Megyn Kelly said Wednesday that the label used for seven former Cornell University fraternity members accused of rape should be reconsidered after one defendant alleged that he, too, was sexually assaulted by the woman who brought the claims.
The seven men have faced intense scrutiny since a former Cornell student, identified as Jane Doe in court filings, alleged in a civil lawsuit last month that she was gang-raped at the Chi Phi fraternity house on October 19, 2024.
On her podcast Wednesday, however, Kelly argued that Jane Doe could also be viewed as an alleged perpetrator in the dispute.
She said the phrase “Cornell seven” should instead become “Cornell eight” after defendant Matthew Ingalls accused Jane Doe in messages to campus police of being “a sexual molester, a harasser and assaulter.”
“He’s alleged in this proceeding that if the standard is you were intoxicated and someone had sex with you, notwithstanding that fact, very intoxicated, then she is an… assaulter as well,” Kelly said.
Kelly said Ingalls was “passing out repeatedly” during a threesome involving him, Jane Doe and another defendant, Jonathan Newell, citing statements the two gave to police.
“And she was aware of that, that he could not stay awake, and was continuing to perform sex acts at least in bed next to him shortly thereafter,” Kelly said. She noted that Jane Doe had also alleged that she repeatedly tried to wake Ingalls.
During Cornell’s Title IX investigation, Ingalls also testified that Jane Doe was performing oral sex on him while he was “in and out of consciousness,” struggling to remain awake after consuming drugs and alcohol, according to Kelly.
Megyn Kelly said Wednesday that the term used for seven fraternity members accused of gang-raping a former Cornell University student should be revised after one defendant alleged that the woman had assaulted him
Cornell University has been at the center of a controversy since Jane Doe, the name used for the alleged victim in court documents, sued last month and claimed she was pressured to take drugs before being sexually assaulted by seven Chi Phi fraternity members at an off-campus house in 2024
Kelly claimed that Cornell investigators failed to treat Ingalls’ account with the same seriousness.
She said Ingalls later sent an angry letter stating: “I knew you’d do this. I knew you’d only take her allegation seriously. That she’s the only one who could possibly be assaulted, not me.”
Ingalls had invited Jane Doe to the Chi Phi house that night. In text messages, he described the pair dancing before they engaged in a threesome with Newell.
Jane Doe’s lawsuit alleges that seven men ultimately took part in sexual intercourse over the following seven hours. She said she became “completely incapacitated” after drinking several alcoholic beverages and taking ketamine.
According to her account, the alleged assault continued until approximately 5:45 a.m., when she lost consciousness.
The lawsuit says Jane Doe reported the incident to Cornell University Police on November 8, after friends urged her to come forward.
Ingalls later offered a different account, saying he was too intoxicated to consent to sexual activity and claiming that he was the person who had been sexually assaulted.
In a February 2025 email to Cornell’s Title IX investigator, Ingalls accused the university of “entrapment” and indicated that he might submit his own complaint against Jane Doe.
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Matthew Ingalls, who invited Jane Doe to the October 19, 2024, gathering, alleged that he was the person sexually assaulted
“After all, you received information that I was sodomized by her while I was incapacitated back in November and you never once thought to alert me of my rights under these procedures as a survivor of this assault?” he wrote.
‘The very fact that I had to bring this to your attention now in February confirms my worst fears: that this process is rolled [sic] with gender discrimination.’
During the investigation, campus police had obtained a phone call in which Ingalls insisted that the alleged victim told him she was sober – though the woman refuted those claims, telling Ingalls he ‘already knew I was 10 shots deep’ when the alleged assault occurred.
‘If I wanted to take this somewhere, what y’all did would be classified as gang rape,’ she then told him.
At another point in the conversation, Jane Doe told Ingalls she did not remember who all of the men were during the encounter, and said she recalled four men in a bed at one point with more stood around them.
Ingalls responded: ‘I have racked my brain for this mystery. You know, it’s possible that both of us, like, remember this and it’s not true.’
Jane Doe argued back to this, saying: ‘No, because I remember looking up and being like, “That is too many people.”‘
The audio showed that while Ingalls appeared to try and calm Jane Doe’s feelings about the incident, he did not mention that he texted his fraternity group chat during the alleged assault, according to Jane Doe’s lawsuit.
He allegedly posted a photo of Jane Doe to the fraternity group chat, and said, ‘Boys come whip it out,’ her lawsuit alleges.
One of the men allegedly posted to the fraternity’s active-members Snapchat group saying that there was ‘free p***y’ upstairs, referring to Doe, according to her civil suit, which included an image of the purported chat
Ingalls was later expelled from the school along with Jonathan Newell, who engaged in a threesome with Jane Doe and Ingalls and allegedly struck the victim.
Winston Lee and Gillio Lopes, meanwhile, were both suspended and have since re-enrolled and Diego Sarabia was banned from campus. He had already graduated from the school at the time.
The two other men, Scott Norris and Scott Kretzschmar, were found not responsible for sexual activity, and their punishments did not include expulsion or any suspensions.
All of the defendants have denied wrongdoing and were never charged in the alleged assault after Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten concluded there was a lack of evidence based on Jane Doe’s statement to police at the time.
His office has since reopened the case, while New York Governor Kathy Hochul has appointed Attorney General Letitia James as a special prosecutor.
Officials at Cornell University also announced Tuesday they hired former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates to review the school’s handling of the case and its broader sexual assault policies.