Protecting a Predator?

A lawsuit filed against Louisiana State University last month claims that university officials failed to protect students from a graduate student and alleged serial sexual predator who was allowed to retain positions of influence over undergraduate French students despite having been arrested for rape -- and despite repeated complaints about the graduate student’s harassing behavior to numerous LSU officials with “authority to rectify the situation” during a two-and-a-half-year period.

The suit, filed by five current or former LSU students and a professor, alleges that the behavior of the graduate student, Edouard d’Espalungue d’Arros, “ranged from comments about students’ bodies, marital status, weight, sexual history, and physical appearance, to sexualized and improper text messages, to following students to their cars on multiple occasions, to blocking them from LSU French Club social media accounts in retaliation for reporting harassment or declining his advances, to unwelcomed touching, hugs, fondling, sexual assault, sexual battery and rape.”

The suit alleges that “due to the deliberate indifference of LSU officials, and an official policy of gender discrimination,” d’Espalungue raped two of the undergraduate plaintiffs and sexually assaulted a third -- all of whom were approximately 10 years younger than he. Joining the three unnamed undergraduate plaintiffs in the suit as Jane Does No. 4 through 6 are two current and former graduate students and one professor who allege they were retaliated against by the French department chair, Adelaide Russo, for sounding alarms about d’Espalungue’s alleged harassment.

Russo, who is named as a defendant in the lawsuit, along with four other LSU officials, declined to comment for this story, referring an inquiry to LSU’s university counsel, who did not reply to an email requesting an interview. Russo has been removed as department chair but remains an endowed professor at LSU.

The suit is at least the third legal action alleging violations of Title IX, the federal law prohibiting sex discrimination in higher education, filed against LSU in the last year. Two other suits focus largely on reported mishandling of sexual misconduct allegations and issues of retaliation within the athletics department.

“Up until our suit was filed, a lot of the public conversation was about how LSU athletics and football in particular was where the real problem with Title IX is. Because football is such a huge financial factor for LSU, they were heavily invested in sweeping all Title IX problems under the rug in the athletics department,” said Mimi Methvin, the lawyer for the plaintiffs. “Our suit really peels that story away.”

Methvin said that the French department gave d’Espalungue “huge freedom and leeway” to sexually harass and rape students over two years.

“Many, many, many reports were made to the Title IX office, to the deans’ office, to the Office of Human Relations, because this guy was an employee, as a grad student,” she said. “Nothing was done by any of these officials.”

The lawsuit alleges Russo protected d’Espalungue and permitted him to continue to hold leadership positions over undergraduate students after he was arrested for sexual battery and second-degree rape of a 21-year-old University of Louisiana at Lafayette student at a Catholic student retreat in September 2018.

“LSU’s sole response to the battery and rape arrests was to remove d’Espalungue from the French 1001 class which he had begun teaching at the beginning of the fall semester,” the suit claims. “LSU did not bar d’Espalungue from employment at LSU or take any actions to prevent him from having access to LSU students in a leadership position.”

The suit says that Russo “immediately hired d’Espalungue as her personal research assistant, essentially promoting him to a status of greater influence and prestige within the department. He continued leading French Department activities such as French Table and French Movie Night which brought him in touch with undergrads … D’Espalungue was also in charge of the French Department web page and the LSU French Club, including its social media platforms, where he energetically engaged with LSU undergrads and other students.”

“Soon after d’Espalungue’s arrest, Dr. Russo met individually with grad students and faculty in the French Department, including Does #4-6, told them that d’Espalungue was ‘innocent,’ that he should be supported and his privacy respected, and that any further discussion of his rape arrest would violate FERPA,” the complaint states, citing an acronym for a federal law that protects the privacy of educational, not criminal, records. “Grad students Does #4 and #5 reported to Dr. Russo that they had been sexually harassed by d’Espalungue and had seen him sexually harass other students. Dr. Russo dismissed these claims and made clear she was irritated by the reports. She told Doe #4 she should consider d’Espalungue’s verbal harassment ‘a compliment,’ an early example of what become [sic] a continuing series of comments and behaviors by Russo reinforcing gender stereotypes and dismissing women.”

The lawsuit also claims that d’Espalungue was permitted by LSU to travel to high schools to meet with students to solicit submissions for an LSU-affiliated journal he founded, the American Journal of French Studies. In some instances he used an alias on these trips, the lawsuit states.

