There is no evidence to support claims by Rolling Stone that a University of Virginia student was gang-raped at a campus fraternity in September 2012, said Charlottesville Police Chief Timothy Longo. Detectives discredited numerous claims about the alleged assault, reports the Washington Post. Longo said “Jackie, the woman who said she was gang-raped at a fraternity party, declined to speak about the alleged incident or provide any information about it. Detectives determined that the fraternity did not host a party the night of the alleged attack, and police did not find anyone matching the description of the alleged attackers.
“We're not able to conclude to any substantive degree that an incident occurred at the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house or any other fraternity house, for that matter,” Longo told a news conference. “That doesn't mean something terrible didn't happen to Jackie. . . . We're just not able to gather sufficient facts to determine what that is.” A 9,000-word Rolling Stone account went viral online in November. The report unraveled under scrutiny, as the accuser's version of events was challenged by her friends, members of the fraternity and sexual assault advocates on campus. After the Washington Post reported flaws in the account, Rolling Stone's editors backed away from it. Rolling Stone will soon publish the results of a review by the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University of its handling of the story.