case, but has said he aims to convene a grand jury and present evidence to it.
