00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. It is Friday, October 2nd, and it is now officially, officially an active criminal investigation as the Cornell gang rape story. As we hear more details and more disturbing details about not only what happened to this young woman, but what happened to her afterwards. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ, an episode in which Robes, we're hopping on, Just moments ago, we saw a press conference with the governor of New York and the attorney general of New York, who are now very much front and center in this story.
00:00:37
Speaker 2: Yes, it was a brief. It was a very brief press conference.
00:00:40
Speaker 3: But the bottom line is Governor Hochul made it very clear and very public that she believes that the police department and the prosecutor failed this alleged rape victim.
00:00:54
Speaker 2: And that is about to change now.
00:00:57
Speaker 1: Robes, the attorney general of New York has essentially taken over from the district attorney in that county, the one who was supposed to seek justice for this young lady in 2024 when this happened. And she went and talked to police. Here we are two years later. The state has to get involved. You know what? Not even to provide justice for this young woman, just to listen to her.
00:01:24
Speaker 2: Yes, or to provide an actual investigation.
00:01:27
Speaker 1: What the hell? She wasn't even listened to.
00:01:29
Speaker 2: She wasn't.
00:01:30
Speaker 3: And to the point where you actually have the DA saying, I didn't know she said that. I didn't see that. I wasn't made aware of that. That is not a good enough excuse. You need to say, I reviewed all the facts of the case and decided not to prosecute because of X, Y, and Z. We never heard that from him. Instead, he's acting like he somehow missed the email or missed the memo or didn't get all the paperwork in.
00:01:56
Speaker 2: What is that? That is not an excuse.
00:01:58
Speaker 3: And so, yes, it's a big deal to see the governor of New York bring in the attorney general of New York to personally oversee this investigation.
00:02:08
Speaker 1: We have a special prosecutor in this case now. You all have been certainly this week following all of these headlines. But yes, Cornell University was named in a lawsuit along with seven members of of the Chi Phi fraternity. This young woman alleging that she was gang raped, she was forced to take drugs, or at least encouraged to take drugs during what was a several hours long gang rape, sexual assault at a fraternity house back in 2024. She told police her story, robes, it went nowhere, no prosecutions. However, the school looked into it, kicked two of the guys out of school, suspended and gave other sanctions to at least five others. So the school... did an investigation and found there was enough to kick people out of school.
00:02:51
Speaker 2: And they shut down the entire fraternity chapter.
00:02:53
Speaker 1: And has not been back. They are still off campus. So, if they found enough robes to take really serious action, how is it the police didn't have enough information to take also serious action?
00:03:08
Speaker 2: And that is the question. That is the glaring question that has yet to actually be answered.
00:03:15
Speaker 1: Well, the answer we're getting... Robes don't, they don't vie from both sides because the Cornell police saying they did one thing and the prosecutor saying, no, you didn't. They're saying we talked to her. We did all these, but we handed over every bit of investigative material to the DA. The DA is now saying some of this stuff in public. I've never heard this stuff before. He's claiming that Cornell didn't turn everything over to him.
00:03:41
Speaker 2: That is what he is claiming.
00:03:42
Speaker 3: But I did like what, what was said by Hochul, then what world would police learn that she was literally gang raped and not elevate those actions to the district attorney? In what world does the prosecutor not interview her?
00:03:55
Speaker 1: You know, that was a good point. The governor didn't just say it was one side or the other. She said both of y'all screwed up. But, Robes, the DA was told that there was a potential gang rape. You don't want to talk to the victim? How does that work?
00:04:10
Speaker 2: That makes no sense, babe. How does that work, really? No sense whatsoever.
00:04:13
Speaker 3: Okay. unless somehow he had just decided, look, the question is, look, no university, and especially not a prestigious university like Cornell, an Ivy League university that parents spend ridiculous amounts of money to send their children to, and children spend their whole lives working hard to get into. Nobody wants there to be a gang rape story out there.
00:04:35
Speaker 2: So look, there are questions. Is this something that No one wants to.
00:04:39
Speaker 3: Be true, so they just sweep it under the rug because it's bad for everyone. I mean, you do have to wonder if part of that plays a role. This is an icky, awful, terrible story, and better that no one finds out about it.
00:04:53
Speaker 1: But how does that, well, okay, we're talking two different entities here, the Cornell police versus the Cornell, I don't know, administration, right? They looked into it. It didn't seem like they were, and you tell me, babe, if I'm speaking, if I have this wrong. They investigated it. It seems like Cornell, the administration, did what they were supposed to do and took action against these young men who were accused of doing something heinous. They found, yeah, it was bad enough. Two of y'all get the hell out of our school. Some of them were suspended, even couldn't come back for semesters. That was very serious. So that's one thing. Did they do something wrong, or was it police on Cornell's campus that swept something under the rug by not giving all the worst... most important details to the DA?
00:05:39
Speaker 2: Yes, I think it's the police who dropped the ball here.
00:05:42
Speaker 3: Cornell did what they could do, I believe, in terms of what their ability to discipline the alleged rapists were. They followed through. But it certainly, I don't know, I just think questions need to be asked. Why would police not have pursued charges? Why would they not have given the prosecutor's office, if it's true that they didn't give them all the details, why wouldn't they have passed that along? Because it's one thing for the university to privately deal with this and remove these potential bad actors off their campus. It's another thing to have police involved, headlines to be written, and the entire campus to suddenly be made aware of something beyond just rumors and whispers.
00:06:26
Speaker 1: Disciplinary action on the university, they will keep that quiet and private. You make a good point there. If, again, That is an allegation that's out there right now. That's not just us. Why in God's name? If a woman came to Cornell Police, said, I was gang raped, here is who they are, this is when it happened, this is where it happened. Okay, we got your information, young lady. Now we're going to go give it to the DA so the DA can make a determination to file charges. But we're going to take out the part about the gang rape? Then what are you handing over? That makes no sense.
00:06:55
Speaker 2: It makes no sense. Look, and Hoke will even address this.
00:06:57
Speaker 3: She said she could not have been clearer that she was 100% confident that she had been raped. Shockingly, those words never made it into the account that Cornell sent to the prosecutor's case.
00:07:08
Speaker 1: Then what are you sending? It was the whole point of her coming to police, was it not?
