Rolling Stone faces suit
RICHMOND, Virginia — The University of Virginia fraternity that was the focus of a debunked Rolling Stone article about a gang rape has filed a $25-million US lawsuit against the magazine, saying the article made the frat and its members “the object of an avalanche of condemnation worldwide.”
The complaint, filed in Charlottesville Circuit Court on Monday, also names the story’s writer, Sabrina Rubin Erdely, as a defendant. It is the third filed in response to the November 2014 article headlined: “A rape on campus: A brutal assault and struggle for justice at UVA.” Three fraternity members and recent graduates are suing for at least $225,000 each, and a university associate dean who claims she was portrayed as the “chief villain” is suing the magazine for more than $7.5 million.
Rolling Stone spokeswoman Kathryn Brenner said the magazine had no comment on the lawsuit.
The article described a student’s account of being raped by seven men at the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house in September 2012. It portrayed university officials as insensitive and unresponsive to the plight of the student, who was identified only as Jackie, and suggested that the attack was emblematic of a culture of sexual violence at the elite public university. The story horrified university leaders, sparked protests at the school and prompted national discussions about sexual assault on U.S. campuses.
However, details in the lengthy narrative did not hold up under scrutiny by other media organizations. Phi Kappa Psi did not host any social event at its house on the day of the alleged gang rape as the article claimed.
Additional discrepancies led Rolling Stone to commission an examination by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, which said in a blistering report that Rolling Stone failed at virtually every step, from the reporting by Erdely to an editing process that included high-ranking staffers.
An investigation by Charlottesville police found no evidence to back up Jackie’s claims. Rolling Stone retracted the article, and the magazine’s managing editor and Erdely both apologized. But the fraternity said the damage had already been already done.
“These allegations did not concern harmless fraternity pranks,” the fraternity said in the lawsuit. “These were allegations of ritualized and criminal gang rape that Rolling Stone knew were the predicates for annihilation of Phi Kappa Psi and widespread persecution of its members.”