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ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — A student is suing a private Catholic university in St. Paul over its handling of a sexual assault allegation against him.
The student wasn't criminally charged in the incident, but the University of St. Thomas suspended him for more than a year after it launched its own investigation.
The case illustrates the difficulty for colleges and universities that find themselves criticized in such cases for either going too easy on alleged perpetrators or trampling their rights, the Star Tribune (http://strib.mn/1OcNlR8 ) reported
A federal lawsuit filed Friday in St. Paul alleges that St. Thomas imposed an unfair and illegal disciplinary process against the student in order "to reach a predetermined result." The university denies the allegations and claims in a statement issued Monday that its investigations are "thorough and impartial."
St. Thomas filed an emergency motion Monday to delete and seal some of the student's allegations in his complaint.
The university wants a judge to order the student to destroy private medical reports by a sexual-assault nurse examiner for the alleged victim and to seal some allegations the student made in reference to the medical records. The university said in its motion that those reports "are improperly in his possession" and he should be sanctioned for obtaining them.
Although the Ramsey County attorney's office determined there wasn't enough evidence to support to alleged victim's story that she was sexually assaulted, St. Thomas continued its own investigation and notified the student in a Feb. 10 letter that he committed "nonconsensual sexual intercourse" and was suspended starting Feb. 13 until the beginning of the 2017-2018 school year.
The student appealed the suspension, saying the university "is desperately grasping for evidence to support an unsupportable finding," but the appeal was denied.
His lawyer declined to comment on whether the student will return to St. Thomas once his suspension ends.
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Information from: Star Tribune, http://www.startribune.com
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