Two years ago, Lizzy Seeberg, a 19-year-old freshman at Saint Marys College, across the street from Notre Dame, committed suicide after accusing an ND football player of sexually assaulting her. The friend Lizzy told immediately afterward said she was crying so hard she was having trouble breathing.
Yet after Lizzy went to the police, a friend of the players sent her a series of texts that frightened her as much as anything that had happened in the players dorm room. Dont do anything you would regret, one of them said. Messing with Notre Dame football is a bad idea.
At the time of her death, 10 days after reporting the attack to campus police, who have jurisdiction for even the most serious crimes on school property, investigators still had not interviewed the accused. It took them five more days after she died to get around to that, though they investigated Lizzy herself quite thoroughly, even debriefing a former roommate at another school with whom shed clashed.
Six months later after the story had become national news Notre Dame did convene a closed-door disciplinary hearing. The player testified that until he actually met with police, he hadnt even known why they wanted to speak to him though his buddy whod warned Lizzy not to mess with Notre Dame football had spoken to investigators 13 days earlier. He was found not responsible, and never sat out a game.
A few months later, a resident assistant in a Notre Dame dorm drove a freshman to the hospital for a rape exam after receiving an S.O.S. call. She said shed been raped by a member of the football team at a party off campus, the R.A. told me. I also spoke to the R.A.s parents, who met the young woman that same night, when their daughter brought her to their home after leaving the hospital. They said they saw and reported to athletic officials a hailstorm of texts from other players, warning the young woman not to report what had happened: They were trying to silence this girl, the R.A.s father told me. And did; no criminal complaint was ever filed.
Among those being congratulated for our return to gridiron glory is NDs president, Rev. John Jenkins, who refused to meet with the Seeberg family on advice of counsel, and other school officials whove whispered misleadingly in many ears, mine included, in an attempt to protect the schools brand by smearing a dead 19-year-old.
(Yes, Lizzy suffered from depression, but according to her therapists was neither unstable nor a teller of tales. No, she had never before accused anyone of such a thing. And no, she had never before attempted suicide.)
