sexual violence on campus

Sexual Violence

You have been accused of sexual violence on campus. You believe this means an investigation will take place where neutral parties examine the evidence and determine what actually happened. You think the truth will come out. You are wrong about all of this. Welcome to Spodek Law Group. Our goal is to tell you something that changes how you understand your situation: you are not facing an investigation. You are facing a compliance exercise. The institution has already decided the outcome it needs to produce. Your guilt is the path of least resistance for a school that receives billions in federal funding contingent on aggressive response to sexual violence allegations. Your innocence is an obstacle they need to work around.

The label “sexual violence” is not a finding. It is a trigger. The moment that label attaches to an allegation against you, the school’s self-preservation machinery activates. The Office for Civil Rights at the Department of Education has made clear that schools must respond promptly and aggressively to sexual violence. Schools that appear lenient face federal investigation, public relations disasters, and potential loss of the funding that keeps them operational. Finding you responsible demonstrates compliance. Finding you not responsible invites scrutiny. The system is designed to validate allegations, not evaluate them.

Todd Spodek founded this firm on one principle: students deserve to understand exactly what they are facing before they make any decisions. What you are facing is a process where 87 percent of institutions receive a D or F grade for their failure to protect due process rights. What you are facing is a system where only 28 percent of schools guarantee the presumption of innocence that 85 percent of students believe you deserve. What you are facing is an institution that may have already begun punishing you before any evidence has been presented.

The Label That Ends Your Education

Heres the thing that nobody explains to students when they get accused of sexual violence on campus. The term “sexual violence” triggers an institutional response that has nothing to do with finding out what actualy happened. Schools recieve federal funding under Title IX. That funding comes with strings attached. One of those strings is that schools must respond aggresivly to sexual violence allegations. The 2011 Dear Colleague Letter from the Department of Education made this abundantly clear to university administrators across the country – respond fast, respond hard, or face consequences.

The pressure on schools is immense and its completly one-sided. If a school finds too many students “not responsible” for sexual violence allegations, the Office for Civil Rights can investigate. Federal funding can be threatend. Media coverage turns hostile. The schools reputation suffers. Administrators lose their jobs. But if a school finds students responsible – even when the evidence is weak, even when exculpatory evidence exists, even when the alleged victim denies that anything happened – there are basicly no consequences for the institution. The accused student might file a lawsuit years later, but by then the administrators who made the decision have moved on and the schools insurance handles the settlement.

Think about what this incentive structure means for you. The school has every reason to find you responsible and almost no reason to find you not responsible. Your guilt solves their compliance problem. Your innocence creates one. You are not facing an impartial investigation – you are facing an institution that needs a particular outcome to protect its funding and its reputation. Thats the reality wheather you want to beleive it or not.

OK so heres something that makes accused students absolutly furious when they finaly understand it. The formal investigation has not even started yet, and the school may have already begun actively punishing you. These are called “interim measures” or “supportive measures” and they can include being removed from your campus housing, being required to change your class schedule, losing your campus job, being banned from certain buildings or areas of campus, and being placed under no-contact orders that restrict your social life. All of this can happen before a single piece of evidence has been presented against you. Before you have had any opportunity to tell your side of the story.

Heres the kicker about these interim measures. They are supposidly designed to be “non-punitive” according to the regulations. The school will claim they are just protecting the campus community while the investigation proceeds. But if you are kicked out of your dorm and have to find somewhere else to live, that is punitive. If you lose your campus job and cannot pay your bills, that is punitive. If you are banned from the library during finals week, that is punitive. The school can completely destroy your semester before any hearing ever takes place and then call it a protective measure instead of punishment. The effect on your life is exactally the same wheather they call it punishment or not.

51% vs. 90%: The Standard That Convicts When Courts Cant

The standard of proof in most Title IX sexual violence proceedings is “preponderance of the evidence.” This means the hearing panel only needs to beleive that its more likely than not that the alleged conduct occured. More likely than not. Fifty-one percent certainty. Basicly a coin flip plus a feather is enough to find you responsible and permanantly end your college education.

Compare that to the criminal standard of “beyond a reasonable doubt.” Legal scholars and courts generaly agree this standard means aproximately ninety percent certainty or higher. To convict you criminaly of sexual assault, a prosecutor must prove your guilt to a jury beyond any reasonable doubt. To find you responsible under Title IX, a panel of professors and administrators who have taken some compliance training only needs to think its slightly more probible than not that you did what your accuser says you did.

