Florida State University to pay $950,000 over rape suit
Florida State University has agreed to pay $950,000 to settle a federal lawsuit with Erica Kinsman, a former student who was raped by Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Jameis Winston in 2012.
Kinsman has agreed to drop her Title IX lawsuit against the school in return for $250,000 and $700,000 she and her attorney will receive respectively, according to a statement announced on Monday.
“I will always be disappointed that I had to leave the school I dreamed of attending since I was little,” Kinsman said in a statement. “I am happy that FSU has committed to continue making changes in order to ensure a safer environment for all students.”
Also, school president James Thrasher said; "Although we regret we will never be able to tell our full story in court, it is apparent that a trial many months from now would have left FSU fighting over the past rather than looking toward its very bright future."
Thrasher said the main reason the school settled was to avoid millions of dollars in legal expenses.
"We have an obligation to our students, their parents and Florida taxpayers," he said. "With all the economic demands we face, at some point it doesn't make sense to continue even though we are convinced we would have prevailed."
The settlement, however, does not have any effect on an ongoing investigation by the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights.
Kinsman lodged a complaint with the agency in early 2014 and it began its investigation in April of the same year.
The woman said in her lawsuit, settled in US District Court for the Northern District of Florida, that Florida State was “indifferent” to her reported sexual assault deliberately.
She said it was sometime in December 2012 when she was drinking with her friends at Potbelly’s, a bar near campus. She noted that an unknown man gave her a shot and the two left the bar and ended up in Winston’s place where she was raped.
Kinsman also argued that FSU hid and obstructed the investigation so that Winston can continue to play football.
She left FSU in November 2013 after the case was made public. She said that continued harassment hindered her ability to grasp her educational opportunities under Title IX.
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