Commentary by Robert Lynch; posted October 23, 2026
My opinion: Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten is a man under siege, as is the office he leads. The siege is political. The siege is unjustified. The siege s misdirected. And the siege, should it prevail, will irreparably tarnish the reputation and obscure the accomplishments of a good and decent public servant, a defender of the criminal law. It will also dishonor the good and decent people who serve under him. And some of the solons we elect to govern us don’t seem to care.
On Tuesday, October 20, the Tompkins County Legislature adopted a resolution that undercuts Van Houten’s independent elected prosecutorial authority. The long-winded, two-page, 13-paragraph initiative, adopted on a 14-2 vote, authorizes “an independent comprehensive review of the District Attorney’s Office” and calls for “policy changes in alignment with victim-centered practices” specifically as they pertain to sexual assault cases.
Tompkins County would draw up to $200,000 from its current year’s Contingency Fund to underwrite what was first called an “independent audit,” yet later renamed a “comprehensive review.” An outside investigator or law firm would undertake it.
As the resolution’s plain reading inescapably reveals—as much as its authors might attempt to hide it—the “Jane Doe” case, the alleged multi-man rape of a female student at a Cornell University frat house two years ago, drives this initiative.
If you thirst to speculate about the sickening saga, or hunger for additional salacious details, look elsewhere, not here. What happened the night of October 19, 2024 at the Chi Phi fraternity is the proper province of police, prosecutors and the courts, not the rest of us; we who profess to know, but really do not. Confine your curiosity to the D.A.’s account of September 28. That the Jane Doe story has burned its path into national headlines has not done Lady Justice any favor. Give it a rest. Conversation closed.
What matters to me is Matt Van Houten’s character and credibility. I stand with him.
Freshman legislator Irene Weiser gained credit for the October 20 resolution’s authorship. But scripting was a collaborative endeavor. Another legislative newcomer, Cornell ILR labor lawyer and activist Iris Packman, exerted heavy influence. Packman handed out an altered, “clean version,” of the Weiser resolution on meeting night as she warmly welcomed to the gallery Jane Doe sympathizers. The resolution was rushed. It never cleared customary committee review. The Weiser-Packman effort bore every sign of an overhasty, politically correct pile-on. The strategy worked.
The adopted resolution micromanages. It instructs D.A. Van Houten and his staff how better to do their jobs. The legislature on the flimsiest of grounds usurps authority to itself. The Democrat-dominated Tompkins County Legislature meddles in Matt Van Houten’s independent prosecutorial decisions in ways it would never tolerate were the orders coming from a President Donald Trump.
By my count, 15 people spoke to the Weiser resolution during meeting floor privileges. The overwhelming majority supported the resolution. And they frequently criticized the D.A. I spoke among the 15, but was one of only three who gave Van Houten any clear expression of support.
Here’s what I said. No script; just words from the heart:
“I’m here to speak in favor of our District Attorney, Matthew Van Houten. I think the man has professionalism, reason, and respect for the law. He followed the evidence in this case. He followed the law. He also followed the long-held principle that someone is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
“Unfortunately, people far away and people in this community have not respected that last principle. I am very disappointed that our Governor and our Attorney General have taken this case away from our District Attorney’s office.
“When additional evidence showed up, Matt Van Houten agreed to reopen the investigation, to put it before a grand jury, as he should. But he was not given sufficient evidence initially, according to media reports. He was given something that was incomplete. And he had to operate on that basis of that incomplete information, and he made a judgment call.
“Now, perhaps, should Matt Van Houten have been more aggressive with Cornell? Should he have said, well, maybe you’re not telling the whole truth; maybe you’re covering things up for the sake of making your university look better? Well, perhaps he should have. But there’s always a price to be paid for poking the Big Red Bear.
“Ithaca is a company town. And Cornell is our company. It is just as much a company as Microsoft, U.S. Steel, or Elon Musk’s empire. And we maybe should treat it that way.
“I am urging you to vote against Irene Weiser’s member-filed resolution tonight because I think it goes too far, and I think it amounts to a vote of no confidence in our District Attorney. And I have confidence in him.
“And I think… perhaps you should put it back to committee. Maybe committee would be able to discuss it more and be able to refine it more. But right now it really is a vote of no confidence in the D.A. And I believe it’s misplaced, and it’s unfair, and it is really disrespectful of an independent elected officer of this county.
“So I’ve said what I’ve got to say. And I hope that you take it into regard. It’s a serious case. We know that. But the victim—the alleged victim, I should be specific about—has not had her evidence tested in the crucible of cross-examination yet. And so I think we should all take a deep breath, and let the justice system work its way to a conclusion. Meanwhile, we should have confidence in our D.A. Please vote against the resolution tonight….”
****
What about the other voices? Former Ithaca Common Council member George McGonigal made a rare cameo appearance. “I came to voice my support for District Attorney Matt Van Houten, who I’ve known for many years” McGonigal said. “He’s a man of integrity. He works very hard at his job, takes it very seriously. He practices it with compassion. I can’t say enough about the man.”
