ITHACA, N.Y. (AP) — A former top Justice Department official will review how Cornell handles sexual misconduct complaints, university administrators announced Tuesday as they tried to respond to an outpouring of anger over allegations of gang rape in 2024 in a fraternity house.
Sally Yates, who was deputy attorney general in the Obama administration, will spearhead the review, administrators said. The assessment must include how the Ivy League university investigates reports of sexual assault and sexual harassment, how the disciplinary process works, campus police responses and more.
“It is imperative that Cornell be prepared to examine itself with the same rigor that we expect of others,” board chair Anne Meinig Smalling said in a statement.
The announcement comes after days of outrage and widespread protest about Cornell’s response to a complaint from a woman known publicly only as Jane Doe. She told campus police in November 2024 that, a few weeks earlier, she had been sexually assaulted by several Chi Phi fraternity brothers after they were pressured to drink and do drugs.
No criminal charges have been filed. The Chi Phi chapter at Cornell was closed and the Ivy League university said he expelled some students and suspended others.
Yates will review how the woman’s complaint was handled and oversight of fraternities, sororities and other groups on campus, Cornell said.
The woman continued universityseven former students, fraternity and others last month.
Lawyers for two of the former students have denied participating in a sexual assault. Attempts by The Associated Press to reach the other men or their representatives were unsuccessful. Court records show that during an investigation by Cornell under federal Title IX lawsome of the accused students maintained that the sexual activity was consensual.
The trial set a new one, national spotlight about the allegations and the response from campus police, the university and the local prosecutor.
that of New York the Attorney General is currently conducting a criminal investigationand the state governor requested an independent review of Cornell’s handling of the case — the review Yates will now lead.
Cornell students, faculty and others gathered in the campus plaza Monday to protest the university’s response to sexual assault complaints and demand more accountability, greater transparency, an overhaul of the disciplinary process and other changes.
Yates had a decades-long career at the Justice Department, serving for years as the chief federal prosecutor in Atlanta and then as deputy attorney general.
She gained particular prominence in January 2017 when, as acting attorney general at the start of the Trump administration, she led the Justice Department’s lawyers failing to defend the constitutionality of President Donald Trump’s immigration and refugee ban. She was quickly fired, with Trump accusing her of treason and insubordination.
Yates also made headlines when it emerged that, in a conversation days before his departure, she expressed her concern at the Trump White House on the contacts that Trump’s new national security adviser, Michael Flynn, had with the Russian ambassador during the presidential transition period. Flynn was later fired.
Yates has been in private practice since leaving the Department of Justice. His practice with the law firm King & Spalding includes conducting independent investigations for external organizations and companies.
She led a high-profile investigation into allegations of abuse and misconduct, including allegations of harassment and coercion, within the National Women’s Soccer League. The investigation concluded in 2022 with a finding of systemic abuse.
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Peltz reported from New York. Associated Press writer Eric Tucker contributed from Washington.
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