SETTLEMENT: DUKE Hands Lewis McLeod His Degree, and Lewis is now an Alumni!
Duke student, Lewis McLeod has finally been given the degree he earned four years ago. Lewis was accused of sexual assault one semester before he was set to graduate. The alleged incident took place in the fall of 2013 following a night of drinking, as so many of these accusations do. Lewis maintained the sex was consensual, while the accuser claimed she was too drunk to consent. The accusing female went to police, but after an investigation, they declined to file a report. So then she went to Duke’s student conduct office and filed a report. At the time, Duke’s misconduct policy stated that an individual “incapacitated due to alcohol” cannot freely consent to sex, but that “being intoxicated does not diminish one’s responsibility to obtain consent.” In practice, however, being intoxicated, rather than incapacitated, appears to be all the university needs to find one student responsible for sexual assault. In testimony during McLeod’s lawsuit, Duke Dean Sue Wasiolek said the senior was tried under a new expulsion rule that hadn’t been written down yet and was the result of a calculated activist campaign. She was asked during testimony if two students were both incapacitated under Duke’s policy, whether that would be mutual rape. Wasiolek replied: “Assuming it is a male and female, it is the responsibility in the case of the male to gain consent before proceeding with sex.” She also said giving McLeod his degree would damage the university’s reputation.The trial date was repeatedly pushed, until February 2018 when Duke settled with McLeod, finally giving him his degree and expunging his record. As author and professor K.C. Johnson noted on Twitter, however, the damage has already been done: “Duke’s actions: (a) cost him a job; and (b) forced him to leave the country [because] he lost his visa.”
thefederalist.com By Ashe Schow
