Sexual offender sues his victim for $4m because she called him a rapist.

Lang Her, 26, is currently serving a one-year jail sentence for the assault of Yee Xiong, who is 24.

As Yee Xiong prepared to leave the sentencing hearing for a man she said sexually assaulted her at an off-campus apartment when they were students, she felt ready to finally put the case behind her after four years. Then, she was handed a $4 million defamation lawsuit.

The lawsuit from Lang Her, who pleaded no contest to felony assault, stated that Xiong and her three of her siblings colluded to alienate him from the close-knit ethnic Hmong community and called him a rapist on Facebook.

Xiong said it was like a 'slap to the face,' what she saw as a way for Lang Her to 'continue to harass my family and me.'

Yee Xiong,24, was about to leave the sentencing hearing for Lang Her, who she said sexually assaulted her when they were student when she was handed a $4 million defamation lawsuit.

According to court documents, Xiong told police she woke in the early hours of July 10, 2012, after a night of drinking in an off-campus apartment, with her arms pinned by Him.She said he was having sexual intercourse with her.

Both were students at the University of California, Davis at the time.

After his semen was found during a rape kit evaluation, He maintained that no penetration occurred, and testified that he believed Xiong wanted to have sex with him.

During the investigation, He's story changed more than once. He went from claiming that nothing had happened on the night in question to saying he and Xiong had kissed but had not had sex.

A number of postings were made on Facebook by Yee Xiong's family who were supporting her during her rape trial, but her assailant is now suing her for libel and defamation as a result.

However, his semen was found inside Xiong. He has continued to deny that any penetration took place, and his attorneys have used Xiong's behavior after the incident – staying at His apartment for the rest of the night and allowing him to give her a ride back to campus in the morning – against her in court.

His attorneys questioned why Xiong stayed the rest of the night in the apartment if she had been raped. 

The lawsuit cites May 21, 2015, as the date the Facebook postings began: The final day of the first criminal trial, when Xiong learned it had ended in a mistrial.

Though Xiong and her siblings were angry and frustrated, she said, they never hatched a plot to ruin his reputation.

A second trial in February 2016 also ended in a hung jury.

The online postings have since been taken down, but in a formal response to the lawsuit stated that the posts were true or believed by the defendants to be true.

The saga has divided their small, tight-knit Hmong community, Xiong said, with members choosing which family to side with and whom to believe.

Eric Rosenberg, an Ohio attorney who has represented clients suing their accusers and universities, said many of the accused suffer damaged reputations and lost educational and career prospects.

'There is no bigger stain on a person in this culture than being labeled as a sexual assailant, and that's what they're labeled as,' said Rosenberg, who has filed or acted as a consultant for more than half a dozen such lawsuits in the past five years.

He said the number of such lawsuits have increased in recent years as the consequences for those accused at schools have intensified. 'They can't get into school, they can't get in to the military, a lawsuit's their only way out,' he said.

Tracking such cases can be difficult, as defamation lawsuits are often filed in state courts and many are settled.

Regardless of the venue, Laura Dunn, executive director of SurvJustice, a nonprofit victim rights group, discourages potential clients from naming perpetrators outside of formal channels.