Former long-time legislator Rich John also spoke. He, like me, urged the legislature to send the resolution to committee for retooling.
“Go slow on this,” John warned the legislature. And as for Van Houten, the former Public Safety Committee Chair stated, “I didn’t always agree with him, but I never questioned his sincerity, his integrity, and his desire to do the best job he possibly could.”
But of the other dozen who shared the public microphone that night, “Elise’s” remarks became typical.
“I do not care if Matt Van Houten is a nice guy. I care about whether he does his job well, and it is clear to me that his response to this case was at minimum negligent and to me sounds like a case of the men and women in power closing ranks instead of using their power to enact justice for the ones who need it the most.”
Another commenter, Kathy Russell, put it this way: “I’m ashamed to be in Ithaca.”
Irene Weiser made her own statement:
“I’m introducing this resolution because I believe there were serious failures in the District Attorney’s handling of the Jane Doe case,” Weiser said. “And those failures need to be acknowledged, examined and corrected.”
“My heart goes out to Jane Doe and to every survivor whose experienced sexual violence, struggled to be heard, or wondered whether coming forward would make any difference,” Weiser stated. “We see you, we hear you, and we are here because what happened cannot simply become another terrible story that makes headlines for a few weeks and then disappears.”
Irene Weiser tried her best to immunize her criticism from prejudging criminality. “This resolution does not ask this legislature to determine whether a crime occurred or criminal charges should have been brought,” the legislator from Caroline qualified.
But equating the anonymous Chi Phi accuser with “every survivor whose experienced sexual violence” belies any attempt at neutrality.
Many in this nation, in this community, and also on the Tompkins County Legislature have already drawn conclusions that no court of law has yet determined. Seven young men have had their identities disclosed and their reputations potentially defamed forever by a woman whose name we still do not know. And as an officer of the court and as a man of character, our District Attorney, Matt Van Houten, has been hung out to dry by politicians for nothing more than his attempt to strike a legal balance.
Some of the legislators one might expect to oppose the Weiser resolution did not. Only Groton Republican Lee Shurtleff and Ithaca Democrat John Hunt voted against the resolution that night. Neither explained his dissent. Both of Enfield’s representatives, Rachel Ostlund and Randy Brown, supported the measure.
“I’m in favor of all of this,” Brown remarked at one point, “except for spending $200,000.” Nevertheless, Brown voted in the affirmative.
Before the final decision, a sudden move by Iris Packman blindsided some. Packman attempted to fatten the already bloated resolution with an amendment, one that would tack onto it seven new prefatory paragraphs specifically referencing the Jane Doe investigation.
“We don’t want to have Jane Doe’s experience erased from the resolution,” Packman appealed to colleagues.
“I think the resolution as written,” Packman continued, “leaves out sort of obtusely that there were questions that were raised, but it doesn’t name what went wrong.”
The additional paragraphs chronicled steps Van Houten did or did not take in the Cornell rape investigation. Each paragraph implied criticism of the D.A.’s conduct.
Uncomfortable with the surprise embellishments, legislators rejected Packman’s amendments, four votes to 12. Packman and Weiser each supported the changes, as did Veronica Pillar and Adam Vinson. No one else did. One opponent of the amendment openly feared it could prompt a change of venue should criminal charges ever be brought and advance to trial.
Of course, the Chi Phi frat house case is not for Matt Van Houten to handle anymore. On October 1, Governor Kathy Hochul pre-empted local prosecution and handed the case to New York Attorney General Letitia James. James could take prosecutions to any court in the state.
And Albany leaders’ preemption of power poses a problem for me.
Responsible state governance rests on respectful deference to independent leadership at the local level. Neither Kathy Hochul nor Letitia James exercised that respectful deference. With their own reelections just weeks away, each begged for headline grabbers. They found one.
The Cornell case tempted their intervention. They’ve played politics at Matt Van Houten’s expense, and I find that spectacle ugly. It makes this undecided voter less inclined to support either candidate, Hochul or James. For one office in particular, I wish for an option that I cannot receive; namely for a third choice.
Asked by Randy Brown to speak, Matt Van Houten briefly addressed the resolution before last Tuesday’s vote was called. Van Houten’s reaction was one of grudging acceptance. He was humble, subdued. He spoke like a prosecutor who’d lost his case.
“I’m’ 100 percent in favor of transparency and absolutely willing to cooperate with whatever it’s called,” Van Houten said of the impending review. “The point is not about defending anything. It’s is there some way we can do better.”
What else could he have said? In a legislative chamber that had become that night a Guernsey pasture for the Me Too movement, our District Attorney had little alternative.
But if Jane Doe was wronged, as she may have been, the truly negligent party is not our District Attorney, but rather the university that gleefully took her tuition, assured her a safe education, and oversaw the frat house in which she was allegedly violated. Why was not an “independent comprehensive review” also commissioned to probe Cornell’s policing, judicial, and administrative practices, one might ask?
But as I warned in my words to the Tompkins County Legislature that night, there’s a price to be paid for poking the Big Red Bear. Matt Van Houten becomes an easier target.
###