--- title: Phillips Exeter Forced Student to Accept Bread From Attacker description: A student was made to accept penance gifts from her alleged attacker instead of going to the police about her sexual assault. canonical: https://time.com/4408308/phillips-exeter-sexual-assault/ author: TIME article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-07-15T18:48:19.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T09:02:57.077Z og:title: Private School Punished Attacker By Having Him Deliver Bread to Victim og:description: The penance, recommended by school reverend, was for groping her in church basement og:url: https://time.com/4408308/phillips-exeter-sexual-assault/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta9d316e42b0fc95e/69889c1e3c1639d3ff45e0e2/phillips-exeter-academy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2254 og:image:height: 1268 og:image:alt: Prep School Abuse og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Private School Punished Attacker By Having Him Deliver Bread to Victim twitter:description: The penance, recommended by school reverend, was for groping her in church basement twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta9d316e42b0fc95e/69889c1e3c1639d3ff45e0e2/phillips-exeter-academy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Private School Punished Attacker By Having Him Deliver Bread to Victim > Sponsored content. 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Worth Your Time is TIME's culture newsletter, published Tuesdays and Saturdays to 40,000 subscribers as of August 2026. #### Who writes TIME's culture recommendations? Culture editor Eliza Berman writes Worth Your Time, drawing on TIME's critics and culture desk. #### Is Worth Your Time free? Yes. It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters. by [Jessie Van Amburg](https://time.com/author/jessie-van-amburg/) ## Jessie Van Amburg Jul 15, 2016 6:48 PM UTC  Part of the campus of the prestigious Phillips Exeter Academy is seen in Exeter, N.H. The principal of the elite prep school dealing with a series of sexual abuse allegations acknowledged on April 22, 2016. Part of the campus of the prestigious Phillips Exeter Academy is seen in Exeter, N.H. The principal of the elite prep school dealing with a series of sexual abuse allegations acknowledged on April 22, 2016.Jim Cole—AP by [Jessie Van Amburg](https://time.com/author/jessie-van-amburg/) ## Jessie Van Amburg Jul 15, 2016 6:48 PM UTC [Phillips Exeter](http://www.cosmopolitan.com/lifestyle/news/a61401/exeter-sexual-assailant-had-to-bake-bread-for-victim/) Academy, a prestigious New Hampshire boarding school, is reportedly under investigation by the county attorney and local police department for mishandling sexual assault and abuse. After 17-year-old student Michaella Henry told two deans that she was groped by fellow student Chukwudi Ikpeazu in October 2015, she was directed to the school’s reverend instead of the police. As reported by the [Boston _Globe_](https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/07/12/phillips-exeter-academy-under-fire-again-for-its-handling-sexual-misconduct-allegations/UlfO1FgtbFEvWAQcEK7grN/story.html), the school’s reverend Robert Thompson urged reconciliation between Henry and Ikpeazu. After Ikpeazu took responsibility for his actions, Thompson had him agree to an “act of penance”—delivering baked goods to Henry. (Ikpeazu was known for his baking around campus.) School authorities meanwhile never reported her story to the police, or to her parents. The weekly bread deliveries did nothing to help Henry, who explained to the _Globe_ that the regular encounters with her alleged attacker increased her anxiety. Yet Henry says that Thompson told her she “did a great service” for Ikpeazu, because “gave him an opportunity to express his regret and to take responsibility for what he had done.” She took her story to the police in May. Ikpeazu was arrested in June and is now facing a misdemeanor charge of sexual assault. His lawyers declined to comment to the _Boston Globe_. This isn’t the first time that the school has faced scrutiny for sexual abuse and misconduct. Former [admissions official](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/14/us/arthur-peekel-phillips-exeter-sexual-assault.html?%5Fr=0) Arthur Peekel was recently charged with sexually assaulting a student in the 70s, and former teacher [Rick Shubart](https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/03/30/celebrated-teacher-phillips-exeter-academy-barred-from-campus-after-admitting-sexual-misconduct/c1Z7irufFBnBJIrLKVJG5M/story.html) was banned from campus after admitting to sexual misconduct with students in the 70s and 80s. Photography teacher [Steve Lewis](https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2016/04/14/second-phillips-exeter) also confessed to sexual encounters with a student “decades ago” and was fired in April. Nearby St. Paul’s School in Concord already made national headlines after then-student [Owen Labrie](http://abcnews.go.com/US/owen-labrie-released-bail-prep-school-sex-assault/story?id=39151513) was found guilty of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old student in 2014. Students and alums at Phillips Exeter are speaking out against the recent incidents. A [petition](https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/massachusetts/2016/07/14/phillips-exeter-alumni-vow-withhold-donations-over-mishandled-sexual-abuse-complaint/UJJW5wmH9Lcu3XSUTLh7tJ/story.html) vowing to withhold donations over the mishandled complaints has gained 700 signatures from alumnae. One student wrote a piece for [Jezebel](http://jezebel.com/when-i-tried-to-talk-to-my-prep-school-about-rape-cultu-1725635150) in 2015 about her frustrations with Phillips Exeter’s administration turning a deaf ear to her concerns about rape culture on campus in the wake of Owen Labrie’s trial. “What I’m saying is not that elite institutions are breeding assault intentionally,” she wrote, “but that the side effects of elitism can nudge some prep school students closer to violent ground.” Phillips Exeter principal Lisa MacFarlane released a statement on Wednesday, reports the Globe, where she expressed “grave concern” over the recent allegations, but that “we cannot comment further, other than to say we approach this investigation with humility, openness, and a sincere desire to improve.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4408308/phillips-exeter-sexual-assault/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4408308/phillips-exeter-sexual-assault/"},"headline":"Private School Punished Attacker By Having Him Deliver Bread to Victim","datePublished":"2016-07-15T18:48:19.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T09:02:57.077Z","description":"The penance, recommended by school reverend, was for groping her in church basement","url":"https://time.com/4408308/phillips-exeter-sexual-assault/","keywords":["motto","News"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta9d316e42b0fc95e/69889c1e3c1639d3ff45e0e2/phillips-exeter-academy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jessie Van Amburg","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/jessie-van-amburg/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta9d316e42b0fc95e/69889c1e3c1639d3ff45e0e2/phillips-exeter-academy.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Prep School Abuse","caption":"Part of the campus of the prestigious Phillips Exeter Academy is seen in Exeter, N.H. 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