Khan v. Yale Univ.

• Citation: 511 F.Supp.3d 213
• Decision Date: 07 January 2021
• Docket Number: No. 3:19-cv-01966 (KAD),3:19-cv-01966 (KAD)
• Parties: Saifullah KHAN, Plaintiff, v. YALE UNIVERSITY, Peter Salovey, Jonathon Halloway, Marvin Chun, Joe Gordon, David Post, Mark Solomon, Ann Kuhlman, Lynn Cooley, Paul Genecin, Stephanie Spangler, Sarah Demers, Jane Doe, Carole Goldberg, Unknown Persons, Defendants.
• Court: United States District Courts. 2nd Circuit. United States District Court (Connecticut)

511 F.Supp.3d 213

Saifullah KHAN, Plaintiff,

v.YALE UNIVERSITY, Peter Salovey, Jonathon Halloway, Marvin Chun, Joe Gordon, David Post, Mark Solomon, Ann Kuhlman, Lynn Cooley, Paul Genecin, Stephanie Spangler, Sarah Demers, Jane Doe, Carole Goldberg, Unknown Persons, Defendants.

No. 3:19-cv-01966 (KAD)

United States District Court, D. Connecticut.

Signed January 7, 2021

Kevin Murray Smith, Norman A. Pattis, The Pattis Law Firm, LLC, New Haven, CT, for Plaintiff.

Patrick M. Noonan, Donahue, Durham & Noonan, Guilford, CT, for Defendants Yale University, Peter Salovey, Jonathon Halloway, Marvin Chun, Joe Gordon, David Post, Mark Solomon, Ann Kuhlman, Lynn Cooley, Paul Genecin, Stephanie Spangler, Sarah Demers, Carole Goldberg.

Brendan Gooley, James M. Sconzo, Carlton Fields, P.C., Hartford, CT, for Defendant Jane Doe.

MEMORANDUM OF DECISION RE: JANE DOE'S MOTION TO DISMISS (ECF NO. 26)

Kari A. Dooley, United States District Judge:

Plaintiff Saifullah Khan ("Mr. Khan" or the "Plaintiff") filed this action against Yale University ("Yale"), several of its administrators and faculty members (the "individual Yale Defendants"), and former Yale classmate Jane Doe ("Ms. Doe" or the "Defendant")¹ following Mr. Khan's alleged suspension and eventual expulsion from Yale. Underlying each of his claims is an allegation that Ms. Doe falsely accused him of sexually assaulting her on Halloween night 2015. Pending before the Court is Ms. Doe's motion to dismiss the claims brought against her, claims sounding in defamation and tortious interference with business relationships. For the reasons that follow, the motion to dismiss is GRANTED.

Allegations

The following allegations are taken from the Plaintiff's complaint and are accepted as true for purposes of the instant motion. See, e.g. , Hogan v. Fischer , 738 F.3d 509, 514 (2d Cir. 2013).

Mr. Khan is a citizen of Afghanistan who at all relevant times was enrolled as an undergraduate student at Yale. (Compl. ¶ 3.) He was born in a refugee camp in Pakistan six months after his family fled from the Taliban in Afghanistan and spent much of his upbringing in a refugee camp and surrounding environments before the family later fled from a Pakistani terrorist group to the United Arab Emirates. (Id. ¶¶ 18–20.) Mr. Khan cultivated an early love of learning and was ultimately drawn to the educational opportunities in the United States and to Yale's promise of academic excellence in particular. (Id. ¶¶ 21–23.) He was expected to graduate Yale with the Class of 2016. (Id. ¶ 38.)

Ms. Doe was a classmate of Mr. Khan's and was likewise enrolled at all relevant times as an undergraduate student at Yale. (Id. ¶ 16.) On Halloween night in 2015, Mr. Khan and Ms. Doe, who were familiar with one another from prior campus encounters, met at an off-campus Halloween party before attending a musical performance at Woolsey Hall. (Id. ¶¶ 39–40.) Ms. Doe was not feeling well and so the two left the performance early and walked on campus together before returning to Trumbull College, where they both resided. (Id. ¶ 41.) After Mr. Khan escorted Ms. Doe to her room, she asked him to return and the two ultimately engaged in consensual sexual intercourse. (Id. ¶¶ 42–43.) In the morning Ms. Doe reported to friends that she had been raped, though she informed a health care worker that she had engaged in unprotected consensual sex when seeking contraception at the Yale health center that same day. (Id. ¶ 45.)

In the days that followed Ms. Doe went public with her rape claim and issued a formal complaint against Mr. Khan on the advice of the Yale Women's Center. (Id. ¶ 46.) Mr. Khan was immediately suspended by Yale Deputy Dean Joe Gordon based on Ms. Doe's written complaint alone and was ordered to vacate campus, which rendered him homeless. (Id. ¶ 47.) The Yale Police Department opened an investigation and by mid-November the State of Connecticut filed criminal charges against Mr. Khan for first-degree sexual assault. (Id. ¶ 48.) In the meantime Yale's University-Wide Committee on Sexual Misconduct ("UWC") agreed to stay any disciplinary proceedings pending the outcome of the prosecution.² (Id. ¶ 51.) Mr. Khan subsequently faced trial before a jury in early 2018 for first, second, third, and fourth-degree sexual assault during a nearly two-week trial and was acquitted on all counts after less than a day of deliberations. (Id. ¶ 52.)

