3 Michigan State Players Violated Sexual Assault Policy: Title IX Probe

EAST LANSING, MI — Three Michigan State University football players at the center of a Title IX sexual assault investigation violated university policy, according to an attorney who represents the student who accused them. The case against the players, who haven’t been named is moving through the university’s student conduct system, but they haven’t been expelled, according to media reports.

A panel will determine what, if any, sanctions should be taken against the three students following the completion of an external Title IX investigation conducted by Rebecca Veidlinger, an Ann Arbor attorney hired by the university in February to look into potential violations of the university’s relationship violence and sexual misconduct policy. (For more local news, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts and newsletters from Detroit Patch, click here to find your local Michigan Patch. Also, follow us on Facebook, and if you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

Disciplinary action against the students could range from a slap on the hand in the form of a warning to expulsion, according to Michigan State’s student conduct system. The Ingham County Prosecutor’s Office has been reviewing the case since mid-March, but charges haven’t been filed, nor has a timeline been established for charging.

The recently closed Title IX investigation is one of three stemming from a student’s report that she was raped by three football players at her on-campus apartment in the early morning hours of Jan. 17. The students have since been suspended from football-related activities and kicked out of campus housing, the Detroit Free Press reported.

An external Title IX investigation by the Jones Day law firm is ongoing. Launched a day after Michigan State announced it had suspended three football players and a staff member, the Jones Day law firm investigators are looking into football program staff members’ compliance with university policy in connection with the allegations.

Another investigation involves charges filed in 2015 by four women who allege the university didn’t adequately respond to their claims of sexual assault and protect them from retaliation.

In 2015, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights said in a blistering report that MSU’s mishandling of sexual assault allegations from 2005 to 2014 “may have contributed to a continuation of a sexually hostile environment” for students and staff. The report said that after the OCR became involved, the university’s handling of complaints “ultimately were thorough and equitable.”

Photo by John M. Quick via Flickr Commons