Letitia James is absolutely wrong person to get to bottom of complex Cornell case

“Seven men drugged and gang raped a 20-year-old woman.” That verdict in the alleged Cornell rape case was delivered by Rep.Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has joined a chorus of others in pronouncing the guilt of Cornell students accused of raping a fellow student.Mind you, not a single witness has testified under oath publicly and not a single charge has been brought.

However, guilt is now being collectively declared from the usual figures and outlets who have never been late to mob justice.Ocasio-Cortez declared, “I want to be clear that the culture of rape, sexual assault, and pedophilia is protected in elite institutions across the United States and including Cornell University in this instance.It has got to stop.”We have been here before.

Twenty years ago, Duke students were accused of gang raping a stripper at a campus party.The media quickly lionized Durham District Attorney Michael B.

Nifong as he pandered to the media in portraying the students as personifying a racist rape culture in the United States.The problem is that, from the start, the facts did not fit the allegations and there was a total lack of forensic evidence to support the claim. Crystal Mangum later admitted that she had lied.Nifong was disbarred and Mangum, who was still not prosecuted for lying about these students, later went to jail for murder.All the politicians and pundits who declared the Duke students guilty simply shrugged and moved on to the next scandal, demanding instant, uninformed judgments.Conflicts in testimony, as there is in the Cornell case, does not mean that there was no rape.Indeed, this is a stronger case than Duke in my view.

However, there is ample reason to withhold judgment until more is known.Much of what we know comes from a 101-page civil complaint filed by Doe against Cornell, fraternity-related entities, seven individual defendants and other defendants. The alleged rape occurred on the night of Oct.19, 2024.

Doe admits that she drank heavil...