PR: 40-50% of Campus Sexual Assault Allegations Are Unfounded, Revealing Need for Strong Protections of the Innocent

PRESS RELEASE

Contact: Rebecca Stewart

Telephone: 513-479-3335

40-50% of Campus Sexual Assault Allegations Are Unfounded, Revealing Need for Strong Protections of the Innocent

WASHINGTON / May 11, 2021 – Analyses of sexual assault allegations at colleges and universities reveal 40-50% are unfounded. Black male students are at especially high risk of being wrongfully accused of sexual misconduct. SAVE urges universities to maintain and strengthen due process protections to assure a reliable determination in campus proceedings.

An early study by Eugene Kanin reported that the police department in a Midwestern city concluded that 41% of 109 rape allegations were false. Kanin then did a follow-up study at two large colleges, concluding that 50% of campus rape complaints were untrue (1).

More recently, Brett Sokolow confirmed, “Probably 40 or 50% of allegations of sexual assault are baseless. There are a lot of cases where someone says they were incapacitated, but the evidence doesn’t support that they weren’t able to make a decision.” (2) Sokolow is the head of the Association of Title IX Administrators (ATIXA), and is regarded as a national expert on sexual assault in the campus setting.

Black male students are at especially high risk of being wrongfully accused of sexual misconduct:

Title IX For All analyzed demographic data from 650 lawsuits filed against colleges. Among the 30% of cases in which the race of the accused student was known, black students are four times as likely as white students to file lawsuits alleging their rights were violated in Title IX disciplinary proceedings (3).
During a 2015 Senate hearing, Harvard Law Professor Janet Halley observed that, “male students of color are accused and punished at ‘unreasonably high rates’ in campus sexual misconduct investigations.” (4)

Colgate University has revealed that black male students represented 50% of all sexual violations reported to the institution, even though black students represent only 4% of all undergraduate students (5). SAVE has compiled numerous case studies of Black students who were wrongfully accused (6).

Activist David Lisak has claimed that only 6% of campus allegations are “false.” (7) But Lisak did not consider the many other reasons why an allegation can be determined to be “unfounded.” Air Force judge advocate Reggie Yager reveals that about 45% of the cases Lisak reviewed did not proceed because there was insufficient evidence, the complainant withdrew from the process, the accuser couldn’t identify the perpetrator, or the allegation did not rise to the level of a sexual assault (8).

In the past, sexual assault activists stated that unfounded accusations were rare. In her book, Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape, Susan Brownmiller asserted that only 2% of sexual assault cases are false (9). This claim was refuted when it was revealed that her statistic was based on a casual comment made by a judge at a bar association meeting (10). Legal scholar Michelle Anderson likewise reported, “no study has ever been published which sets forth an evidentiary basis for the two percent false rape complaint thesis.” (11)

To reduce the risk of wrongful determinations of campus sexual assault, SAVE calls on college officials to assure impartial investigations, fair adjudications, and the presumption of innocence.

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