Tony Gonzalez

tgonzalez@tennessean.com

A lawsuit charging that Belmont University failed to protect a female student who was raped on campus by an intruder has been settled out of court.

Details of the agreement were not disclosed. The judge’s order dismissing the case said the victim’s medical bills and other debts would be covered by money from a settlement, and the university agreed to pay court costs.

A university spokesman said the matter was “resolved to the mutual satisfaction of the parties,” and the student’s attorney did not return calls.

The lawsuit, filed in December 2009, described a Dec. 5, 2008 rape in which a sophomore was attacked by a stranger inside a university-owned apartment. Police never made an arrest.

The student — since graduated and anonymous in filings — charged that the university did not provide adequate security by allowing a security gate to be disabled for the semester, enabling the attacker to enter.

The university denied those claims and said in filings that the student “failed to exercise ordinary care for her own safety.”

Reach Tony Gonzalez at 615-259-8089 and on Twitter @tgonzalez.