Virginia cancels Virginia Tech game after players killed
A Virginia Tech football star who was charged with sexually assaulting another student was on the Maryland football team’s radar from the first day of preseason camp, according to a new lawsuit.
A Virginia Tech football star who was charged with sexually assaulting another student was on the Maryland football team’s radar from the first day of preseason camp, according to a new lawsuit.
The school allegedly paid the student $100,000 to drop the charges for the Feb. 12 assault, resulting in an “unequivocal guarantee” of her silence, according to the civil rights lawsuit being filed in U.S. District Court on Monday.
The student, identified as Jane Doe, was a member of the Tech team that lost to the Hokies in an Atlantic Coast Conference opener on Wednesday.
The Virginia Tech players told the Washington Post that they were aware of the civil suit from the student’s attorney, which alleges that they took part in a “smear campaign” against her.
“The truth is you guys are not going to know me,” the student said, according to court papers obtained by The Associated Press. “I don’t want to be in your stories.”
The lawsuit also claims that the program denied the student a spot on the team because of “racially-based stereotypes,” and that Tech officials threatened not to allow a new player “from a single race to play for Tech” if she did not change her story.
The student said she dropped out of school and joined Tech to seek her justice, according to the suit.
The student told the newspaper that she believed that the school had “a vendetta against her.”
“They are not the only ones making up lies of me, the other players are going too,” she said.
The student, who remains unidentified, said she filed the suit after she was notified that a Virginia lawyer had retained her to represent her in a possible appeal of the $100,000 judgment against her.
A spokesperson for the school said in a statement: “The University of Virginia has no comment on the suit by Jane Doe.”
Under Virginia law, students can turn in false accusations to clear their names, but the student said she chose not to do so.
“I chose not to because I felt