00:07:11
Speaker 3: Yes, so I don't understand either, and it needs to be examined. We need answers to that.
00:07:29
Speaker 1: So as Letitia James is now taking over the Attorney General, Robes, a lot more is starting to come out. So we are getting Robes and several outlets are going over what they say are hundreds and hundreds of pages of notes from the police investigation, from the Cornell investigation. So we're starting to kind of get a trickle of new information, Robes, and some of this stuff, text messages that came out, people who observed the alleged victim here in the days after. We're getting more of a picture. Some of the new stuff, Robes, I didn't realize this. She started to get upset. And the days after, Robes, I know you saw this, and I guess this goes in line, that some of her friends were even saying she didn't seem to even have a grasp on what had happened to her, meaning she never used the word rape or sexual assault.
00:08:18
Speaker 3: Look, and I know that that is something that people will point to and say, aha, she's changed her story because now she's been publicly shamed and she's embarrassed and she hears people talking about her on campus. And so now she has to say it was against her will.
00:08:33
Speaker 2: But the reality is, I mean, most people who are.
00:08:37
Speaker 3: Experts in this type of assault and violence will tell you it is a very common thing for a victim to minimize what happened, to try and laugh it off or make it seem like it isn't a big deal because it's so overwhelming to process. And yes, in this case and in many of them, alcohol is involved, drugs are involved, and some of that was voluntary. And so you feel like you are responsible for what happened to you.
00:09:01
Speaker 2: So you try to make.
00:09:04
Speaker 3: Sense of it without pointing the finger at someone else. And that is so common, and that does seem to be what happened in this case.
00:09:11
Speaker 1: Rose, and it makes sense. It does. They almost describe how through text messages, like over the following days and weeks, you saw a shift in her, a new realization even. And Rose, you described it better than I did. I had it in my own mind, right? There is a shame. You almost try to laugh off, or what did I do wrong? This didn't really happen to me. One of her friends, actually, in one of these notes said she had not yet processed what had happened to her. She had not yet processed. So this is a, she was a sophomore, I believe, at the time this was going on. So what was she, 18, 19, maybe? She's 19 years old.
00:09:48
Speaker 2: And look, here's the deal.
00:09:50
Speaker 1: You.
00:09:52
Speaker 3: I can speak to this and I think a lot of women listening will understand this.
00:09:57
Speaker 2: No one wants to be a victim.
00:09:59
Speaker 3: And so I do think there's a part of that where you're like, well, I did drink and I did put myself in that situation. So I guess I just have to kind of accept my role and my responsibility into what happened to me. Because you don't want to think, I'm some helpless, I'm one of those women who, you know, had some horrible thing happen to her.
00:10:20
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, no.
00:10:21
Speaker 3: I did play a role. It's a weird way to think about it. But no one, if you imagine yourself, no one wants to be a rape victim. No one wants to be a victim, period. And so it makes sense. Initially, you try to rationalize or at least maybe even take on more responsibility than you should, rather than accept that you had something violent and horrific happen to you?
00:10:43
Speaker 1: Roves, this is, I cannot imagine what this young lady was going through on campus, in that she first started feeling shame, disgust, embarrassment. Roves, they said she was, according to these notes, she saw on message boards on campus that were meant for Greek life, People started talking about this story, started talking about and there were rumors and buzzing about what had happened at the frat house. Robes, that's awful. That is awful.
00:11:15
Speaker 2: It's terrible.
00:11:16
Speaker 1: Everybody is talking about her, buzzing about her, know who she is. And you can imagine the names they're calling her. This is a 18, 19, 20 year old kid possibly on this college campus. Robes, that's devastating.
00:11:29
Speaker 2: I want to start crying right now. It's as awful as it gets.
00:11:33
Speaker 1: Okay, so some back and forth with some text messages that were released. One, I think this one had been out, but this was from one of the accused. It said, quote, I just want to apologize for how things went down the other night. Should have shut it down and kicked people out before it got way out of hand. Again, these are accusations. These are allegations. Nobody's been convicted of a crime. That one... goes to at least, doesn't it sound like Robes, confirming some at least general details of the event.
00:12:08
Speaker 3: And there's some acknowledgement there of doing something wrong. No question, like there is remorse in that text. And yes, an actual apology. So she responds, correct? Yes. To that saying at the end of the day, none of the sexual stuff was illegal.
00:12:29
Speaker 2: And honestly, I really like being with you and Matt.
00:12:32
Speaker 1: So this is how it started against the descriptions. Again, the descriptions we have seen is that she did. She was OK because she thought one guy she was talking to was good looking and he invited this other guy. And she did, according to her own account and her words that we have seen, was OK with. with these two guys she was hanging out with. A threesome.
00:12:50
Speaker 3: Yes, it did seem like she was okay and consensual with having a threesome. But yes, it obviously grew from there. We know that to be true. And look, again, I do think she's probably thinking, well, I was willing to do this. Maybe I was asking for it. Maybe I, you know, I really do think that, unfortunately, I can see a young girl and plenty of women thinking that and actually preferring to believe that because at least you... You maintain some sorts of control, like, well, I chose that versus it happened to me. And I do think it takes a while to actually understand, no, actually, I didn't choose that.
00:13:26
Speaker 1: That's what woman you get put in the position like this. What happened to this girl? What is described? I don't know how she could consent to this. Forget the alcohol and drugs. I don't know an 18, 19 year old kid who would say, yeah, seven dudes. Yeah, I'm coming to the house.
00:13:44
Speaker 2: I can tell you no woman actually wants that. God.
00:13:49
Speaker 3: No.
00:13:49
Speaker 1: What they describe is horrific. However, there is a text as well that's been out there, Robes, in which she sent to the same guy we were mentioning, Robes, what do you do with that when she's saying that none of the sexual stuff was illegal? They have this text message from her in which she's saying that to one of the guys she has now accused and named. That's up for interpretation, but a defense attorney is going.
00:14:11
Speaker 3: To go Yes, of course, they're going to use her words against her, but I see somebody who's trying to, again, maintain a sense of control, maintain a sense of not being a victim, and actually almost trying to assure them, I'm not going to say anything. You don't want to destroy your life. You don't want to destroy your friends. You don't want to destroy the community you've built. You don't want to be that girl or that woman who's pointing the finger, and so she's trying to keep some sort of normalcy or some sort of semblance of a community or a group. That's what she's doing there, in my personal opinion.
