Make California Post a Preferred Source A Stanford University student has been accused of raping a drunk woman after walking her home from a party at the prestigious college.
Leo Rossitter, a 24-year-old economics and data science student, allegedly tried to kiss the sophomore girl several times before climbing on to her bed and raping her.
The alleged attack left her bleeding and traumatized, she alleged. Rossitter was not publicly identified until now. He is set to face trial next month, according to the Stanford Daily.
The Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office charged Rossitter in October 2024 with rape of an intoxicated person, oral copulation of an intoxicated person and penetration by force.
The school had been aware of the assault, suspending Rossitter as a member of the class of 2025 for two years as part of an internal Title IX investigation of the assault.
Rossitter just became eligible to return to classes at Stanford this quarter, The Daily reported. Rossitter’s attorney, Daniel Barton, told the outlet his client “is not guilty of the horrible things that he is accused of.”
“Since 2022, he has been defending himself against these false allegations both at the University and in court, and he will continue to defend his innocence,” he added.
Barton is an award-winning lawyer who has practiced law since 1988. He graduated from Stanford Law School.
Rossitter’s alleged victim wrote an op-ed in The Daily last month — with the headline calling her “A Stanford Jane Doe” in reference to the Cornell rape case — suggesting Stanford and the DA’s Office lacked coordination and responded slowly.
“When I was raped in my Stanford dorm room at 19, I too, like Cornell’s Jane Doe, thought that reporting it to Stanford and law enforcement would yield justice. It was their job to keep their community safe and hold others accountable, right?” she wrote.
“Like Jane Doe, I was met with negligence and apathy.”
The Daily reported that her claims of “months of silence” from the DA’s office were corroborated by emails, texts, and documents.
A Stanford spokesperson told the outlet that the process is careful and long.
“The process is designed to be careful and thorough, and many parts of it are dictated by federal law, but it can take too long,” Stanford spokesperson Angie Davis told The Daily in response to the op-ed last month.
Davis added Stanford was “committed to finding opportunities to improve the process, from intake to hearing to outcome.”
Stanford’s “Jane Doe” wrote in her op-ed that she didn’t understand why her alleged rapist wasn’t expelled.
“I once believed, naively, that students’ suffering meant something to Stanford,” she wrote.
“Why is Stanford OK with giving degrees to people they recognize are rapists? Why can you be expelled for some forms of academic dishonesty but, apparently, not rape?”
Students are revolting against any alleged rapists returning to campus.
Pelagia Martin, who graduates in 2027, said the university is “failing survivors” by allowing a student charged with rape to return to campus. Martin is a member of the campus’s Resisting Rape Culture at Stanford group.
“The University is condoning rape at Stanford,” she added. “There is 100 percent a public safety risk inviting known perpetrators like the defendant back onto our campus.”
Rossitter currently works for the NBA’s Minnesota Timberwolves as a business strategist, according to his LinkedIn. He was hired in 2025.
The California Post reached out to Barton and Stanford University for comment.
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