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Woman sues Oregon State, Mike Riley, for 'sexually violent culture'

A former Oregon State student has filed a federal Title IX lawsuit against former head football coach Mike Riley for creating and not correcting a sexually hostile culture among football players, which she said contributed to her rape in 1999.

The woman alleges that she was raped on Oct. 9, 1999, while a freshman at OSU.

According to legal documents obtained by the Oregonian, the woman was attending a party at an off campus apartment when a man approached her with an open beer can. The man said he was visiting Corvalis, where the Oregon State campus is located, from Portland.

"She took two drinks of the beer and then became woozy and fuzzy-headed," according to her complaint filed Monday in Eugene's U.S. District Court. She vomited and the man escorted her to an apartment in the 1400 block of Northwest 20th Street, where some OSU football players allegedly lived.

She passed out and regained consciousness in a bedroom with OSU football jerseys and team photos on the walls. .

"She was being sexually assaulted by the young man who had offered her the beer," the suit says. "She was unable to move her arms or legs to fight back. She faded back out of consciousness." .

She woke the next morning naked and alone in the same bed where the assault occurred, she alleges. She dressed and fled the apartment. .

The woman said she reported the rape two days later to a counselor at Oregon State’s Student Health Services and says that the worker suggested that perhaps she said “yes” to the alleged perpetrator and that she probably should not have been drinking.

The woman did not seek other help or go to authorities and ultimately transferred from the school.

The lawsuit is seeking $7.5 million in damages.

While Riley, who is now the head coach at Nebraska, is named in the suit, he actually wasn’t the coach when the alleged assault took place. In fact, Riley, who has been at Oregon State in 1997 and 1998, left the Beavers in January 1999 to become the head coach of the San Diego Chargers and he didn’t return to Oregon State until 2003. Dennis Erickson was the head coach at Oregon State during the time Riley was gone.

The woman does say she was inspired to come forward after a ready a 2014 story in the Oregonian on Brenda Tracy, who said she was sexually assaulted on June 24, 1998, by four men, including two Oregon football players, Calvin Carlyle and Jason Dandridge.

The woman learned that she was raped in the same apartment complex and believes her attacker was Calyle’s cousin.

The woman alleges that OSU officials in the late 1990s, including Riley, failed to remedy a sexually violent culture toward women permitted by OSU's football program and implement a more effective assault prevention policy.

The Oregon statute of limitations for felony sexual offenses is six years if the alleged victim was over 18 and 12 years if the victim was younger. Title IX cases usually have to be filed within 180 days of the event, but exceptions can be made if there is a similar case that was filed outside the 180-day window. However, the difference between this case and the case involving Brenda Tracy is that she went to police and had a rape examination at Salem Hospital. There was a thorough investigation, but the case was dropped because Tracy did not want to assist with the case.

In the Oregonian story, Tracy actually reconciled with the university and coach Mike Riley even asked — through the reporter — whether she’d be willing to help educate the team on sexual violence. There’s no word in the story of what came of that request.

Steve Clark, Oregon State’s vice president of university relations, told the Oregonian the school refuted the woman’s claims.

"We disagree and refute her claim that the university's actions in the Brenda Tracy matter led to her assault a year later by a non-student relative of one of Ms. Tracy's assailants.”

For more Oregon State news, visit BeaverBlitz.com.

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Graham Watson is the editor of Dr. Saturday on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email her at dr.saturday@ymail.com or follow her on Twitter!

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