Appeals Court Reverses SUNY Student's Expulsion in Sex Case

Article here. Jump the paywall by Googling the first paragraph. Excerpt:

'The expulsion of a male student from a State University of New York campus after he had a sexual encounter with a female student that may have been consensual was too harsh, a divided state appeals court ruled Thursday.

The 3-2 majority of the Appellate Division, Third Department, panel said in Haug v. State University of New York at Potsdam, 522632, that many aspects of the disciplinary process at SUNY-Potsdam as it was applied to Benjamin Haug "give us pause," beginning with the fact that the female student's account of the encounter as presented at campus disciplinary proceedings was hearsay.

While she initially reported the incident as a sexual assault to campus police within a few hours after it happened on Sept. 7, 2014, Justice Eugene Devine noted that the woman acknowledged that she had not declined to engage in sex with the male student nor provide any "gesture saying that [the encounter] wasn't welcome."

Nevertheless, the court noted that Haug was found guilty before a campus disciplinary board of sexual misconduct, suspended for the remainder of the semester and made to take an alcohol evaluation and treatment program. When Haug appealed, the campus disciplinary appeals board increased the penalty to expulsion and Potsdam president Kristin Esterberg affirmed Haug's dismissal.'