00:14:46
Speaker 1: Okay, well, there was more to it. So why did things then change? It changed all over a Halloween party. Stay here. We'll explain why Jane Doe decided to go back to the same house where this alleged assault took place. Stay here. All right, folks, we continue here on Amy and TJ. The Cornell gang rape story allegation has really been in headlines this week. Robes, this is everybody everywhere is talking about this. Robes, this is one of those. We talk about sexual assaults on campus. These stories come up. It's always it's been a problem for a long time. Robes, this one is now speaking to people. in a much different way that is going to force changes on college campus.
00:15:43
Speaker 3: And babe, I can speak as a woman who was on a college campus, who had daughters and has one still on a college campus. I worry about this all the time because these cases go unreported for a reason.
00:15:56
Speaker 2: The victim gets blamed. The victim isn't believed.
00:15:59
Speaker 3: The victim is humiliated and examined and actually becomes re-victimized by coming forward.
00:16:07
Speaker 1: God forbid if the victim had a drink that night.
00:16:09
Speaker 2: And most often, obviously, they have.
00:16:11
Speaker 3: You're on a college campus, you're partying. That is how this sort of thing actually is set up or certainly is the foundation for a lot of this violence. And most of these cases do not get reported, period. And I feel like we can all look and examine this case and understand why.
00:16:32
Speaker 1: This one wasn't going to be reported. She didn't go to police immediately. She didn't do a rape kit until a month later.
00:16:37
Speaker 2: It was three weeks later, I believe.
00:16:39
Speaker 1: She didn't. Robes, and that, again, as a woman, Robes, you describe it in a way a guy, I could never, can, no matter how many of these stories I cover. Robes, this idea that a woman is sitting like, I don't want to rock the boat. I don't want to get anybody in trouble. How did I contribute to what happened to me? You all, and you hear women, you all go through a whole list of things before you get to the point of you actually being assaulted.
00:17:06
Speaker 3: Yes, we don't want to be victims, period. And that is just true. And I think, again, every woman listening totally understands that.
00:17:17
Speaker 1: So this young lady, and I guess some women will understand this as well, Robe, she stayed in contact with the guy she is accusing. She stayed in contact and exchanged friendly text messages even. How many times have we seen that in so many of these cases?
00:17:32
Speaker 2: In almost all of the cases.
00:17:34
Speaker 1: All of them, right? And the defense attorney will use that against the woman later. So in this situation, Robes, yes, she did exchange pleasant text messages. But, Robes, there's also an incident in which she wanted to go to a Halloween party at the same damn frat house where this assault happened. She wanted to go, like was desperate and very excited to go, according to these new documents released. Bro, she reached out to the guy that she was now accusing, the main guy, if you will, asked about the party, said she could come, actually used the phrase, this is your house, right? Said that to her. She claims then she gets a phone call from the president of the fraternity, uninviting her. It's for your own good. This probably wouldn't be good for you to be here. Now she gets... Pissed. Now she gets wildly upset, and she sends this text message here, Robes, to the main guy that she's accusing, saying, quote, I knew this was going to happen. The woman will always get the short end of the stick. Y'all aren't my friends. Y'all are covering your asses. A few days later, she went and got a rape kit. Wow. Robes, it's, again, whatever expert can explain this, but this is a young woman saying, You're describing Robes a horrific scene, and you want to go back to that scene.
00:18:56
Speaker 2: Three weeks later.
00:18:58
Speaker 3: She wants to go back to that scene because she wants to have a different memory, and she wants to make herself believe that it's all okay and that nothing bad actually happened to her. She's desperate to go back because she wants to repair this damage she's feeling inside of herself.
00:19:18
Speaker 2: That is why she wants to go back.
00:19:20
Speaker 1: We don't necessarily even need some expert here. Rose, what you're saying makes sense. She wants to know it's all okay. It's all good. He's actually a good guy. This guy's a good guy. We're friends again, and it's cool. Rose, had they not invited her to that or uninvited her?
00:19:39
Speaker 2: She might not have ever come forward.
00:19:40
Speaker 3: Isn't that crazy?
00:19:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, because for her, in a way, you know what?
00:19:43
Speaker 3: It makes me so sad because I also feel like for her, she would have been able to maybe put it to bed.
00:19:48
Speaker 2: Like, it's okay.
00:19:49
Speaker 3: I can forget about this. I don't have to think about this. I don't have to relive this because, you know what? Maybe it wasn't so bad. You can just kind of re-remember things or gloss things over or maybe just put kind of like some fuzziness to it in a way and feel like no permanent damage was done. That's what she was trying to do. And I don't know if Can men understand that you said you did? You can understand that, that desire and why she would go back and why she would want to make it feel like it was all good.
00:20:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, babe. When you say it, I can comprehend it. I've never been in that position. Men don't... There is a way you immediately are able to understand everything this woman did every step of the way where other people, men in particular, hear it and go, well, why would she text him if you like the guy? There's no way you would go back if you were traumatized. That kind of a thing. It makes sense. I know it. But Robes, you all immediately go, oh, yeah, well, yeah. Sometimes we have to have it explained to us by you all, and then we go, okay, now we get it.
00:21:00
Speaker 3: And look, I mean, I now, it's so interesting we are talking about this because if you think about what's happened, you had, and I don't know if the, whoever in the police department chose not to hand over all of the important documents to the district attorney, but we are, I did see men's names attached to all of those decision-making moments. including even the Cornell University president. Now you have two women who are in charge of this investigation, Governor Kathy Hochul and Attorney General Letitia James. And I just think that there might be a better understanding.
00:21:42
Speaker 1: How do they do this, Robes, with— it' s not a requirement enough to say that there's some man out there who can't do a good investigative— interview with a woman. But man, why is this not required? Why, if somebody comes in and said they've been sexually assaulted by a man, okay, we got a woman here for you to talk to. Stand by. Yeah. It seems like that should be an automatic. And you're right, Rose. I didn't think about it. Now, just the face of this.
00:22:06
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:22:07
Speaker 1: We've been seeing men on TV for a week.
