A Stanford University employee was arrested Wednesday on charges of lying to authorities about two alleged rape incidents on the California campus, prosecutors said.
Jennifer Griese, 25, of Santa Clara, was arrested on two felony counts of perjury and two misdemeanor counts of perjury, according to a complaint obtained by NBC News, after an investigation found she matched False allegations of rape were made twice against the person. The description of a black male coworker involved what Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen called a “rare and deeply devastating crime.”
The false assault report – which did not identify Grice by name – “triggered a campus-wide security alert and campus unrest,” the DA’s office said. He also spurred national media coverage, including NBC News, which covered two false assault reports, as well as a student-led protest on campus in October following a second false report.
“These false reports are hurtful to true survivors of sexual assault and to members of our community who have experienced fear and anxiety from the reports,” Stanford officials said in a statement Wednesday. Rare.
In fact, according to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, research has shown that false reports make up 2% to 8% of sexual assault reports. And black men in particular have long been falsely accused of sexual assault. Five black and Latino teenagers, for example, were wrongly imprisoned for six to 13 years for the 1989 rape of a white jogger in New York City’s Central Park, before their convictions were overturned in 2002. was given.
“Sexual assault and other sexual crimes are unfortunately prevalent both at Stanford and in our wider society. We remain steadfast in our commitment to providing compassionate support for survivors of sexual assault and to preventing these acts from occurring,” continued Stanford’s statement. .
According to a probable cause document, the university’s Department of Public Safety spent more than $300,000 to investigate false reports and hire outside security.
Grice, who works in the university’s housing services department, has been A spokeswoman for the DA said he was released on $25,000 bail and is scheduled to appear in San Jose on April 17.
The spokesman said if convicted he could face up to five years in prison.
It was not immediately clear whether he had a lawyer. Gries did not immediately respond to messages and emails on Wednesday morning to contacts listed by his name.
According to a LinkedIn profile under her name, she has worked at Stanford since August 2020 – first as a front-desk assistant and most recently as a housing service center supervisor.
Grice is on a leave of absence, officials said in a statement released Wednesday, adding that they will “review her employment in light of the information shared” by the DA’s office.
A university spokesperson did not respond to questions about whether the falsely accused colleague is still employed.
Two fake news in two months
According to the DA’s office, Grice first told county sexual assault forensic exam nurses at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center on August 9 that she was assaulted by a black man in his late 20s in a bathroom near Stanford’s Wilbur Hall. it was done. It said she alleged that she did not want to be contacted by law enforcement and that the perpetrator was an “unknown assailant”.
After then seeing the campus security alert, Grice reached out to the Stanford Department of Public Safety to speak with a detective about the criminal process. When they met on August 17, she “refused to provide further details about the alleged sexual assault” but said she knew the alleged perpetrator and did not believe the public was in danger. She also asked the detective “if Human Resources would be notified of this report” and “said she did not expect a community alert or incident to be in the news,” the probable cause document says.
The detective told her that the university had received “many questions from concerned parents of students at Stanford about whether the campus is safe.”
Less than two months later, on October 7, Gries again reported to a sexual assault forensic examination nurse at Stanford Hospital that she had been raped on campus—this time, she alleged, by a black man. Cupboard in a basement storage in his late 20s.
In both cases, the probable cause document says, she had signed a consent form acknowledging that nurses were mandated reporters who had to notify law enforcement about reported sexual assaults and that they would receive a The suspect will submit his or her name to law enforcement along with the injury report. The complaint states that two misdemeanor charges of perjury occurred.
Both Greise’s sexual assault test kits were “analyzed as a primary suspect given the extreme public safety risk of a potential sex offender,” the DA’s office said. According to the probable cause document, “the laboratory report found no male DNA in the genital or oral areas for both rape kits”.
Evidence showed that “Grice made up the stories because he was angry at a co-worker,” the DA’s office said, adding that he applied twice under penalty of perjury for funds from the California Victims of Crimes Board – which Reimburses expenses related to the crime – Proving that she was sexually assaulted. A DA spokesperson said it did not receive funds from the foundation.
‘Can’t I make her life hell’
An investigation by the Stanford Public Safety Department revealed Gries made a sexual assault complaint against a coworker who fit the description of the alleged rapist — a black male in his 20s — last March and a human resources investigation. found that the complaint was unfounded according to the probable cause document. He was later shifted to a different location at work, it says.
The investigation also concluded that she had told an acquaintance that she was in a relationship with the co-worker, that he had sexually assaulted her and that she had become pregnant with twins before having an abortion.
But Greece was not actually pregnant, the investigation concluded. And texts between her and the acquaintance show that Gries discussed the coworker’s alleged sexual harassment, blaming herself for the alleged assault and saying, “Can’t I just make my life a living hell,” According to the probable cause document.
On November 3, Greise met again with the same Stanford Public Safety detective she had previously spoken with and “confirmed that she personally knew the assailant.” “She also asked what would happen if she provided a name,” the probable cause document said, and the detective said, “she would talk to that person and to other people who knew them both.”
When the detective told Gries she already knew who was being described, Gries was “obviously distraught, hysterical, and flaying herself” before she said “she needed air” and began to cry. done.” She left and later texted the detective that she was going to the emergency room because she was feeling overwhelmed, the probable cause document says.
On January 24, Grice met with the detective again and “admitted to lying about the rape and wrote an apology letter to the target of the false accusations, who, according to the human resources investigation, was the same person as the victim,” a possible Document by reason.
“She said she was upset with the victim because she felt he had given her ‘ill intent’ and turned her friends against him,” it says.
In an interview with authorities, Greise’s co-worker “denied any sexual or romantic contact” with her and said the human resources investigation “scared” her and caused her extreme stress when she was caring for her sick mother. lived, who later died. He also provided evidence, according to the probable cause document, where he said he was there at the time of the alleged attacks, and he provided swabs for DNA analysis.
He told the officers that the false allegations made him feel “disgusted”.
According to a probable cause document, he said, “I don’t feel human. I don’t feel human at all.”
students react
Advocates for the prevention of sexual violence on campus say that false reports should not distract from the prevalence of sexual violence at Stanford.
“This example of a baseless allegation does not change the fact that 40% of female-identifying graduate students at Stanford will be sexually assaulted on their campus,” the student-led advocacy group, Sexual Violence-Free Stanford, said on Instagram on Wednesday ” Referring to the findings of the 2019 survey.
“Not only are large percentages of campus sexual violence underreported, but the false reporting rate of sexual violence is almost always comparable to—if not lower than—other crimes,” it added.
