A year-long investigation by
the Center for Public Integrity on rape and sexual assault on U.S. campuses finds that while perpetrators often go unpunished, victims lives may be "turned upside down."  Victims often lack any support from the institutions that are supposed to protect them and, adding insult to injury, sometimes even face disciplinary action for bringing a complaint forward.

Moreover, while both campus administrators and the federal government have joint responsiblity for addressing and punishing the perpetrators of sexual violence on campus, neither of these institutional actors is doing their job. 

To carry out the study, the Center interviewed 50 experts
familiar with the campus disciplinary process, as well as 33 female
students who have reported being sexually assaulted by other students.

The inquiry also included:

• a review of records in select cases;

• a survey of
  152 crisis services programs and clinics on or near college campuses;

• and an examination of 10 years of complaints filed against institutions
  with the U.S. Education Department under Title IX and the Clery Act.

The report, Sexual Assault on Campus: A Frustrating Search for Justice, "reveals that students deemed "responsible” for alleged sexual
assaults on college campuses can face little or no consequence for
their acts." 

Yet their victims’ lives are frequently turned upside down.
For them, the trauma of assault can be compounded by a lack of
institutional support, and even disciplinary action. Many times,
victims drop out of school, while their alleged attackers graduate.
Administrators believe the sanctions commonly issued in the college
judicial system provide a thoughtful and effective way to hold culpable
students accountable, but victims and advocates say the punishment
rarely fits the crime.

Additional data suggests that, on many
campuses, abusive students face little more than slaps on the wrist.

The Center has examined what is apparently the only database on sexual
assault proceedings at institutions of higher education nationwide.
Maintained by the U.S. Justice Department’s Office on Violence Against
Women, it includes information on about 130 colleges and universities
receiving federal funds
to combat sexual violence from 2003-2008, the most recent year
available. Though limited in scope, the database offers a window into
sanctioning by school administrations. It shows that colleges seldom
expel men who are found “responsible” for sexual assault; indeed, these
schools permanently kicked out only 10 to 25 percent of such students.

Among the key findings of the report:

• Research shows that repeat offenders
  actually account for a significant number of sexual assaults on campus,
  contrary to what those who adjudicate these cases on college campuses
  believe. Experts say authorities are often slow to realize they have
  such “undetected rapists” in their midst.

• Critics
  question whether faculty, staff, and students should even adjudicate
  what amounts to a felony crime. But these internal campus proceedings
  grow from two federal laws, known as Title IX and the Clery Act, which
  require schools to respond to claims of sexual assault on campus and to
  offer key rights to victims.

• The
  Education Department enforces both laws, yet its Office for Civil
  Rights rarely investigates student allegations of botched school
  proceedings by students, largely because students don’t realize they
  have a right to complain. When cases do go forward, the civil rights
  office rarely rules against schools, the Center’s probe has found, and
  virtually never issues sanctions against institutions.

 

• Many
  student victims don’t report incidents at all, because they blame
  themselves, or don’t identify what happened as sexual assault. Local
  criminal justice authorities regularly shy away from such cases,
  because they are “he said, she said” disputes sometimes clouded by
  drugs or alcohol. That frequently leaves students to deal with campus
  judiciary processes so shrouded in secrecy that they can remain
  mysterious even to their participants.

 

• Institutional
  barriers compound the problem of silence, and few actually make it to a
  campus hearing. Those who do come forward, though, can encounter secret
  disciplinary proceedings, closed-mouth school administrations, and
  off-the-record negotiations. At times, school policies and practices
  can lead students to drop complaints, or submit to gag orders — a
  practice deemed illegal by the Education Department. Administrators
  believe the existing processes provide a fair and effective way to deal
  with ultra-sensitive allegations, but the Center’s investigation has
  found that these processes have little transparency or accountability.

 

Leniency for Perpetrators:

"Just
more than half the 33 students interviewed by the Center said their
alleged assailants were found responsible for sexual assault in
school-run proceedings," according to the report.

But only four of those student victims said the
findings led to expulsion of their alleged attackers — two of them
after repeat sexual offenses. The rest of those victims said discipline
amounted to lesser sanctions, ranging from suspension for a year to
social probation and academic penalties, leaving them feeling doubly
assaulted.

An examination of Title IX complaints filed against
institutions with the Education Department revealed similar patterns:

Eight students whose complaints stem from reported acts of “sexual
assault,” “rape,” and “sexual misconduct” objected to the school’s
punishment of their alleged perpetrators. All but one of these eight
complaints involved lesser sanctions than expulsion and three ended in
no punishment after responsible students appealed.

Survey respondents
reinforced the belief that schools fail to hold abusive students
accountable. One respondent summed up the sentiment this way:

Judicial hearings almost NEVER result in suspension,
let alone expulsion. … Alleged perpetrators still remain on campus, in
fraternities, and on sports teams.

By
contrast, some students, including Margaux, reported dropping out
because of what they considered lenient discipline for their alleged
perpetrators, whom they feared seeing on campus. Others said their
alleged attackers violated school-imposed sanctions, often with little
repercussion.

College administrators stress that the
sanctioning in disciplinary matters reflects the mission of higher
education. Proceedings aren’t meant to punish students, but rather to
teach them.

“We’d like to think that we can always educate and hold
accountable the student,” says Pamela Freeman, associate dean of
students at Indiana University.

Margaux, a reserved cellist whose black
curls frame moon-shaped cheeks, had doubts about the process even as
her informal proceeding took place on May 4, 2006. She reported being
raped on April 6 by a fellow freshman who lived on her co-ed floor.
Within days, she filed a report with IU police; then, a complaint with
IU residence staff. Now, she sat in an office with a school advocate,
testifying by speaker phone. Nearby, the alleged assailant — a
taciturn, stocky athlete who had seen IU’s disciplinary process before
— faced a two-member panel in a separate conference room, his father
beside him.

IU officials defended suspending
Margaux’s alleged attacker as, in effect, a teachable moment, according
to interviews with the Center and documents from a federal
investigation into the school’s handling of the case.

But
victim advocates question this notion. “There’s no evidence to suggest
that a college campus can rehabilitate a sex offender,” says Brett
Sokolow, of the National Center on Higher Education Risk Management, which consults schools on sexual assault policies. “So why are we even taking that chance?”

The report includes numerous in-depth stories–including video and audio–of individual women who have been sexually assaulted by classmates on campus.