00:22:09
Speaker 2: Now it's women.
00:22:10
Speaker 1: Now it's women saying, okay, fellas.
00:22:12
Speaker 2: Things are going to change.
00:22:13
Speaker 1: I don't mind that so much.
00:22:14
Speaker 3: I don't either.
00:22:14
Speaker 1: The other thing that might change This has been debated in New York, in the state of New York, for a while now. But one, the Senate has passed a bill that would close a loophole in the rape law in New York. The House hasn't passed it in robes. You have the voluntary, what's the other one?
00:22:30
Speaker 2: It's called voluntary intoxication loophole.
00:22:33
Speaker 3: And we heard Governor Kathy Hochul talk about this today in the press conference. And she says that she wants... the state of New York to close this loophole. But right now, under the current law here in New York, it is very difficult to prosecute, successfully prosecute an alleged sexual assault or a rape if the victim was intoxicated voluntarily. So if the victim chose to drink alcohol, chose in this case to consume ketamine, I believe is what the drug that they were using, if she chose it, then it's almost impossible to actually have a successful rape investigation or, yes, conviction.
00:23:16
Speaker 1: The accused can use your intoxication as a defense. And they're trying to get rid of that. To say, look, she was high on ketamine. She took the stuff. She was drinking all night. You can use that as a defense to say, it's not a matter of, I didn't tell her to drink that stuff. I didn't force her. They're trying to close that. They are using this case now. I say use. It sounds a little callous. But still, they think we have some momentum now. Everybody's paying attention to Cornell. Maybe they can get this thing passed. What are we supposed to do with a case like this? A bunch of parents who have college... Students, right now, from freshmen to seniors, baby. What's supposed to be the lesson from this? What's supposed to be the conversation?
00:23:57
Speaker 3: I can only tell you that I have told my daughters you cannot count on anyone doing the right thing. And you certainly cannot count on the police or the government to protect you as a woman. You have to take it on yourself. And you just cannot be alone, first of all, is my number one thing. Always have a gal pal with you. There is safety in numbers when it comes to situations like this. If she had a best friend with her, her best friend might have said, girl, you are not in a good place.
00:24:21
Speaker 2: You are not making good decisions. Come with me now.
00:24:24
Speaker 1: You have friends that will snatch your ass right out of there. Say, no, it's not your decision. We're leaving. Yes.
00:24:29
Speaker 3: You need a friend like that. So I've said that. And also, yeah, it's on you. You cannot be so incapacitated that you... that you don't know what you're doing and you don't remember what you're doing, blackout drunk, that's what they call it, right? And that is the scariest thing any parent can think about when they, I'm sorry, especially when it comes to your daughter because you cannot trust, I do not trust anyone around my daughters. I just don't and not at that level of intoxication. So look, I wouldn't, I don't trust I wouldn't trust the members of the fraternity. I wouldn't trust the police. And I wouldn't trust the district attorney.
00:25:06
Speaker 2: I just wouldn't.
00:25:07
Speaker 3: That sucks.
00:25:07
Speaker 1: You should be able to trust all of them, quite frankly. And I don't know, bae, when we... Sexual assaults on campus, the education always is directed on what the woman should do. Behave this way. Have a buddy. Don't drink this much. Don't go to that house. Don't put yourself out there like this. Why?
00:25:27
Speaker 2: It's the same when.
00:25:27
Speaker 1: In God's name.
00:25:29
Speaker 2: This is the way it is for women.
00:25:31
Speaker 3: In everything we do, running, walking alone at night, walking back to our car at night.
00:25:37
Speaker 2: We can't be alone. We can't have our headphones on.
00:25:39
Speaker 1: Babe, I think we're going to continue to have the problem until we switch our technique of educating. We should be teaching young men. We're teaching. Why do we got to teach a woman to be scared of a guy? Why don't we just start with teaching the guys by not being something that the woman should fear ever. Robes, there is not a set of parents, one set of parents that failed this young girl and didn't tell her the right lessons and all this. There are seven sets of parents who failed because you got seven people possibly capable of this? Robes, I don't know seven young men who would participate in something like this. What happened?
00:26:26
Speaker 2: I did when I was in college.
00:26:27
Speaker 3: There was a story like this one at a fraternity at the University of Georgia. And honestly, it's so appalling because it's so similar to what we're hearing happened at that fraternity house in Cornell.
00:26:41
Speaker 2: I heard a story.
00:26:42
Speaker 3: Almost identical while I was at college. This stuff has happened since the beginning of time.
00:26:47
Speaker 1: Oh, it's out there. It happens. What is the problem, babe? We're trying to educate the one woman. What about the seven guys?
00:26:53
Speaker 2: No, I agree with you.
00:26:54
Speaker 1: Where are we screwing up in our education of young men? I agree. And I don't want to put it on this manosphere bullshit, but robes. What guy could get a text to say there's free pussy upstairs and you just run up there and... Go at it with some damn near unconscious woman. Robes, seven guys were willing to do that.
00:27:17
Speaker 2: It's disgusting.
00:27:18
Speaker 1: The lessons have to be on that side.
00:27:21
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:27:22
Speaker 1: We have to, I don't know how we're screwing this up, but are we raising young men who are smart enough, capable enough to get into Cornell?
00:27:34
Speaker 2: You make a good point.
00:27:34
Speaker 3: These are not, these are intelligent, hardworking, driven young men.
00:27:39
Speaker 1: So where are we screwing up? I really don't know, babe.
00:27:43
Speaker 2: The moral compass was missing in that moment.
00:27:46
Speaker 1: Intellectually, the best of the best are at that campus, and they are being accused of behaving like the worst of the absolute worst on any campus I have ever set foot on.
00:27:57
Speaker 2: That's so true.
00:27:58
Speaker 1: This is a wild story. It will not be going away anytime soon, and this will possibly, and I would argue Robes will, lead to changes.
00:28:06
Speaker 2: Yes, change laws.
00:28:08
Speaker 3: And at least at the very least, closing that loophole here in the state of New York.
00:28:11
Speaker 2: But we will stay on top of this story.
00:28:13
Speaker 3: We always appreciate you listening to us, everyone.
00:28:15
Speaker 2: I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes. We'll talk soon.
Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. It is Friday, October 2nd, and it is now officially, officially an active criminal investigation as the Cornell gang rape story. As we hear more details and more disturbing details about not only what happened to this young woman, but what happened to her afterwards. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ, an episode in which Robes, we're hopping on, Just moments ago, we saw a press conference with the governor of New York and the attorney general of New York, who are now very much front and center in this story.
00:00:37
Speaker 2: Yes, it was a brief. It was a very brief press conference.
00:00:40
Speaker 3: But the bottom line is Governor Hochul made it very clear and very public that she believes that the police department and the prosecutor failed this alleged rape victim.
00:00:54
Speaker 2: And that is about to change now.
00:00:57
Speaker 1: Robes, the attorney general of New York has essentially taken over from the district attorney in that county, the one who was supposed to seek justice for this young lady in 2024 when this happened. And she went and talked to police. Here we are two years later. The state has to get involved. You know what? Not even to provide justice for this young woman, just to listen to her.
00:01:24
Speaker 2: Yes, or to provide an actual investigation.
00:01:27
Speaker 1: What the hell? She wasn't even listened to.
00:01:29
Speaker 2: She wasn't.
00:01:30
Speaker 3: And to the point where you actually have the DA saying, I didn't know she said that. I didn't see that. I wasn't made aware of that. That is not a good enough excuse. You need to say, I reviewed all the facts of the case and decided not to prosecute because of X, Y, and Z. We never heard that from him. Instead, he's acting like he somehow missed the email or missed the memo or didn't get all the paperwork in.
00:01:56
Speaker 2: What is that? That is not an excuse.
00:01:58
Speaker 3: And so, yes, it's a big deal to see the governor of New York bring in the attorney general of New York to personally oversee this investigation.
00:02:08
Speaker 1: We have a special prosecutor in this case now. You all have been certainly this week following all of these headlines. But yes, Cornell University was named in a lawsuit along with seven members of of the Chi Phi fraternity. This young woman alleging that she was gang raped, she was forced to take drugs, or at least encouraged to take drugs during what was a several hours long gang rape, sexual assault at a fraternity house back in 2024. She told police her story, robes, it went nowhere, no prosecutions. However, the school looked into it, kicked two of the guys out of school, suspended and gave other sanctions to at least five others. So the school... did an investigation and found there was enough to kick people out of school.
00:02:51
Speaker 2: And they shut down the entire fraternity chapter.
00:02:53
Speaker 1: And has not been back. They are still off campus. So, if they found enough robes to take really serious action, how is it the police didn't have enough information to take also serious action?
00:03:08
Speaker 2: And that is the question. That is the glaring question that has yet to actually be answered.
00:03:15
Speaker 1: Well, the answer we're getting... Robes don't, they don't vie from both sides because the Cornell police saying they did one thing and the prosecutor saying, no, you didn't. They're saying we talked to her. We did all these, but we handed over every bit of investigative material to the DA. The DA is now saying some of this stuff in public. I've never heard this stuff before. He's claiming that Cornell didn't turn everything over to him.
00:03:41
Speaker 2: That is what he is claiming.
00:03:42
Speaker 3: But I did like what, what was said by Hochul, then what world would police learn that she was literally gang raped and not elevate those actions to the district attorney? In what world does the prosecutor not interview her?
00:03:55
Speaker 1: You know, that was a good point. The governor didn't just say it was one side or the other. She said both of y'all screwed up. But, Robes, the DA was told that there was a potential gang rape. You don't want to talk to the victim? How does that work?
00:04:10
Speaker 2: That makes no sense, babe. How does that work, really? No sense whatsoever.
00:04:13
Speaker 3: Okay. unless somehow he had just decided, look, the question is, look, no university, and especially not a prestigious university like Cornell, an Ivy League university that parents spend ridiculous amounts of money to send their children to, and children spend their whole lives working hard to get into. Nobody wants there to be a gang rape story out there.
00:04:35
Speaker 2: So look, there are questions. Is this something that No one wants to.
00:04:39
Speaker 3: Be true, so they just sweep it under the rug because it's bad for everyone. I mean, you do have to wonder if part of that plays a role. This is an icky, awful, terrible story, and better that no one finds out about it.
00:04:53
Speaker 1: But how does that, well, okay, we're talking two different entities here, the Cornell police versus the Cornell, I don't know, administration, right? They looked into it. It didn't seem like they were, and you tell me, babe, if I'm speaking, if I have this wrong. They investigated it. It seems like Cornell, the administration, did what they were supposed to do and took action against these young men who were accused of doing something heinous. They found, yeah, it was bad enough. Two of y'all get the hell out of our school. Some of them were suspended, even couldn't come back for semesters. That was very serious. So that's one thing. Did they do something wrong, or was it police on Cornell's campus that swept something under the rug by not giving all the worst... most important details to the DA?
00:05:39
Speaker 2: Yes, I think it's the police who dropped the ball here.
00:05:42
Speaker 3: Cornell did what they could do, I believe, in terms of what their ability to discipline the alleged rapists were. They followed through. But it certainly, I don't know, I just think questions need to be asked. Why would police not have pursued charges? Why would they not have given the prosecutor's office, if it's true that they didn't give them all the details, why wouldn't they have passed that along? Because it's one thing for the university to privately deal with this and remove these potential bad actors off their campus. It's another thing to have police involved, headlines to be written, and the entire campus to suddenly be made aware of something beyond just rumors and whispers.
00:06:26
Speaker 1: Disciplinary action on the university, they will keep that quiet and private. You make a good point there. If, again, That is an allegation that's out there right now. That's not just us. Why in God's name? If a woman came to Cornell Police, said, I was gang raped, here is who they are, this is when it happened, this is where it happened. Okay, we got your information, young lady. Now we're going to go give it to the DA so the DA can make a determination to file charges. But we're going to take out the part about the gang rape? Then what are you handing over? That makes no sense.
00:06:55
Speaker 2: It makes no sense. Look, and Hoke will even address this.
00:06:57
Speaker 3: She said she could not have been clearer that she was 100% confident that she had been raped. Shockingly, those words never made it into the account that Cornell sent to the prosecutor's case.
00:07:08
Speaker 1: Then what are you sending? It was the whole point of her coming to police, was it not?