Heres the practical implication of this gap that destorys students lives every single day. You can be found responsible in a Title IX proceeding and then aquitted in criminal court for the exact same underlying conduct. The evidence might be completly insufficent to convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt – meaning a criminal court finds you not guilty – but that same evidence was sufficient to meet the much lower preponderance standard used in your campus proceeding. You can win your criminal case and still lose your education becuase the two systems use fundamentaly different measuring sticks.

At Spodek Law Group, we have seen this pattern play out repeatedley with devastating consequences. The criminal charges get dismissed becuase the evidence simply is not strong enough. But the university already found the student responsible months earlier under its much lower standard. The student is already expelled. The transcript is already marked. The damage is already done and cannot be undone. Winning the criminal case does not reverse the expulsion. It does not restore your enrollment. It does not erase the notation on your permanant academic record that follows you for the rest of your life.

Prosecutor, Judge, Jury: One Person

Under whats called the “single investigator model,” one administrator can serve as the detective who gathers evidence, the prosecutor who builds the case against you, the judge who evaluates the evidence, and the jury who decides your fate. One person with all that power. One person whose biases and errors have no effective check. One person who has every institutional incentive to find you responsible.

A federal judge in Doe v. Brandeis University recognized exactally how dangerous this is when he wrote: “The dangers of combining in a single individual the power to investigate, prosecute, and convict, with little effective power of review, are obvious.” The American Bar Association has denounced this approach. Legal scholars across the political spectrum have criticized it as fundamentaly unfair. And yet schools continue to use it becuase its efficient – efficient at producing the responsible findings that demonstrate compliance with federal requirements.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression has been grading universities on their due process protections for years. The results are absolutly damning. Only one in ten institutions guarantees students or their representitives a meaningful opportunity to cross-examine witnesses. Seventy percent of schools do not guarantee the right to sufficient time with access to all relevant evidence to prepare for a hearing. The procedural protections that would exist in any legitimate legal proceeding are simply absent from campus sexual violence adjudications at the vast majority of American colleges and universities.

Look at what this means practicaly for your ability to defend yourself. You cannot effectivly challenge your accusers version of events if you cannot ask them questions directley or through a representitive. You cannot prepare a meaningfull defense if you do not have access to all the evidence being used against you. You cannot identify inconsistancies in witness statements if you do not have time to review them carefuly. The system is deliberatly designed to prevent you from mounting the kind of defense that would be your constitutional right in any criminal proceeding.

When The Victim Says No And They Expel Anyway

Heres something that reveals exactally how broken this system is. Matt Boermeester was a student-athlete at USC who was accused of domestic abuse against his girlfriend Zoe Katz. The allegation did not come from Katz herself – it came from a third party who reported something they claimed to have witnessed. When investigators contacted Katz about the allegation, she denied that any abuse had occured. She stated repeatedley and consistantly that Boermeester had not abused her. She later released a public statement describing the entire process as “horrible and unjust” for both of them.

USC expelled Boermeester anyway.

Let that sink in for a moment. The alleged victim denied that any abuse happened. She called the investigation horrible and unjust. She supported the accused student. And the university still expelled him. The institutions need to demonstrate aggressive response to sexual violence allegations trumped the actual wishes and testimony of the person the investigation was supposidly designed to protect. The compliance machinery ran right over her denial becuase stopping would have created a paper trail showing the school did not respond aggresivly to a sexual violence allegation.

This is what happens when institutional self-preservation becomes more important than finding the truth. Third-party complaints trigger investigations that proceed regardles of what the alleged victim says. The schools need to demonstrate compliance overrides any consideration of what actualy happened. Students are expelled based on allegations that the very people they supposedly harmed deny ever occured.

The Evidence That Wont Save You

At Amherst College, a male student was expelled for sexual misconduct despite the existence of text messages from his accuser admitting that she had initiated the sexual contact. These messages were powerfully exculpatory – they directley contradicted the accusers claims and suggested the encounter had been consensual. When the accused student finaly discovered these texts and presented them to the school, the universitys response was devastating: it was too late. The texts had been sent during the timeframe for appeals, and the school said he should have found them sooner. His expulsion stood despite evidence that could have completly changed the outcome.

