Governor Kathy Hochul has stripped a small-town New York prosecutor of control over one of the most explosive campus sexual assault cases in recent memory, handing it instead to state Attorney General Letitia James just as newly surfaced text messages and a chilling Snapchat post are rewriting the public record of what happened inside a Cornell University fraternity house two years ago.

The case centers on a woman, identified in court papers as Jane Doe, who says she was drugged with ketamine and gang-raped for roughly four hours at the Chi Phi fraternity house in Ithaca on the night of October 19, 2024. A campus police investigation at the time ended without criminal charges. That changed after the woman filed a civil lawsuit on September 16 against seven former fraternity brothers, Chi Phi, Cornell and a local bar, prompting Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten to reopen the criminal probe on September 28 and assign a senior sex-crimes prosecutor to the case.

Newly disclosed records, first detailed by CBS News, show a fraternity member sent a Snapchat message around 1:42 a.m. offering the woman for "free" sex, and that another brother later texted her an apology for how "things got way out of hand." In the days that followed, the woman's own texts show her growing certainty about what had happened to her, moving from uncertainty to telling the brother that "90% of what happened that night was not consensual," and later informing police she could say "with 100% confidence" she had been raped.

Governor steps in

Hochul signed an executive order on October 1 removing the case from Van Houten's office and naming James special prosecutor, saying she had lost confidence in how the local investigation and the original decision not to prosecute had been handled.

"This culture has to stop. And it will stop here in the state of New York," Hochul said.

James, who now has authority to present evidence to a grand jury and pursue charges if warranted, pledged a fair and thorough review. Van Houten has defended his office, noting that the woman's original 2024 sworn statement did not allege drugging or gang rape, and that he was never contacted by her attorney before the lawsuit was filed, according to NPR.

Cornell's own disciplinary process, separate from the criminal case, resulted in two students expelled and two suspended, while two others were found not responsible; the university permanently banned the Chi Phi chapter from campus. University officials have said they imposed "consequential" punishments, a characterization the woman and her supporters dispute. She has since withdrawn from the university.

The case has drawn outside political attention as well, with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pointing to the fraternity group chat as evidence of a broader culture, telling reporters the posts showed "it was normal to them," according to CBS News.

No criminal charges have been filed as of Friday. James's office has not set a timetable for when a grand jury presentation might occur.