#University assistant dean pressured grad student to have threesome: lawsuit

An assistant dean at Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania repeatedly pressured a female student to join her in a threesome with a man, a federal lawsuit claims.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in US District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, alleges the unidentified former student was propositioned early last year up to four times a week to have a “ménage à trois” by her female supervisor who worked as an assistant dean at the university’s Office of Professional, Continuing and Distance Education.

The student rejected the initial January 2019 offer by her supervisor — identified in the 13-page lawsuit as Dr. Roe — and then told the dean of the office about the sexual advance — but was told by the university official that “she did not want to hear about it,” the lawsuit claims.

The unwanted sexual advances continued through April 2019, during which the assistant dean regularly expressed her desire to have a threesome with the student, as well as “flaunting details” about her sex life, including showing her explicit photographs and text messages, the suit states.

The student then accompanied Dr. Roe on a spring business trip to Philadelphia, where the assistant dean allegedly showed her nude photos from her phone while “engaging in activities as a dominatrix” with several men.

The assistant dean then “threatened” the student’s job when she said she didn’t want to see the steamy pics, warning her that she could “suffer the same fate” as her predecessor, who was terminated by Dr. Roe, according to the lawsuit.

“Plaintiff understood this threat to mean that Dr. Roe was trying to intimidate her to not reject her advances,” the filing claims.

The student again approached the OPCDE dean to complain about the ongoing sexual harassment, but the university official told her “she did not want to hear it” because Dr. Roe was her friend, the lawsuit states.

The harassment then allegedly continued through August 2019 when the student and Dr. Roe attended a work conference in New Orleans, where the assistant dean asked for a room key to the woman’s room “in case I want to visit in the middle of the night,” the suit claims.

After rejecting that request, the student claims she was told by Dr. Roe she no longer had a job at Shippensburg when she returned to Pennsylvania.

The student proceeded to file a Title IX lawsuit in late August, complete with text messages sent by Dr. Roe that purportedly describe some of the harassment she endured.

Shippensburg ultimately put Dr. Roe on leave before she resigned her position in lieu of termination, according to the lawsuit, which seeks unspecified damages.

Officials at Shippensburg initially said they would reinstate the grad student’s employment after seeing evidence supporting her claims, but she was never brought back to the university, the lawsuit claims.

University officials, meanwhile, declined to comment on the lawsuit, citing its practice not to discuss pending litigation, WHP-TV reports.

“The university was just made aware of this filing and our legal counsel is reviewing it,” university spokeswoman Megan Silverstrim told the station.