Cornell Rescinds Recognition Of Sigma Alpha Epsilon After George Desdunes' Death

Cornell will no longer recognize Sigma Alpha Epsilon as a fraternity on campus, the Cornell Daily Sun reports.

The decision comes with new, shocking allegations in the February death of SAE brother and Cornell sophomore George Desdunes.

The Sun has more:

The university found that Desdunes, who was a brother at SAE, was provided alcohol "while in the care of certain members and associate members" of SAE and became incapacitated, [Cornell Vice President of Student and Academic Services Susan] Murphy stated.

"Even though the members and associate members recognized the condition Desdunes was in, they failed to call for medical care. He subsequently died," she said.

Desdunes' death has caused considerable controversy on campus. IvyGate parses through Cornell's official statements on the issue:

We still don't have any official confirmation about what exactly was going on that night -- though rumors are aplenty. Parsing through Cornell's statement, a few more interesting bits of information pop out. "Members and associate members" presumably means brothers and pledges, respectively; although we don't know for certain whether there were pledging activities involved. The part about Desdunes being provided alcohol while "in the care" of others is peculiar, to say the least. And the bit about no one calling for help is incredibly sad, though unfortunately not all that remarkable. (For what it's worth, Cornell's Interfraternity Council passed a new "medical amnesty" resolution this week, with the hopes of avoiding that sort of inaction in the future.)

The investigation into Desdunes' death is ongoing. Fraternity members will have until the end of March to vacate the SAE house on campus, and the fraternity will be barred from operation for five years.