College student holds rally against college who want to expel her because she 'INTIMIDATED' her alleged rapist by speaking out about her ordeal

A college student and her supporters held a rally today to oppose her expulsion because school administrators say that she is 'intimidating' her alleged rapist by publicly discussing a sexual assault.

The victim, a female sophomore at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, went through the school-sanctioned order of filing a complaint against her fellow student and ex-boyfriend who she claims raped her.

Rather than remain anonymous she has publicly released her name- Landen Gambill- spoken in news interviews, and even talked about her own experiences at a public rally pushing for the school to increase their support for victims.



In none of those instances has she named her alleged attacker.



Protest: Landen Gambill, center, stands with her supporters during a rally earlier in March. UNC-Chapel Hill has threatened her with an honor code violation for speaking out about alleged abuse

Attacking the victim: Landen Gambill waived her right to anonymity by publicly speaking about the rape that she underwent at the hands of an ex-boyfriend on a number of occasions

Admirable: Ms Gambill, a sophomore at UNC-Chapel Hill, is using her experience to help others but now she is being threatened with expulsion by school administrators

But school administrators have still told Ms Gambill that she may have violated the school's honor code by speaking out and she could be expelled herself rather than the alleged rapist.



Her supporters joined her in a rally today at the school's south building to oppose that stance and defend her position.



They carried placards saying 'The Silence Ends Here' and 'We Stand With Survivors'.



The threat of expulsion came after she joined a group of 64 other students and teachers who filed a legal complaint with the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights, saying that UNC administrators pressured them to under-report cases of sexual assault on campus.



'I'm mostly surprised at just how crazy it is, that they're willing to charge me with something just because my rapist is feeling uncomfortable,' Ms Gambill told The Huffington Post .

At the school, all inter-student grievances go through the Honor Court which is where she brought up the charges against her long term boyfriend.

According to the school newspaper, the Daily Tarheel , Ms Gambill said that she was grilled by the students on the panel- even the female students - who seemed to place the blame of the assault on the victim rather than the attacker.

'They implied that I was emotionally unstable and couldn’t be telling the truth because I had attempted suicide,' Ms Gambill told the paper.

Not shying from attention: Gambill, who has spoken publicly about her assault, has never released the name of her attacker but the school is claiming that she is intimidating him

Group effort: She joined a 64-person group who filed a federal complaint with the school over their under-reporting of sexual assault cases on campus

'The woman student said to me, ''Landen, as a woman, I know that if that had happened to me, I would’ve broken up with him the first time it happened. Will you explain to me why you didn’t?''

The rape in question happened during her freshman year, and she brought it to the Honor Court's attention this past spring. The alleged rapist is still on campus and has not been charged, either by the school or the law.

Threats: Elizabeth Ireland, the Graduate & Professional Schools Student Attorney General, emailed Gambill saying that she now faces two Honor Court charges of her own

After months of inaction, Ms Gambill joined the federal case against UNC, which charges that the school pressured former administrators to report a lower sexual assault rate.

Jezebel reports that ten days after the case was made public, Ms Gambill received an email from Elizabeth Ireland, the Graduate & Professional Schools Student Attorney General, who said that her public speaking could be deemed a Honor Code violation.

Ireland went on to send her an email confirming that there was sufficient evidence that Ms Gambill had been 'disruptive or intimidating' towards her alleged attacker and the issue will be brought up in Honor Court.

'This type of gross injustice is the reason why UNC students are speaking out and demanding answers,' Ms Gambill told Jezebel.