HUNTINGTON — A trial is set for November for a lawsuit against the Marshall University Board of Governors alleging discrimination.
The trial is scheduled for Nov. 14 at 8:30 a.m. and a final settlement conference is scheduled for the day before, according to court documents.
The court document states a pretrial conference is scheduled for Oct. 30 and the last date to complete depositions will be July 17.
An unknown, unnamed individual filed the lawsuit against Marshall University Board of Governors and Debra Hart over the summer, alleging that the university discriminated and retaliated against him, a student, for exercising his rights under Title IX, according to the complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia.
John Doe claims Marshall deprived him of many of the rights to which he was entitled under the law and actively retaliated against him for exercising what rights he could.
In 2020, Doe was the target of a false Title IX complaint that was filed nearly a month after the alleged misconduct, but just days after he and the complainant ended their romantic relationship, according to the suit.
Doe claims Marshall commenced an investigation, but when he exercised his rights to request evidence from the accuser and interview witnesses, the complainant voluntarily dismissed her claim.
"Even after the complainant’s voluntary dismissal, Debra Hart, Marshall’s Title IX Coordinator, attempted to revive and continue the investigation but was precluded from doing so following the intervention of Marshall’s general counsel," the complaint states. "Hart believed that the Plaintiff 'got away with it' and set out to make him pay."
Doe claims when students returned to campus the next fall, Hart reached out to Doe's classmates, shared information about the 2020 complaint, and actively solicited new claims against him.
Hart’s campaign against Doe resulted in two new Title IX complaints, according to the suit.
Doe claims the first new complaint was dismissed almost immediately because it did not allege any sexual misconduct covered by Title IX and Hart dredged up a second new complaint from Jane Roe, a female student at Marshall.
"Incredibly, the complaint was based on previously unreported conduct that had allegedly occurred more than nine months earlier, and Jane Roe admitted that: (a) she was intoxicated and high on illegal drugs at the time the alleged misconduct occurred and (b) she never would have filed the complaint if not for Hart’s active solicitation and encouragement," the complaint states.
Doe claims that not only did Hart retaliate against him by soliciting the 2021 Complaint, but she and others in Marshall’s Title IX Office have continued to discriminate against him by conducting an unfair and biased investigation and depriving him of important rights guaranteed by Title IX and the United States Constitution.
Doe is seeking compensatory and punitive damages. He is represented by Ryan McCune Donovan and J. Zak Ritchie of Hissam Forman Donovan Ritchie in Charleston.
U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia