In particular, the texts, according to Steele’s lawsuit, reveal that Masters asked Steele to engage in behaviors she would later claim as nonconsensual. She would also become upset if Steele didn’t respond to her enthusiastically when she asked for additional sexual encounters.

Masters even, according to the lawsuit, threatened to drive past Steele’s apartment and expose their affair to Steele’s other romantic partner if he didn’t sufficiently respond to Masters’ requests. She would later admit to actually driving past his apartment around midnight on the day she made the threat.

After their final sexual encounter around June 16, 2020, Masters repeatedly tried to get Steele to engage in additional sexual activity, even texting him, “When are you going to f*** me again?”

When Steele didn’t respond to Masters’ requests, she went to Pacific administrators and accused him of physical and sexual assault beginning around June 22, 2020. Thus started a chain of events that led to Steele being removed from his graduate program.

[And that’s really just the beginning of the nightmare. Abigail Masters used the university to wreak her revenge on Peter Steele for rejecting her — and the university let her do it. Even when they have evidence that Masters had not only fully consented to their encounters but was angry that Steele refused to participate in more, Pacific University abused their authority to punish Steele anyway. They deserve to pay up every dime of that $3.95 million. Let’s hope more such lawsuits impose some rational behavior on Academia, including due process. — Ed]