What Cornell’s Jane Doe told police about the alleged gang rape — and what the DA says he knew
(CNN) — A Cornell University student described to campus police how a visit to a fraternity house devolved into an alleged gang rape, recounting being hit and feeling emotionally coerced into sexual activity while intoxicated, according to her signed police statement.
She made a more explicit accusation of rape in a November 2024 interview with campus police – the transcript of which Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten told CNN on Wednesday his office never received before deciding not to bring charges in the case that has now sparked national outrage.
Meanwhile, Cornell says police followed protocol and shared “all investigatory information” with the DA.
Questions are swirling about the initial investigation and what the county district attorney was aware of about the allegations. Here’s what we know.
What Jane Doe told Cornell police in 2024
The now-former student, identified publicly only as Jane Doe, described the alleged events of an October 2024 night when she was a 20-year-old Cornell sophomore. CNN obtained her 2024 statement to Cornell University Police from a source familiar with the investigation.
She recounted arriving at the Chi Phi fraternity house and dancing with one person who asked if she would be interested in participating in a threesome, telling police she was “pretty ok” with aspects of an initial encounter, but that later in the night she did not consent to other sexual activities, according to the six-page statement.
“I felt like I was unable to make any decisions because of how intoxicated I was,” she said in the statement. Doe said she felt like her overall intoxication level at one point was about an “8 out of 10” — which she said was the most intoxicated she had been in her life.
She described being “pretty incapacitated,” feeling uncomfortable, swatting one man’s hand away several times and being “horrified” as more men entered the room they were in. She said she “finally gave in” to one later encounter after she was asked “to have sex so many times,” according to the statement.
“To me that felt like coercion,” she said in the statement. “Also, I felt like due to my intoxication, they should have known how intoxicated I was based on how I was slurring my words.”
Doe made a more explicit accusation of rape in a separate document, according to CNN affiliate WCBS. The station obtained a transcript of a November 2024 interview with campus police from a source.
“I can say with 100% confidence I was raped,” Doe said in the transcript, according to WCBS.
CNN has not seen the transcript and has asked Cornell for a copy but has not heard back. The transcript is a separate document from the six-page statement that was submitted by the university.
Beyond alleged emotional pressure, Doe told police in the statement she was physically hit and remembered feeling hurt. “One hit in particular sent a sharp pain through me,” she said. The student also described noticing bruising on her body the following day.
Doe also described she “had become extremely uncomfortable with how this night was turning out” and thought, “if I passed out and the men had sex with me, then they could be charged with Rape,” the statement reads.
Doe told police she remembered consuming a “heavy amount” of ketamine, smoking marijuana and having “various things” poured on her body. She said she initially agreed to having drugs consumed off her body while feeling “extremely tired” but “couldn’t tell what they were pouring on me.”
Doe reported the alleged incident to Cornell police on November 8, 2024, weeks after the alleged assault, according to a civil complaint filed last month. In the days following the alleged incident, she was “traumatized, numb and unable to function or accept the horror of what had happened,” Doe’s attorney, Thomas P. Giuffra, told CNN.
DA’s office says it “never received” transcript
Although Cornell said it provided the district attorney’s office with a police investigation report, Van Houten told CNN his office was not given the interview transcript before deciding no charges should be filed in the investigation.
Van Houten told CNN on Wednesday morning that the university had still not provided his office with the transcript.
The DA said it was Doe’s six-page statement that determined no charges should be filed, adding, “Multiple prosecutors and criminal investigators reviewed Jane Doe’s statement and correctly determined the alleged facts as set forth in the statement do not constitute a crime.”
Van Houten said he learned of the more explicit allegation made in the interview when he was contacted by WCBS on Tuesday evening and said his office will be investigating the reported statements “fully.”
When reached by CNN about the DA’s comments, a Cornell University spokesperson did not specifically address the transcript but said it “shared all investigatory information” with the DA’s office.
Cornell hasn’t responded to repeated requests to explain or clarify whether that turnover included the interview transcript.
The university likely did not break any laws if it did neglect to share all relevant documents with the DA, said former prosecutor Gary Galperin, while acknowledging that not sharing all documents would violate “all principles of what’s logical and decent.”
The DA’s comments Wednesday raised new questions about what law enforcement knew in the weeks after the alleged assault and why no criminal charges were filed.
“It is a case that, clearly, just on the face of her statement, is so complex and so nuanced,” former Westchester County DA Mimi Rocah told CNN’s Jake Tapper.
“If you’re an investigator trying to get at the truth, as this DA office should have been, they should have sought more information,” she added.
Van Houten canceled his appearance on CNN Wednesday evening, saying, “At this time I need to shift my focus to the investigation and to pursuing the additional evidence that has recently come to light.”
He said his office will keep the public informed of developments in the investigation and any action of the Tompkins County Grand Jury.
University’s investigation faces scrutiny
The unfolding details of Jane Doe’s case have sparked renewed attention to the ongoing topic of sexual assault awareness and prevention on college campuses.
Doe’s attorney has said Cornell expelled two of the seven accused students while the others received lesser punishments, including suspensions, workshops or written assignments.
Cornell has countered that claim, saying “none of the individuals charged were offered the opportunity to write essays as a sole consequence of their involvement.”
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said Cornell has agreed to an outside investigation to “determine whether Cornell met every obligation to protect its students and pursue justice,” she told CNN. The university confirmed that it agreed to the investigation and declined to provide further details.
The Chi Phi national fraternity said in a Wednesday statement that it condemns sexual assault and drug and alcohol abuse, and three days after Doe filed a police report, the fraternity chapter “voted unanimously to remove the accused members from its rolls” and “recommended that our national fraternity permanently expel them,” which it said the fraternity’s Grand Council did in a subsequent meeting.
“These actions went beyond anything the law or Cornell University required of us,” the fraternity added in the statement.
The school also said it had closed that chapter of the Chi Phi fraternity in 2024, and that the chapter remains barred from campus.
It is unclear if any of the accused men are still Cornell students.
Lawmakers, current and former Cornell students, actors and other public figures are among those who have spoken out.
In another effort for future accountability, Ithaca Mayor Robert Cantelmo told CNN he has asked Cornell to consider an agreement to loop in the Ithaca Police Department whenever incidents involving sexual assault are reported on campus. Cantelmo said he was waiting for a response from the university.
Giuffra said it had been Doe’s dream to go to Cornell, which she no longer attends.
It’s unclear how extensive that initial police investigation was, but Doe’s attorney says he believes it was inadequate.
“It is challenging for me to understand how a thorough criminal investigation could have been conducted when she never spoke with anyone other than the officer who took her original complaint,” Giuffra said.
Help is available: For help in the US, call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-4673 or chat 24/7 on online.rainn.org.
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
CNN’s Danya Gainor, Jason Carroll, Gloria Pazmino, Chris Boyette, Cindy Von Quednow and Avni Trivedi contributed to this report.
