Cornell case spotlights 'confusing' web of systems for reporting campus assaults

Warning: This story contains distressing details and discussion of sexual assault.

When Mary was a first-year college student, she woke up after a fraternity party with bruises and bite marks all over her body. She says it took her a few days to piece together that she had been sexually assaulted while "blacked out", and to find the strength - and the right avenue - to report the assault.

The man she accused was eventually expelled, but police declined to bring charges because they said there was a lack of physical evidence.

Mary - whose name has been changed to protect her identity - says the process of finding some measure of justice was oftentimes confusing and disappointing.

"Even though it was a positive outcome, it was still so emotionally exhausting and draining, because I had to do all of this in tandem with getting used to being a college student for the first time," said Mary. "In many ways, I had to be my own advocate, gathering all my evidence."

The experience with local police, she added, "left me with a deep sense of disappointment in the system".

How both universities and the criminal justice system respond to these types of assaults on college campuses is once again under the spotlight, after a former student at Cornell University filed a civil lawsuit alleging she was raped by several members of a fraternity two years ago, with prosecutors declining at the time to pursue a case.

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