00:07:11
Speaker 3: Yes, so I don't understand either, and it needs to be examined. We need answers to that.
00:07:29
Speaker 1: So as Letitia James is now taking over the Attorney General, Robes, a lot more is starting to come out. So we are getting Robes and several outlets are going over what they say are hundreds and hundreds of pages of notes from the police investigation, from the Cornell investigation. So we're starting to kind of get a trickle of new information, Robes, and some of this stuff, text messages that came out, people who observed the alleged victim here in the days after. We're getting more of a picture. Some of the new stuff, Robes, I didn't realize this. She started to get upset. And the days after, Robes, I know you saw this, and I guess this goes in line, that some of her friends were even saying she didn't seem to even have a grasp on what had happened to her, meaning she never used the word rape or sexual assault.
00:08:18
Speaker 3: Look, and I know that that is something that people will point to and say, aha, she's changed her story because now she's been publicly shamed and she's embarrassed and she hears people talking about her on campus. And so now she has to say it was against her will.
00:08:33
Speaker 2: But the reality is, I mean, most people who are.
00:08:37
Speaker 3: Experts in this type of assault and violence will tell you it is a very common thing for a victim to minimize what happened, to try and laugh it off or make it seem like it isn't a big deal because it's so overwhelming to process. And yes, in this case and in many of them, alcohol is involved, drugs are involved, and some of that was voluntary. And so you feel like you are responsible for what happened to you.
00:09:01
Speaker 2: So you try to make.
00:09:04
Speaker 3: Sense of it without pointing the finger at someone else. And that is so common, and that does seem to be what happened in this case.
00:09:11
Speaker 1: Rose, and it makes sense. It does. They almost describe how through text messages, like over the following days and weeks, you saw a shift in her, a new realization even. And Rose, you described it better than I did. I had it in my own mind, right? There is a shame. You almost try to laugh off, or what did I do wrong? This didn't really happen to me. One of her friends, actually, in one of these notes said she had not yet processed what had happened to her. She had not yet processed. So this is a, she was a sophomore, I believe, at the time this was going on. So what was she, 18, 19, maybe? She's 19 years old.
00:09:48
Speaker 2: And look, here's the deal.
00:09:50
Speaker 1: You.
00:09:52
Speaker 3: I can speak to this and I think a lot of women listening will understand this.
00:09:57
Speaker 2: No one wants to be a victim.
00:09:59
Speaker 3: And so I do think there's a part of that where you're like, well, I did drink and I did put myself in that situation. So I guess I just have to kind of accept my role and my responsibility into what happened to me. Because you don't want to think, I'm some helpless, I'm one of those women who, you know, had some horrible thing happen to her.
00:10:20
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, no.
00:10:21
Speaker 3: I did play a role. It's a weird way to think about it. But no one, if you imagine yourself, no one wants to be a rape victim. No one wants to be a victim, period. And so it makes sense. Initially, you try to rationalize or at least maybe even take on more responsibility than you should, rather than accept that you had something violent and horrific happen to you?
00:10:43
Speaker 1: Roves, this is, I cannot imagine what this young lady was going through on campus, in that she first started feeling shame, disgust, embarrassment. Roves, they said she was, according to these notes, she saw on message boards on campus that were meant for Greek life, People started talking about this story, started talking about and there were rumors and buzzing about what had happened at the frat house. Robes, that's awful. That is awful.
00:11:15
Speaker 2: It's terrible.
00:11:16
Speaker 1: Everybody is talking about her, buzzing about her, know who she is. And you can imagine the names they're calling her. This is a 18, 19, 20 year old kid possibly on this college campus. Robes, that's devastating.
00:11:29
Speaker 2: I want to start crying right now. It's as awful as it gets.
00:11:33
Speaker 1: Okay, so some back and forth with some text messages that were released. One, I think this one had been out, but this was from one of the accused. It said, quote, I just want to apologize for how things went down the other night. Should have shut it down and kicked people out before it got way out of hand. Again, these are accusations. These are allegations. Nobody's been convicted of a crime. That one... goes to at least, doesn't it sound like Robes, confirming some at least general details of the event.
00:12:08
Speaker 3: And there's some acknowledgement there of doing something wrong. No question, like there is remorse in that text. And yes, an actual apology. So she responds, correct? Yes. To that saying at the end of the day, none of the sexual stuff was illegal.
00:12:29
Speaker 2: And honestly, I really like being with you and Matt.
00:12:32
Speaker 1: So this is how it started against the descriptions. Again, the descriptions we have seen is that she did. She was OK because she thought one guy she was talking to was good looking and he invited this other guy. And she did, according to her own account and her words that we have seen, was OK with. with these two guys she was hanging out with. A threesome.
00:12:50
Speaker 3: Yes, it did seem like she was okay and consensual with having a threesome. But yes, it obviously grew from there. We know that to be true. And look, again, I do think she's probably thinking, well, I was willing to do this. Maybe I was asking for it. Maybe I, you know, I really do think that, unfortunately, I can see a young girl and plenty of women thinking that and actually preferring to believe that because at least you... You maintain some sorts of control, like, well, I chose that versus it happened to me. And I do think it takes a while to actually understand, no, actually, I didn't choose that.
00:13:26
Speaker 1: That's what woman you get put in the position like this. What happened to this girl? What is described? I don't know how she could consent to this. Forget the alcohol and drugs. I don't know an 18, 19 year old kid who would say, yeah, seven dudes. Yeah, I'm coming to the house.
00:13:44
Speaker 2: I can tell you no woman actually wants that. God.
00:13:49
Speaker 3: No.
00:13:49
Speaker 1: What they describe is horrific. However, there is a text as well that's been out there, Robes, in which she sent to the same guy we were mentioning, Robes, what do you do with that when she's saying that none of the sexual stuff was illegal? They have this text message from her in which she's saying that to one of the guys she has now accused and named. That's up for interpretation, but a defense attorney is going.
00:14:11
Speaker 3: To go Yes, of course, they're going to use her words against her, but I see somebody who's trying to, again, maintain a sense of control, maintain a sense of not being a victim, and actually almost trying to assure them, I'm not going to say anything. You don't want to destroy your life. You don't want to destroy your friends. You don't want to destroy the community you've built. You don't want to be that girl or that woman who's pointing the finger, and so she's trying to keep some sort of normalcy or some sort of semblance of a community or a group. That's what she's doing there, in my personal opinion.
