Lawsuit: Tennessee Did Nothing Over Athletes' Alleged Sexual Assaults

By D.J. Byrnes on February 10, 2016 at 9:47a

Weeks after Baylor made headlines for reportedly ignoring the claims of athletes' committing sexual assault, Tennessee is in the news for pretty much the same thing.

From washingtonpost.com:

Six women have filed a federal lawsuit against the University of Tennessee, alleging that the school violated Title IX and other laws because of its “deliberate indifference” toward sexual assaults committed by student-athletes, most of them football players.

The lawsuit also claims that Tennessee’s adjudication process for on- and off-campus sexual assaults is biased against victims who step forward.

Five Tennessee athletes — former basketball player Yemi Makanjuola, former football players A.J. Johnson, Michael Williams and Riyahd Jones, and a current football player named as a “John Doe” — are accused of sexual assaults in the lawsuit. A sixth male Tennessee student — not an athlete — also is accused of sexually assaulting a woman after a football team party at a campus dorm at which she was served alcohol by former Tennessee football player Treyvon Paulk.

Also included in the lawsuit: Claims Johnson and Williams assaulted teammate Drae Bowles in 2014 after he took the woman who accused them of rape to the hospital.

Hopefully justice comes swift down in Knoxville.