SUSPENSION OF COLLEGE STUDENT FOR THREE YEARS BASED UPON A FINDING THE STUDENT WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR SEXUAL VIOLENCE AS DEFINED IN THE STUDENT CONDUCT MANUAL UPHELD (THIRD DEPT).

The Third Department upheld the college’s finding that petitioner was responsible for sexual violence within meaning of the provisions of the Student Conduct Manual and was properly suspended from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Plattsburgh for three years. The charges were based upon the female student’s inability to consent or her lack of consent to sexual intercourse:

SUNY’s determination was based upon its finding that the reporting individual could not affirmatively consent to sexual activity with petitioner because she was asleep or unconscious and, therefore, “incapacitated during the time period in question.” In that respect, the reporting individual stated that, over a roughly four-hour period, she had consumed three or four 24-ounce cans of malt liquor, as well as an unknown quantity of alcohol from a friend’s drink. Statements made by petitioner, both at the hearing and during an interview conducted by respondent Butterfly Blaise, SUNY’s Title IX Coordinator, as reflected in a written summary of that interview, corroborated the reporting individual’s account that she had been drinking prior to and during her encounter with petitioner. In fact, as reflected in the interview summary, petitioner recalled observing the reporting individual stumbling in the hallway and mumbling her words. Additionally, the reporting individual asserted that she had significant gaps in her memory regarding her encounter with petitioner, stating that she remembered certain parts but that “other parts fe[lt] ‘black’.” Matter of Jacobson v Blaise, 2019 NY Slip Op 06549, Third Dept 9-12-19