00:14:46
Speaker 1: Okay, well, there was more to it. So why did things then change? It changed all over a Halloween party. Stay here. We'll explain why Jane Doe decided to go back to the same house where this alleged assault took place. Stay here. All right, folks, we continue here on Amy and TJ. The Cornell gang rape story allegation has really been in headlines this week. Robes, this is everybody everywhere is talking about this. Robes, this is one of those. We talk about sexual assaults on campus. These stories come up. It's always it's been a problem for a long time. Robes, this one is now speaking to people. in a much different way that is going to force changes on college campus.
00:15:43
Speaker 3: And babe, I can speak as a woman who was on a college campus, who had daughters and has one still on a college campus. I worry about this all the time because these cases go unreported for a reason.
00:15:56
Speaker 2: The victim gets blamed. The victim isn't believed.
00:15:59
Speaker 3: The victim is humiliated and examined and actually becomes re-victimized by coming forward.
00:16:07
Speaker 1: God forbid if the victim had a drink that night.
00:16:09
Speaker 2: And most often, obviously, they have.
00:16:11
Speaker 3: You're on a college campus, you're partying. That is how this sort of thing actually is set up or certainly is the foundation for a lot of this violence. And most of these cases do not get reported, period. And I feel like we can all look and examine this case and understand why.
00:16:32
Speaker 1: This one wasn't going to be reported. She didn't go to police immediately. She didn't do a rape kit until a month later.
00:16:37
Speaker 2: It was three weeks later, I believe.
00:16:39
Speaker 1: She didn't. Robes, and that, again, as a woman, Robes, you describe it in a way a guy, I could never, can, no matter how many of these stories I cover. Robes, this idea that a woman is sitting like, I don't want to rock the boat. I don't want to get anybody in trouble. How did I contribute to what happened to me? You all, and you hear women, you all go through a whole list of things before you get to the point of you actually being assaulted.
00:17:06
Speaker 3: Yes, we don't want to be victims, period. And that is just true. And I think, again, every woman listening totally understands that.
00:17:17
Speaker 1: So this young lady, and I guess some women will understand this as well, Robe, she stayed in contact with the guy she is accusing. She stayed in contact and exchanged friendly text messages even. How many times have we seen that in so many of these cases?
00:17:32
Speaker 2: In almost all of the cases.
00:17:34
Speaker 1: All of them, right? And the defense attorney will use that against the woman later. So in this situation, Robes, yes, she did exchange pleasant text messages. But, Robes, there's also an incident in which she wanted to go to a Halloween party at the same damn frat house where this assault happened. She wanted to go, like was desperate and very excited to go, according to these new documents released. Bro, she reached out to the guy that she was now accusing, the main guy, if you will, asked about the party, said she could come, actually used the phrase, this is your house, right? Said that to her. She claims then she gets a phone call from the president of the fraternity, uninviting her. It's for your own good. This probably wouldn't be good for you to be here. Now she gets... Pissed. Now she gets wildly upset, and she sends this text message here, Robes, to the main guy that she's accusing, saying, quote, I knew this was going to happen. The woman will always get the short end of the stick. Y'all aren't my friends. Y'all are covering your asses. A few days later, she went and got a rape kit. Wow. Robes, it's, again, whatever expert can explain this, but this is a young woman saying, You're describing Robes a horrific scene, and you want to go back to that scene.
00:18:56
Speaker 2: Three weeks later.
00:18:58
Speaker 3: She wants to go back to that scene because she wants to have a different memory, and she wants to make herself believe that it's all okay and that nothing bad actually happened to her. She's desperate to go back because she wants to repair this damage she's feeling inside of herself.
00:19:18
Speaker 2: That is why she wants to go back.
00:19:20
Speaker 1: We don't necessarily even need some expert here. Rose, what you're saying makes sense. She wants to know it's all okay. It's all good. He's actually a good guy. This guy's a good guy. We're friends again, and it's cool. Rose, had they not invited her to that or uninvited her?
00:19:39
Speaker 2: She might not have ever come forward.
00:19:40
Speaker 3: Isn't that crazy?
00:19:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, because for her, in a way, you know what?
00:19:43
Speaker 3: It makes me so sad because I also feel like for her, she would have been able to maybe put it to bed.
00:19:48
Speaker 2: Like, it's okay.
00:19:49
Speaker 3: I can forget about this. I don't have to think about this. I don't have to relive this because, you know what? Maybe it wasn't so bad. You can just kind of re-remember things or gloss things over or maybe just put kind of like some fuzziness to it in a way and feel like no permanent damage was done. That's what she was trying to do. And I don't know if Can men understand that you said you did? You can understand that, that desire and why she would go back and why she would want to make it feel like it was all good.
00:20:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, babe. When you say it, I can comprehend it. I've never been in that position. Men don't... There is a way you immediately are able to understand everything this woman did every step of the way where other people, men in particular, hear it and go, well, why would she text him if you like the guy? There's no way you would go back if you were traumatized. That kind of a thing. It makes sense. I know it. But Robes, you all immediately go, oh, yeah, well, yeah. Sometimes we have to have it explained to us by you all, and then we go, okay, now we get it.
00:21:00
Speaker 3: And look, I mean, I now, it's so interesting we are talking about this because if you think about what's happened, you had, and I don't know if the, whoever in the police department chose not to hand over all of the important documents to the district attorney, but we are, I did see men's names attached to all of those decision-making moments. including even the Cornell University president. Now you have two women who are in charge of this investigation, Governor Kathy Hochul and Attorney General Letitia James. And I just think that there might be a better understanding.
00:21:42
Speaker 1: How do they do this, Robes, with— it' s not a requirement enough to say that there's some man out there who can't do a good investigative— interview with a woman. But man, why is this not required? Why, if somebody comes in and said they've been sexually assaulted by a man, okay, we got a woman here for you to talk to. Stand by. Yeah. It seems like that should be an automatic. And you're right, Rose. I didn't think about it. Now, just the face of this.
00:22:06
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:22:07
Speaker 1: We've been seeing men on TV for a week.