“D’Espalungue presided over the Journal’s first awards ceremony at the French House on the LSU campus on April 25, 2019, immediately following awards ceremonies for the Department of French Studies, presided over by Dr. Russo,” the suit states. “During the ceremony, d’Espalungue expressed to at least one witness his sexual and romantic interest in one of the high school essay contestants. Within a few weeks d’Espalungue had seduced her into a sexual relationship which lasted on and off for at least several months.”

According to the lawsuit, d’Espalungue was suspended by LSU in November 2020 after he allegedly raped one of the undergraduate plaintiffs, identified in the suit as Jane Doe No. 1, whom he met in August 2020 on the LSU campus.

Separately, as reported by The Advocate, a grand jury indicted d’Espalungue on third-degree rape charges earlier this year in connection with the reported September 2018 rape of the UL Lafayette student. But d’Espalungue reportedly fled to his home country of France, not returning to the U.S. after a judge granted a petition for him to travel over Christmas.

D’Espalungue could not be reached for comment through messages sent via the journal's contact form and a LinkedIn account in his name. It is not clear if he has a lawyer; his former defense attorney, Mike Small, said he withdrew from representing d’Espalungue after he “failed to return as required by the court order permitting his travel to France.”

The Rapides Parrish District Attorney’s office, which is prosecuting the case, did not respond to requests for comment. Brian Cespiva, an assistant district attorney, said in a statement quoted by the Associated Press last month that the office “is actively working with law enforcement, including our federal partners, to secure the apprehension of this fugitive.”

The lawsuit claims that d’Espalungue remained involved in French department activities even after fleeing to France. “Despite being an indicted fugitive serial rapist suspended from LSU and living in France, as of February 24, 2021, d’Espalungue was still in control of the LSU French Club social media accounts, was hosting and planning LSU French Club meetings with undergrads, was moderating their interaction through the GroupMe app and had just received a $1000 grant from the LSU French Department for AJFS,” the lawsuit alleges.

LSU has been under scrutiny for its handling of sexual assault cases since November 2020, when USA Today reported that the university mishandled sexual assault allegations against athletes, including against members of LSU’s national championship-winning football team. An independent review commissioned by the university in response to the USA Today reporting found that LSU “did not handle various items identified in the USA Today article in a manner consistent with obligations under Title IX, widely recognized best practices, and/or University policy.”

The review by the law firm Husch Blackwell also found that “the University’s Title IX Office has never been appropriately staffed or provided with the independence and resources to carry out Title IX’s mandates. We have identified concerns that the Office has at times not handled those matters reported to it appropriately. Again, while the USA Today article focused primarily on Athletics, we found deficiencies in a variety of different matters.”

William F. Tate IV, LSU’s president, said in an Oct. 8 statement responding to the d’Espalungue lawsuit that the campus had made “incredible strides” in improving its policies and protocols on sexual assault.

Although he said was unable to respond directly to the accusations in a pending lawsuit, “which is incredibly frustrating,” Tate did comment in general about the progress LSU has made in addressing sexual misconduct on campus.

“First, while I was not here when these allegations occurred, I want these students to know that they matter to me,” Tate said in the statement. “Every student matters to me. Second, predators and their enablers will be held accountable -- end of story. Third, I want to tell you what Title IX will look like during my tenure as your President. I see a campus community in which no survivor goes without the support and resources necessary to recover from the trauma of sexual assault or harassment. Under the exceptional leadership of Interim Vice President Jane Cassidy, LSU has made incredible strides forward in a relatively short period of time: a robust Office of Civil Rights & Title IX; the development and execution of trauma-informed responses; strengthened relationships with student, community and advocacy groups; and the elimination of past policy gaps.”

Angelina Cantelli, a senior at LSU and president and co-founder of the student organization Tigers Against Sexual Assault, said the university has made significant improvements in reorganizing and staffing up its Title IX office but still needs to improve communication to students about their rights under the law.

“Communicating what happens if you choose to file a Title IX report [is] huge,” Cantelli said. “What we saw in the past were people’s cases of sexual assault were handled inappropriately but they didn’t know their rights.”

“I think almost all LSU students, especially survivors or advocates for survivors, have come to a point where we don’t expect much from our university,” Cantelli said. “Obviously, a lot of that has grown with the scandals that have come out in the last year. But even before the USA Today article came out last November, I heard so many stories of student survivors who reported to the university and they felt like nothing was done or their case wasn’t handled properly or they were in the middle of the case but they hadn’t heard anything in months. I started to get an idea that things weren’t right on campus.”