Cornell rape case defendant had consensual sex with accuser, lawyer tells Megyn Kelly

A Cornell University student accused in a bombshell rape lawsuit admitted he had sex with the accuser — but claimed the encounter was consensual, his lawyer said Thursday.Attorney Tara Davis, who represents Gillio Lopes, acknowledged on “The Megyn Kelly Show” podcast that her client had sex with the woman identified as Jane Doe in the lawsuit, but disputed that he sexually assaulted her.

Asked by host Megyn Kelly whether Lopes denied having sex with Doe during the alleged October 2024 encounter at Cornell’s Chi Phi fraternity house, Davis replied: “No.”“And his defense is that it was consensual?” Kelly asked.“Correct,” Davis said.Doe’s 101-page civil complaint, filed last month in Manhattan Supreme Court, names Lopes and six other then-members of Cornell’s Xi Chapter of the Chi Phi fraternity, accusing them of sexual assault stemming from a night of drinking, drug use and what began as a consensual threesome on Oct.19, 2024.The lawsuit alleges Lopes entered a room where Doe was with two other fraternity members, grabbed her away from one of the men and kissed her before he and another defendant had sex with her without her consent.“That’s just not factual,” Davis told Kelly after the host read portions of those allegations on air.“It’s not what was presented in the hearing through any of the testimony or the evidence,” Davis said, referring to Cornell’s private disciplinary proceeding.“It’s just not factual, and it’s just mischaracterized.”Davis said the university’s investigation produced an approximately 1,500-page record, involved roughly 50 witness interviews and culminated in 12-and-a-half days of hearings — far more material, she argued, than was reflected in Doe’s civil complaint.Lopes was ultimately suspended by Cornell and received additional “educational sanctions,” including an assignment that involved an essay, Davis said.She pushed back on claims that essay-writing constituted the entirety of his...