Harvard has asked a federal court to dismiss a recent graduate’s sexual assault lawsuit brought under Title IX. The suit alleges that Harvard took no action in response to Alyssa Leader’s complaint to Harvard’s Office of Sexual and Gender-Based Dispute Resolution that she had been sexually assaulted, abused, intimidated, and harassed by a dorm-mate.
Leader says that she faced “deliberate indifference” from the school, that Harvard “failed to follow established Federal guidelines” for handling her complaint, and that the University “did nothing to protect her and make her feel safe on campus.” She and her attorneys claim that that’s a clear violation of Title IX’s provision against sex-based discrimination.
According to the suit, Leader wanted the man she accused of sexual assault removed from her dorm immediately after she made the complaint against him. She also wanted him barred from the dorm’s cafeteria where she worked, and protection from the accused’s friends whom she said also harassed her regularly. Harvard waited to remove the alleged offender until Leader had obtained a restraining order from law enforcement.
Harvard said, in its filing, that they did all they could to address Leader’s complaint, that an investigation into the alleged sexual assault was opened immediately, and that the investigation was comprehensive. Eventually, Harvard concluded (after Leader had left campus) that the accused had done nothing wrong.
The filings say the university was definitely not “deliberately indifferent”: “Even if the Court adopts the version of facts most favorable to Leader, her allegations do not show ‘deliberate indifference.’ ”
Harvard also says it provided Leader with support services in accordance with its policies and was thorough in its consideration of Leader’s claims. Harvard does say that it did not do everything Leader asked or abide by her specific direction when looking into her case — but that’s not Title IX-defined sex-based discrimination.
“It is not sufficient to allege, as Leader does here,” the motion reads in reference to Title IX’s burden of proof, “that Harvard failed to accept her particular remedial demands or that it failed to perform an investigation consistent with her specifications.”
Recently, the Obama Administration began putting pressure on colleges and Universities to use Title IX to speed up investigations of sexual assaults on campus. Through a “Dear Colleague” letter published in 2011, the Administration’s Office for Civil Rights encouraged institutions to use a lower standard, “preponderance of the evidence,” when investigating the veracity of victims’ assault claims.
This case is a new twist: using Title IX as a bludgeon to punish a school that does a comprehensive sexual assault investigation but finds nothing, or using it to go after a school the actions of which don’t live up to the victim’s personal beliefs on how the case should be handled.