Dartmouth rape trial ends with guilty verdict
Published: 01-31-2025 9:39 PM
Modified: 02-03-2025 8:48 AM |
NORTH HAVERHILL — A jury on Friday found a Dartmouth College alumnus guilty of raping an 18-year-old freshman in Hanover in 2022.
Kyle Clampitt, 26, a former member of the college’s lacrosse team, was convicted of 10 counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault.
The jury of nine men and three women deliberated for about 2½ hours on Friday afternoon at Grafton Superior Court in North Haverhill before delivering a verdict.
Jurors rejected the defense’s claim that the encounter on the rooftop of a fraternity house was consensual.
The jury found Clampitt not guilty on two counts of second-degree assault for strangulation.
Clampitt covered his mouth, bowed his head and glanced back at his parents as the verdicts were announced by the jury foreman.
Each guilty count is punishable by 10 to 20 years in state prison. Clampitt’s sentencing is scheduled for April 14, according to court records.
Clampitt’s parents sat in the front row on the defendant’s side of the gallery. His mother broke into sobs and her husband held her in his arms as the verdicts were read.
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As she did throughout the trial, the victim, now a senior at Dartmouth, sat in the front row on the prosecution side of the courtroom gallery, flanked by her parents and a friend. Behind her in the gallery sat more than a half dozen classmates and supporters who attended most of the trial’s sessions.
The Valley News generally does not identify the victims of sexual assaults.
Over the six-day trial, jurors heard often graphic testimony, including from the victim herself about how she was physically and sexually assaulted by Clampitt after he invited her to “see something cool” on the rooftop of Theta Delta Chi in the early morning hours of April 24, 2022.
Jurors also heard from another attendee at the party who came to the woman’s aid after the assault, two friends of the victim and a nurse who examined her the next day.
On Thursday, Clampitt, a member of the Class of 2020, took the witness stand to give his own account in which he denied any wrongdoing.
Throughout his testimony, Clampitt insisted the victim never said “no” or “stop” and had been a willing participant.
On Friday morning, defense attorney Robin Melone, of Concord, delivered a nearly one-hour closing statement to jurors. Melone argued that the victim — who acknowledged in testimony she had been “quite drunk” at the time — invented the rape allegation because she was embarrassed “after a hookup on the roof.”
In her closing argument, Assistant County Attorney Amanda Jacobson, who led the prosecution, scoffed at the defense’s claim of consensual sex. She detailed instances where Clampitt’s testimony was contradicted by multiple witnesses who testified at trial.
Jacobson told jurors the claim that the victim had made up a story about being raped was preposterous, especially given how the attack and subsequent legal process has impacted nearly her entire time at Dartmouth.
The victim’s “traumatic and violent attack has been a part of each year of her college experience,” Jacobson told jurors. “Who would want to spend their college age years dealing with this case and the court process unless they were really truly telling you the truth,” Jacobson said.
Clampitt, who said he hoped to work in a career of “sales” or “recruiting” after Dartmouth, was given a few minutes to hug his parents before sheriff’s deputies put handcuffs on him and escorted him through a door at the back of the courtroom.
Contact John Lippman at jlippman@vnews.com.