The ABA presented a panel titled “Sexual Assault on College Campuses: Balancing the Rights and Interests of the Accused and the Victim” at its Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

The ABA reported that the panel “discussed some of the most pressing issues concerning campus sexual violence that included the federal government’s commitment to addressing the issue; best practices and policies or handling allegations of sexual assault and other campus violence; Title IX complaints and compliance; due process rights of the accused with the interests of the victim; and the issue of consent.”

ALI member Andrew S. Boutros of Seyfarth Shaw LLP and council member M. Margaret McKeown of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit both participated on the panel.

Judge McKeown highlighted ALI’s Project on Sexual and Gender-Based Misconduct on Campus: Procedural Frameworks and Analysis, and Model Penal Code Sexual Assault.

The ABA reported “The first project is examining due process in sexual assault on college campuses to develop a usual framework. It has an expert panel of reporters and advisors, who are primarily examining reporting procedures, confidentiality, the role of the police and college administrators. The second project examines the role and definition of consent. In the past two years, there have been 129 federal cases on rape in the court. Ninety of those have been in relation to rape on college campuses. ‘The courts take these matters very seriously,’ McKeown said.”

Read the ABA’s full write-up on the panel.