A federal judge expresed “deep skepticism” about Amhersts conduct in the case. The school eventualy settled rather than defend its actions in court. But by then the student had already been expelled. He had already lost years of his education. The vindication came far too late to undo the damage the school had inflicted.

In another case, a student was actualy found “not responsible” by the initial hearing panel – he won at the first level of the universitys own process. But on appeal, a university administrator reversed that finding and expelled him anyway. The administrator based his decision on other conduct “about which plaintiff had no notice were in issue.” The student was expelled for allegations he had not even been told about. He never had any opportunity to defend against charges he did not know existed until after he was already expelled.

Over eight hundred students have filed lawsuits against colleges and universities claiming they were falsly accused or denied fundamental fairness in campus sexual misconduct proceedings. More than two hundred court decisions have been issued in favor of accused students since 2013. Gary Pavela, a longtime observer of higher education law, stated: “In over twenty years of reviewing higher education law cases, Ive never seen such a string of legal setbacks for universities.” The courts are pushing back against the unfairness – but the system keeps producing more victims.

Heres the cruel irony of these lawsuits. Even when students win their legal challenges, they have already been expelled. They have already lost semesters or years of their education. Their transcripts are already marked. Their reputation is already damaged. The vindication comes too late to undo the practical damage that has already been done. Winning a lawsuit against your university years later does not give you back the education they took from you. It does not restore the relationships they destroyed. It does not erase the trauma of being branded as someone who committed sexual violence when you did not.

The Criminal Parallel Track

Heres something else that makes this situation extremly dangerous for accused students. If you are facing a Title IX sexual violence allegation, there is a good chance you are also facing or will soon face criminal charges for the same underlying conduct. These two processes run in parallel but operate under completly different rules with completly different standards and completly different consequences.

The criminal system gives you constitutional protections. You have the right to remain silent under the Fifth Amendment. You have the right to confront your accuser under the Sixth Amendment. You have the presumption of innocence. The prosecution must prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. In a Title IX proceeding, you have basicly none of these protections. Your silence can be held against you. You may not be able to question your accuser effectivly. The standard is a mere preponderance – fifty one percent.

Think about what this means stratgicaly. Your criminal defense attorney will tell you not to talk to anyone about the case – thats standard and good advice for protecting your criminal defense. But your silence in the Title IX investigation can be interpreted as evidence of responsibility. What protects you in one proceeding damages you in the other. And heres where it gets even worse – statements you make in the Title IX proceeding can potentialy be subpoenaed and used against you in criminal court. You face an impossible strategic situation where every choice that helps one case hurts the other.

What Defense Actually Looks Like

If you are facing a sexual violence allegation on campus, you need immediate professional help. Not tomorrow. Not next week. Now. Evidence is dissapearing while you wait. Witnesses are forgetting details. The school is already building its case against you and may have already imposed interim measures that are disrupting your life. Every day you delay makes your situation worse.

The defense strategy for campus sexual violence cases is completly different from criminal defense strategy – and often conflicts with it. In criminal court, your Fifth Amendment right to remain silent protects you. In a Title IX proceeding, your silence can be used against you and interpreted as evidence of responsibility. Statements you make in the Title IX investigation can potentialy be subpoenaed and used against you in criminal proceedings. The wrong statement to a Title IX investigator can destroy your criminal defense. The right statement to protect your criminal case can sink your Title IX defense.

At Spodek Law Group, we understand that students facing sexual violence allegations need attorneys who know how to navigate both systems simultaneosly without sacrificing one for the other. We handle Title IX defense for students nationwide and work with criminal defense counsel to ensure your defense in each proceeding supports rather than undermines the other. Todd Spodek has seen how these cases actualy play out – the institutional pressures, the procedural traps, the ways schools ignore evidence that should exonerate students.

You have been accused of sexual violence. The school has already begun its process. The system is designed to find you responsible regardless of what actualy happened. Evidence will be ignored. Procedures will be stacked against you. Your silence will be held against you while your statements are used to convict you.

Call us at 212-300-5196. The consultation is free. The mistake of waiting could cost you everything.

The institution is not trying to find out what happened. Its trying to protect itself by finding you responsible. That is the reality you are facing. Your defense needs to account for that reality from day one.