When a student at Brigham Young University-Idaho reported being sexually assaulted in July, she thought she could not be punished under the Mormon school’s Honor Code.
BYU-Idaho and other colleges owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints promise amnesty from school discipline to students who report sexual misconduct. The 2017 change was part of sweeping reforms that began at BYU in Provo after the university came under scrutiny for punishing victims of sex crimes — expelling them in some cases — if they had broken school rules that forbid alcohol and coffee, restrict contact between male and female students, impose a strict dress code and ban “homosexual behavior.