Following his acquittal Mr. Khan sought readmission Yale, to which #MeToo activists galvanized an opposition, generating more than 77,000 signatures on a petition protesting his reenrollment. (Id. ¶¶ 56–57.) Mr. Khan was eventually readmitted and resumed full-time student status in the fall of 2018, though he was denied on-campus housing and treated as unwelcome on campus. (Id. ¶ 58.) In early October 2018, the Yale Daily News published an article relaying the allegations of a troubled young man who claimed that he had a romantic relationship with Mr. Khan that included an episode in which Mr. Khan sexually assaulted him during an act of role-playing with a woman in Washington, D.C., and an instance in which Mr. Khan slapped him in the face while the two were together in Indianapolis. (Id. ¶ 60.) The article did not provide any indication that this young man had any affiliation with Yale or had ever been to the Yale campus. (Id. ¶ 61.)

Following publication of the article Mr. Khan was contacted by members of the Yale Police Department and by two Yale administrators to inquire as to his well-being and to determine whether he needed professional help. (Id. ¶¶ 62–63.) Mr. Khan agreed to undergo a mental health consultation but reported that he was fine and had not considered harming himself or others. (Id. ) Mr. Khan was then asked to meet with Yale administrators and after indicating that he would not do so, Mr. Khan received a letter "informing him that he was suspended effectively[sic] immediately from Yale College due to an ‘emergency,’ " which Dean Marvin Chun described as "necessary for your physical and emotional safety and well-being and/or the safety and well-being of the university community." (Id. ¶ 64.) Mr. Khan was thus barred from campus and prohibited from attending his classes; he was again rendered homeless without warning and informed that he would lose his health care coverage effective November 1, 2018. (Id. ¶¶ 64–65.)

Mr. Khan alleges that Yale's professed concern with his safety and with the safety of the Yale community is not credible, as there is no evidence that Mr. Khan posed a danger to himself or to anyone else as a result of the article that appeared in the Yale Daily News, and because a psychiatric examiner concluded that Mr. Khan posed no such threat. (Id. ¶¶ 66, 71.) Instead, Mr. Khan asserts that his suspension was pretextual and arose from a confluence of factors that included his unique history at Yale and the heightened sensibilities surrounding sexual assault claims, which were often credited without investigation or due process at Yale as a function of the university's pervasive #MeToo culture. (Id. ¶¶ 67, 70.) Following his suspension Mr. Khan placed Yale on notice that he intended to seek judicial relief and open an investigation into Yale's alleged Title IX³ violations in connection with his suspension and with the university's failure to convene a hearing on the claims of Ms. Doe, who had since graduated. (Id. ¶ 68.) Mr. Khan also requested and was denied permission to attend his classes with an escort to address Yale's safety concerns, though Yale had afforded other male students accused of sexual misconduct the ability to complete their degrees off-site. (Id. ¶ 69.)

In November 2018 Mr. Khan was permitted to return to campus for a hearing convened by the UWC on Ms. Doe's 2015 sexual assault complaint. (Id. ¶ 74.) Ms. Doe, who had since graduated from Yale, was not present and provided a statement via teleconference. (Id. ¶ 77.) Mr. Khan was not permitted to be in the room when the UWC panel questioned Ms. Doe and was instead required to sit in an anteroom where he listened to an audio-feed of the hearing; as a result, Mr. Khan was denied an opportunity to confront his accuser. (Id. ) And although Mr. Khan had counsel present, his attorney was not permitted to speak, question witnesses, or launch objections when panel members assumed facts not in evidence and asked compound questions. (Id. ¶ 78.) A member of the Yale Corporation Counsel's office was present throughout the proceedings to provide counsel to the UWC panel. (Id. ) Mr. Khan also requested a transcript or recording of the hearing, which the panel denied. (Id. ¶ 79.) The UWC panel decided to expel Mr. Khan as a result of the hearing, which he contends failed to afford him the basic due process that Title IX demands. (Id. ¶¶ 76, 80.) As a result of losing his opportunity to complete his Yale education, Mr. Khan is subject to immediate deportation to Afghanistan, where he faces serious physical danger due to his family's decision to seek refuge in Pakistan. (Id. ¶ 81.)

In light of the foregoing, Mr. Khan brings claims against Yale and the individual Yale Defendants for a violation of Title IX, breach of contract, breach of the implied warranty of fair dealing, negligent infliction of emotional distress, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and breach of privacy. As indicated above, Mr. Khan also brings claims against Jane Doe for defamation and tortious interference with business relationships, which Ms. Doe has moved to dismiss.

Legal Standard

On a motion to dismiss pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6), the Court must accept the complaint's factual allegations as true and must draw inferences in the plaintiff's favor. Littlejohn v. City of New York , 795 F.3d 297, 306 (2d Cir. 2015). A motion filed pursuant to " Rule 12(b)(6) must be decided on ‘facts stated on the face of the complaint, in documents appended to the complaint or incorporated in the complaint by reference, and matters of...