Miami University Says It Failed to Notify Sex-Crime Victim of Return of Her Attacker

Oct. 6, 2004
Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, could face financial penalties for failing to notify a former student that the man who sexually attacked her

Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, could face financial penalties for failing to notify a former student that the man who sexually attacked her last year was allowed back on campus, a school spokesman said.

The university is reviewing its files to determine if it had previously failed to provide the written notice to other sex-crime victims, university spokesman Richard Little said Tuesday. Federal law requires colleges and universities to disclose such information.

The former student learned that her attacker, Jason Landis, 25, was back on campus after she heard that he was accused of raping another woman last week. Landis, of Troy, was being held in the Butler County Jail on a rape charge. He is scheduled for a preliminary hearing Thursday in Oxford, said his lawyer, Jon Paul Rion.

Landis pleaded guilty in November 2003 to misdemeanor charges of sexual imposition and aggravated trespassing after entering the former student's dorm room while she slept and fondling her. The 20-year-old woman said he was a stranger to her.

The woman said university officials told her Landis was barred from campus until 2005. Little said the university gave Landis a document that lifted his suspension from campus in August 2004, but there is no record that his victim was sent a copy of it.

The 2003 victim, now attending another college, said she made social visits to Miami University recently, unaware that Landis was allowed back.

"It's terrifying,'' she said. "I don't even know what I would have done if I ran into him.''

Daniel Carter, vice president of Security On Campus Inc., a national organization that promotes college students' safety on campus, said his group is considering asking the U.S. Department of Education to investigate. Carter said Miami was previously found in violation of federal law and pledged in 1997 to provide -- to accusers and accused -- written final results of student disciplinary action in all sexual-assault cases.