The case centers on a student who was suspended for three semesters in 2021 after a university hearing panel found he had committed "Rape and Forcible Fondling" against another student. The panel concluded that the female student's account was more credible because it had been "consistent over time" while the male student's account had allegedly changed.

The student, who has not returned to USI and has no intention of doing so, filed a federal lawsuit alleging Title IX discrimination, due process violations, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. He later discovered through discovery that USI officials had created memoranda of early conversations that arguably showed his account was consistent over time and the complainant's was not—records that USI had not disclosed to him or Title IX decisionmakers.

Circuit Judge David Hamilton, writing for a three-judge panel that also included Chief Judge Diane Brennan and Circuit Judge Joan St. Eve, held that the plaintiff failed to show "substantial risk of harm—either physical harm or retaliation by third parties, beyond the reaction legitimately attached to the truth of events." The court noted that while vile social media posts in 2021 threatened the student and his mother with death or physical harm, those messages were "several years old" with "no other evidence indicating any intent to follow through on those threats years later."

Hamilton rejected the student's request to broaden the pseudonym standard to protect mental health. "The lines between embarrassment, stress, and degrees of mental illness are not sharp," he wrote, adding that "if there is any mental health exception for the strong presumption against use of pseudonyms, and we are not saying there is," the evidence here was insufficient.

The court also rejected both sides' attempts to leverage the merits of their underlying dispute to support their positions on anonymity. Hamilton wrote that the court was "reluctant to adopt a test for pseudonyms that would depend on or even consider the merits of a party's claims or defenses."

Following the circuit's approach in similar recent cases, Hamilton gave the student until May 13, 2026, to choose between dismissing the appeals under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 42 to avoid public disclosure of his name, or proceeding with the merits appeals using his real name. The panel kept all three appeals under advisement pending the student's decision.