- New York’s attorney general has taken over the “Cornell 7” case and said Friday that an “active criminal investigation” is underway into the gang rape allegations.
- New York Governor Kathy Hochul issued an executive order Thursday night appointing Attorney General Letitia James as a special prosecutor to lead a criminal investigation into the alleged October 2024 gang rape of a 20-year-old female sophomore at Cornell University.
- Hochul said at a news conference Friday that police and local prosecutors “failed” the accuser and publicly criticized local police and Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten after no criminal charges were brought, despite the accuser reporting that she was drugged and assaulted at the Chi Phi fraternity house.
- The accuser “could not have been clearer that she was 100 percent confident she had been raped,” Hochul said, but “those words never made it into the account.”
- Attorney General James said her office will present evidence to a grand jury if necessary, a move welcomed by the accuser's lawyer who expressed a lack of faith in local prosecutors.
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