A former North Carolina State University soccer player will be allowed to move forward with his lawsuit against the university in which he alleges sexual harassment against NSCU's former director of sports medicine.
As reported by The Carolina Journal in Raleigh, a three-judge panel of the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled unanimously in favor of Benjamin Locke on Friday, sending his case back to a trial court.
The decision arrived nearly four months after the court revived a similar lawsuit. A former NCSU athlete identified in court records as John Doe 2 had gone to court after Locke filed suit.
A federal trial judge had dismissed the complaints against the university from Locke and John Doe 2, along with a third suit from a plaintiff listed as John Doe.
“On January 7, 2025, this Court issued a decision in Doe finding that the plaintiff had sufficiently pled facts to show that NCSU had adequate notice of the alleged sexual harassment,” according to a two-page order Friday, as reported by The Carolina Journal.
“Locke now moves for summary reversal of the district court’s order based on Doe. Because the question here is materially indistinguishable from that decided in Doe, we grant Locke’s motion for summary reversal and remand the case to the district court for further proceedings,” the order concluded.
Judges Robert Bruce King, James Wynn, and Toby Heytens supported the order sending Locke’s case back to a trial court.
US District Judge Louise Wood Flanagan determined that the suit Locke filed in August 2022 could proceed against Robert Murphy, NC State’s former director of sports medicine. However, Flanagan dismissed the portion of the complaint involving the university itself, as well as both John Doe suits, which targeted only the university as a defendant.
According to The Carolina Journal, Locke alleged that Murphy had touched his genitals improperly during 75 to 100 massages between August 2015 and May 2017. Locke said he later believed those massages lacked “legitimate” medical necessity. Locke’s suit also alleged that head soccer coach Kelly Findley had told a senior athletics official in February 2016 that Murphy was engaging in contact “consistent with ‘grooming behavior.’ ” The suit alleged that the school took no follow-up action.
“Defendant NCSU argues, and plaintiff concedes, that sovereign immunity bars intentional tort claims against the state. … The court agrees that it lacks subject matter jurisdiction to decide these claims,” Flanagan wrote in dismissing Locke’s claims against the university.
Flanagan also ruled that she lacked jurisdiction to hear Locke’s complaint that NC State provided “negligent training and supervision.” The judge also rejected a Title IX claim against the school. “Defendant NCSU argues that plaintiff’s Title IX claim fails for failure to allege facts that, if true, would support an inference that it received actual notice of the abuse. The court agrees.”
Findley’s statements about possible “grooming” did not amount to a report of a specific instance of sexual harassment that would have given NC State “actual notice” under legal standards, Flanagan ruled, as reported by The Carolina Journal. The judge also rejected Locke’s argument that Murphy’s reassignment to an administrative role in 2017 led to an “inference of actual notice.”
The 4th Circuit decision reversing Flanagan and favoring Locke follows a separate Jan. 7 ruling in the John Doe 2 case, The Carolina Journal reported.
“John Doe was a student athlete at North Carolina State University. He alleges that, while attending the university, he was sexually abused by then–Director of Sports Medicine Robert Murphy under the guise of medical treatment,” wrote 4th Circuit Chief Judge Albert Diaz. “Doe filed a Title IX suit, further alleging that the university was deliberately indifferent to prior complaints of Murphy’s sexual misconduct.
“The district court dismissed Doe’s complaint because it found that he failed to plead facts that would support an inference that the university had actual notice of Murphy’s sexual harassment. On appeal, Doe argues that the district court erred in deciding that a report of ‘sexual grooming’ could not provide actual notice to the university. We agree and thus vacate the judgment."
The Doe case returned to a trial judge. The judge must decide whether Doe “adequately pleaded” that complaints about Murphy’s conduct reached “an official with the requisite authority for Title IX purposes,” Diaz explained. Flanagan had “assumed without deciding” that issue before dismissing Doe’s case.
