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What we know about the Cornell University frat house rape investigation
Jane Doe said in her lawsuit that she was intoxicated during the alleged incident and incapable of providing consent.
Cornell case spotlights 'confusing' system for reporting campus assaults
Her lawyer has said she was "traumatised, numb and unable to function or accept the horror of what had happened" in the days after the assault, which she reported to Cornell University Police on 8 November 2024.
Doe's lawyer has said two of those involved were expelled.
Cornell newspaper's editorial board published the names of the defendants in the lawsuit on 21 September in a piece titled "Cornell Won't, We Will", fuelling a social media outcry.
The Cornell University Police Department provided an image of the Snapchat group, titled Chi Phi Actives, to prosecutors as evidence in November 2024, the university said.
CBS News New York has also published excerpts of additional text messages reportedly exchanged between one of the defendants and a woman who appears to be the person who made the allegations.
The woman said she reported the incident to Cornell University Police two weeks after it took place.
Shortly afterwards, Cornell University issued a public statement regarding the "serious and deeply disturbing allegations of drug abuse and sexual violence at the Chi Phi fraternity house".
Cornell also said it had opened an internal investigation as well as a civil rights inquiry under the Title IX law, which bars sex discrimination in schools that receive funding from the federal government, including most universities.
The university said in a statement that the matter was referred to a "panel of trained faculty and staff" that issued "a range of sanctions, which included expulsions and suspensions from Cornell".
In a statement on Tuesday, Cornell said "temporary suspensions and other restrictive measures" were issued when the conduct was reported.
On Wednesday, Governor Hochul said that she held a call with the university president, who had agreed to allow "an independent outside investigation of what happened".
"They understand the importance of this," Hochul said in a post on X, adding that "this culture has to stop".
Cornell confirmed the independent investigation to the BBC.
The Xi Chapter of the Chi Phi fraternity was closed in 2024 and remains barred from campus.
The county's top prosecutor said on Monday that his office would reopen a criminal inquiry into the alleged rape.
Once appropriate charges were determined, the case would be prosecuted "in the most objective and impartial means possible" through a grand jury, said Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten.
In the US legal system, prosecutors convene grand juries to weigh evidence and testimony and eventually vote on whether they merit criminal charges.
The prosecutor said that at the time of the assault two years ago, his office concluded that evidence from the woman's statement to authorities did not meet the legal bar to bring charges.
In his statement, Van Houten included a summary of what Doe told the Cornell University Police Department in 2024 after the alleged attack, noting it differed from the allegations laid out in the lawsuit.
"Jane Doe's sworn statement in November of 2024 did not allege that she was drugged against her will or gang raped," Van Houten said in a statement on Monday.
A Cornell University spokesperson told the BBC its police department shared a "lengthy police investigation report" with the Tompkins County District Attorney's Office.
But the outlet reports that she said of what happened later: "I can say with 100% confidence I was raped."
ABC News, external also obtained a police report from 15 November, in which Doe said in a statement that during one of the later encounters that night, "I felt like I was unable to make any decision because of how intoxicated I was".
Van Houten told CBS News he had never seen the transcript of the interview with campus police.
He also told the New York Times on Wednesday that he hoped to speak to Jane Doe "to discuss new evidence that exists"., external
Van Houten told the Times he did not believe the allegations in the civil lawsuit meet the legal bar to bring charges.
One senior who was on campus at the time of the alleged assault in 2024 told the BBC that it was a hard time to be there, as rumours began circulating about Doe.