“Nice place,” Corrine observed, even though to her it seemed like a photograph from any modern furniture catalog.
“Thanks. My mom did everything.” Her shrug seemed to acknowledge her good fortune. “I haven’t told her about Jason yet. She’s going to freak. And no way will she let me keep working there—”
“At FSS?”
“Yeah. It’s an amazing opportunity for me. Jason’s basically the leading voice at the cross section of finance and international human rights, and now this. I don’t want to blow up my whole professional life before it’s started.”
Corrine suggested that they talk first about what happened before they discussed what actions might follow.
Rachel explained that she was getting her master’s degree in economics at NYU and had an internship for credit at Jason’s consulting firm. She’d entered Jason’s office to deliver a memo she had drafted. “I didn’t see him at his desk, but he must have heard me walk in, because he called me into his spa room.”
“His what?” Corrine asked.
“That’s what the interns call it. He’s got this huge private bathroom with a shower and a little daybed to the side. Sometimes he closes the door, and we think he takes naps in there. A couple of the interns joke that he might actually live at the office. Anyway, I walked in there, and his pants were undone. I started to turn away, and he said it was nothing I hadn’t seen before. Then he kept talking to me, like it’s normal. But he was like touching himself the entire time.”
“His genitals were exposed?”
Rachel shook her head. “No, or at least I didn’t see. His hands were in his pants. I can’t describe it. And it was so fast, and I was sort of freaked out. So then he looked at the memo in my hand and saw my ring. He said something about whether it was a conflict diamond.”
Rachel must have seen the confusion on Corrine’s face, because she paused for an explanation. “They’re diamonds that come illegally from war-torn areas. Same thing as ‘blood diamonds.’” Corrine nodded to indicate she was following along.
“I told him I really didn’t know. I held my hand up like an idiot, telling him how I got engaged last weekend.”
“Congratulations,” Corrine said.
“Well, as if he’d care. I was nervous, trying to find something to talk about. He took the memo from me, and I started to turn around to leave, but he kind of grabbed my other arm. Not hard, but just sort of held it, like he was keeping me from walking off. I thought maybe he was going to skim my memo and ask some follow-up questions while I was there. But then he kind of pulled me back toward him, and his belt buckle was still undone. He told me I was too young to get married. I hadn’t had enough fun yet. It was clear to me that he was about to put my hand against his—you know. I jumped back immediately.”
Corrine asked what happened next.
“Nothing. I kind of stepped backward and pulled my hand away, really abruptly. I didn’t know what to say. And then he turned away, fastened his belt, and started flipping through the memo, like it was no big deal. He told me he’d let me know if he had any questions. And then I left.”
Corrine asked Rachel whether she’d spoken to anyone about the incident.
“I told Zack Hawkins. He’s the executive director, officially the person in charge of the interns.” Corrine recalled the name from the FSS website. “I was so shocked,” Rachel said. “I found myself in his office, telling him what had happened.”
Corrine asked if Zack said what he was planning to do about her complaint.
“He said he’d talk to Jason about it—that he was sure it was some kind of misunderstanding.” Her dismay that there could be any confusion about Jason’s conduct was clear in her tone. “It was still eating away at me after work, so I went to the police precinct.”
“Did you talk to anyone else about the incident? Maybe your fiancé?”
Rachel looked surprised by the mention of a fiancé. “I’m still getting used to that word,” she said, admiring her ring. “No, I didn’t tell Mike, for the same reason I didn’t tell my mother. I don’t want to make a big deal of this—”
“I’m a police detective, Rachel. Are you saying you don’t want to press charges?”
“Like I said, I don’t know, but I didn’t feel right not saying anything. What if I let it go, and he ended up doing something worse to another woman? I guess I just wanted to file a report so it would be there. Do you know if this is the first time he’s done this?”
Corrine told her that the NYPD had no prior complaints.
Rachel’s lips pursed. “There’s no way for me to prove what happened, is there? It’s my word against his. The classic he-said, she-said.”
Yes, Corrine thought. And even if she had the entire incident on video, it wasn’t obviously a crime. According to Rachel, Jason never touched her on an “intimate” body part and didn’t clearly expose his own to her. After a few follow-up questions, she confirmed that Rachel’s allegations—if she could prove them—might be considered an attempt to commit an “offensive physical touching.” A Class B misdemeanor. Theoretically, a maximum sentence of six months, but much more likely to lead to probation and some form of counseling.
“And that’s assuming we can prove that his intention was to place your hand on his genitals,” Corrine added.
“So I should have lied and said he did it?” Rachel asked.
“No, because that’s not what happened, right?”
Rachel shook her head and wiped away a tear. “Sorry, I’m frustrated.”
“Have you thought about reporting it to the university? Isn’t your internship through the school?”
“Technically, but it’s more like a job, and Jason’s basically a rock star at NYU. Plus he’s got tenure, so I assume they won’t do anything. To be honest, my guess is that a lot of the female students wouldn’t have pulled away. I’m not sure I want to be ‘that woman’ on campus.” She looked down as if pondering her fingernails. “So does this mean you’re not going to do anything?”
“My next step would usually be to talk to any witnesses, but you say there weren’t any. I’d speak to Zack to confirm that you reported the incident right afterward—ask him about your demeanor. And I’d usually speak to the suspect before concluding my investigation. That’s if you want me to proceed. I can’t promise he’ll be charged—that’s up to a prosecutor—but at least the reports will be there.”
Rachel nodded.
“Is that what you want?”
When Rachel answered, she no longer sounded like a confused, conflicted student, worried about unwanted attention and a detour from her carefully planned professional track. Her voice was calm and decisive. “Yes, I’m positive. I just want him to admit what he did to me.”
As Corrine walked to her car, she thought about all of the reasons no ADA would ever touch this case for prosecution. The delay in reporting. Rachel’s defensiveness with Officer Kendall. The fleeting nature of the interaction. The absence of any type of force. Not to mention the stamp of ink on the back of Rachel’s hand, left over from a club, possibly from the previous night, only hours after the incident.