Joshua Strange was accused of sexual assault in 2011 by an ex-girlfriend and expelled from Auburn University. Since then, he’s told his story numerous times, but hasn’t really focused on the emotional toll the situation took on him.
Strange, speaking on a panel of due process advocates in March at the National Press Club, described what it felt like when his “world came crashing down.”
“When the accusation came across to me and [Auburn] told me about it, it was as if I had somehow wound up at the bottom of this pit,” Strange said. “And all around you is just darkness – it’s just completely black, except for the light of one match that’s in your hand and that match is burning.”
“And that’s all you can see. And it’s just you by yourself – cold, dark and alone,” he added. “You’re trying to figure out where to go next, and you’re trying to put one foot in front of the other, just trying to go day to day and make it through, and just somehow find the light at the end of the tunnel. And that’s how it went. That was the world that I lived in.”
One night in 2011, Strange and his girlfriend of a month were at his apartment when he claims she initiated a sexual encounter but shortly in began to say “no.” After he stopped and left the room, she called the police, who arrested Strange but released him a few hours later. Strange says his girlfriend apologized profusely for the episode and they continued dating for nearly two more months.
A month after they broke up, the now ex-girlfriend accused Strange of attacking her in a parking lot, although he says he had witnesses placing him miles away at the time.
Nevertheless, the girl had him arrested again, and this time she went to campus administrators to bring up the previous sexual encounter, now claiming that Strange raped her.
The accusation landed Strange in a campus hearing, where a Fisheries professor, a professor of liberal arts, a male student, a female student and a campus librarian decided his fate.
Strange described the room where his hearing took place as having a black sheet in the middle so his accuser couldn’t see him, so that he couldn’t “cause her any more distress,” he said.
“I remember walking into the room and just this black cloud, you know, as if it could get any darker than it already was. It got a lot darker really, really quick walking into that room,” Strange said. “And I just remember thinking this is not going to end well. This is not going to be good. This is going to hurt.”
Strange said he was so nervous he couldn’t even recall his own name, but was expected to defend himself from the accusation.
“It was basically next to impossible,” he said. Despite a grand jury failing to indict Strange in a criminal court, the Auburn University pseudo court found him in violation of the student code of conduct and recommended expulsion.
When the decision to expel him came down, Strange told his family he was no longer wanted at Auburn.
“When that expulsion was mentioned, it was as if something ran up and blew that match out,” Strange said. “Now it’s just you, in the dark, by yourself, not knowing which way’s up, down, left, right, where the door is, where the exit is, where the light is. That light didn’t exist anymore.”
After more than three years, Strange says he is “still trying to get over it.”
“It’s never going to go away. It’s always going to be a cross that I’m going have to bear,” he said. “It’s extremely painful.”
Strange told the Washington Examiner that he was able to graduate from the University of South Carolina-Upstate last May. Auburn had removed the expulsion from his transcript and had him listed as a student in good standing with the university.
Strange’s mother explained to the Examiner that she believes Auburn removed the expulsion notation because they learned the Stranges were looking for an attorney to sue the university and wanted to mitigate the damages. The family was unable to raise the money needed to pay for an attorney and was unable to file a lawsuit due to the statute of limitations. Strange is still forbidden to visit Auburn for fear of trespassing charges.
Auburn University did not respond to an Examiner request for comment prior to press time.
Since the original expulsion, Strange has spoken to numerous students who have found themselves in the same situation. Over 100 schools are being investigated by the Department of Education for failing to find in favor of the accuser. And about 60 male students are suing their universities for a lack of due process leading to their punishment.
“The hardest part of what I’m doing right now is having to say over the phone to someone: ‘Your life is getting ready to get this much harder,'” Strange said. “Your school is getting ready to reject you and you’re going to have to find a way to be okay with that.”
Strange was lucky that the expulsion note was removed from his transcript so that he could transfer to another school – most students in this situation aren’t so lucky.
Still, Strange has to live with this accusation and the years of his life it cost him, as well as the drain on his future earnings it has caused. One can’t Google his name without dozens of articles written about his case.
“It does start to get a little better but it will never be okay for the rest of my life,” Strange said.
Update: Auburn University responded to an Examiner request for comment, but would not discuss the specifics of Strange’s case.
“As a statement of public record in Lee County and Montgomery, Alabama, litigation was filed and concluded several years ago,” the university said in an e-mail. “Federal student privacy rules prohibit us from discussing student educational records.”