00:22:09
Speaker 2: Now it's women.
00:22:10
Speaker 1: Now it's women saying, okay, fellas.
00:22:12
Speaker 2: Things are going to change.
00:22:13
Speaker 1: I don't mind that so much.
00:22:14
Speaker 3: I don't either.
00:22:14
Speaker 1: The other thing that might change This has been debated in New York, in the state of New York, for a while now. But one, the Senate has passed a bill that would close a loophole in the rape law in New York. The House hasn't passed it in robes. You have the voluntary, what's the other one?
00:22:30
Speaker 2: It's called voluntary intoxication loophole.
00:22:33
Speaker 3: And we heard Governor Kathy Hochul talk about this today in the press conference. And she says that she wants... the state of New York to close this loophole. But right now, under the current law here in New York, it is very difficult to prosecute, successfully prosecute an alleged sexual assault or a rape if the victim was intoxicated voluntarily. So if the victim chose to drink alcohol, chose in this case to consume ketamine, I believe is what the drug that they were using, if she chose it, then it's almost impossible to actually have a successful rape investigation or, yes, conviction.
00:23:16
Speaker 1: The accused can use your intoxication as a defense. And they're trying to get rid of that. To say, look, she was high on ketamine. She took the stuff. She was drinking all night. You can use that as a defense to say, it's not a matter of, I didn't tell her to drink that stuff. I didn't force her. They're trying to close that. They are using this case now. I say use. It sounds a little callous. But still, they think we have some momentum now. Everybody's paying attention to Cornell. Maybe they can get this thing passed. What are we supposed to do with a case like this? A bunch of parents who have college... Students, right now, from freshmen to seniors, baby. What's supposed to be the lesson from this? What's supposed to be the conversation?
00:23:57
Speaker 3: I can only tell you that I have told my daughters you cannot count on anyone doing the right thing. And you certainly cannot count on the police or the government to protect you as a woman. You have to take it on yourself. And you just cannot be alone, first of all, is my number one thing. Always have a gal pal with you. There is safety in numbers when it comes to situations like this. If she had a best friend with her, her best friend might have said, girl, you are not in a good place.
00:24:21
Speaker 2: You are not making good decisions. Come with me now.
00:24:24
Speaker 1: You have friends that will snatch your ass right out of there. Say, no, it's not your decision. We're leaving. Yes.
00:24:29
Speaker 3: You need a friend like that. So I've said that. And also, yeah, it's on you. You cannot be so incapacitated that you... that you don't know what you're doing and you don't remember what you're doing, blackout drunk, that's what they call it, right? And that is the scariest thing any parent can think about when they, I'm sorry, especially when it comes to your daughter because you cannot trust, I do not trust anyone around my daughters. I just don't and not at that level of intoxication. So look, I wouldn't, I don't trust I wouldn't trust the members of the fraternity. I wouldn't trust the police. And I wouldn't trust the district attorney.
00:25:06
Speaker 2: I just wouldn't.
00:25:07
Speaker 3: That sucks.
00:25:07
Speaker 1: You should be able to trust all of them, quite frankly. And I don't know, bae, when we... Sexual assaults on campus, the education always is directed on what the woman should do. Behave this way. Have a buddy. Don't drink this much. Don't go to that house. Don't put yourself out there like this. Why?
00:25:27
Speaker 2: It's the same when.
00:25:27
Speaker 1: In God's name.
00:25:29
Speaker 2: This is the way it is for women.
00:25:31
Speaker 3: In everything we do, running, walking alone at night, walking back to our car at night.
00:25:37
Speaker 2: We can't be alone. We can't have our headphones on.
00:25:39
Speaker 1: Babe, I think we're going to continue to have the problem until we switch our technique of educating. We should be teaching young men. We're teaching. Why do we got to teach a woman to be scared of a guy? Why don't we just start with teaching the guys by not being something that the woman should fear ever. Robes, there is not a set of parents, one set of parents that failed this young girl and didn't tell her the right lessons and all this. There are seven sets of parents who failed because you got seven people possibly capable of this? Robes, I don't know seven young men who would participate in something like this. What happened?
00:26:26
Speaker 2: I did when I was in college.
00:26:27
Speaker 3: There was a story like this one at a fraternity at the University of Georgia. And honestly, it's so appalling because it's so similar to what we're hearing happened at that fraternity house in Cornell.
00:26:41
Speaker 2: I heard a story.
00:26:42
Speaker 3: Almost identical while I was at college. This stuff has happened since the beginning of time.
00:26:47
Speaker 1: Oh, it's out there. It happens. What is the problem, babe? We're trying to educate the one woman. What about the seven guys?
00:26:53
Speaker 2: No, I agree with you.
00:26:54
Speaker 1: Where are we screwing up in our education of young men? I agree. And I don't want to put it on this manosphere bullshit, but robes. What guy could get a text to say there's free pussy upstairs and you just run up there and... Go at it with some damn near unconscious woman. Robes, seven guys were willing to do that.
00:27:17
Speaker 2: It's disgusting.
00:27:18
Speaker 1: The lessons have to be on that side.
00:27:21
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:27:22
Speaker 1: We have to, I don't know how we're screwing this up, but are we raising young men who are smart enough, capable enough to get into Cornell?
00:27:34
Speaker 2: You make a good point.
00:27:34
Speaker 3: These are not, these are intelligent, hardworking, driven young men.
00:27:39
Speaker 1: So where are we screwing up? I really don't know, babe.
00:27:43
Speaker 2: The moral compass was missing in that moment.
00:27:46
Speaker 1: Intellectually, the best of the best are at that campus, and they are being accused of behaving like the worst of the absolute worst on any campus I have ever set foot on.
00:27:57
Speaker 2: That's so true.
00:27:58
Speaker 1: This is a wild story. It will not be going away anytime soon, and this will possibly, and I would argue Robes will, lead to changes.
00:28:06
Speaker 2: Yes, change laws.
00:28:08
Speaker 3: And at least at the very least, closing that loophole here in the state of New York.
00:28:11
Speaker 2: But we will stay on top of this story.
00:28:13
Speaker 3: We always appreciate you listening to us, everyone.
00:28:15
Speaker 2: I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes. We'll talk soon.
