Grad accuses Yale of rights violation

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — A Yale University graduate is suing the Ivy League school over allegations she was wrongly removed from campus after she sought counseling for depression as school officials worried about more negative publicity after two student suicides.

The Yale Daily News reported Friday that the lawsuit was filed Nov. 5 in federal court in New Jersey by a woman known only in court documents as “Z.P.”

A Yale spokesman says university officials do not comment on pending litigation.

The woman said Yale violated her constitutional rights by placing her on mandatory medical leave after she sought counseling in November 2016, the same month as the two suicides. She alleges she was unlawfully held for involuntary treatment at Yale-New Haven Hospital and hospital staff illegally gave her medical information to Yale officials.

She was placed on medical withdrawal in the fall of 2016 when she was a senior and reinstated in the fall of 2017. She graduated this year.

The woman’s lawyer, Robert De Groot, said his client is seeking damages for Yale’s violations of the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, saying school officials did not “assist or accommodate” her for her depression and illegally denied her due process by forcibly removing her from campus.

De Groot accused Yale officials of forcing the student to leave school only because they did not want another suicide to spur more negative media coverage.

“This was not done to assist this young woman,” De Groot told the student newspaper. “This was done to protect [Yale’s] own image from being tarnished.”

The lawsuit also names as defendants Yale President Peter Salovey and other top school officials, as well as six unidentified university and hospital employees.