http://www.detroitnews.com/story/tech/2018/01/18/msu-president-told-nassar-complaint-2014/1042071001/


What MSU knew: 14 warned of Nassar abuse

8 women reported abuse claims, at least one of which reached president

Kim KozlowskiUpdated 7 hours ago

Reports of sexual misconduct by Dr. Larry Nassar reached at least 14 Michigan State University representatives in the two decades before his arrest, with no fewer than eight women reporting his actions, a Detroit News investigation has found.

Among those notified was MSU President Lou Anna Simon, who was informed in 2014 that a Title IX complaint and a police report had been filed against an unnamed physician, she told The News on Wednesday.

“I was informed that a sports medicine doctor was under investigation,” said Simon, who made the brief comments after appearing in court Wednesday to observe a sentencing hearing for Nassar. “I told people to play it straight up, and I did not receive a copy of the report. That’s the truth.”

Among the others who were aware of alleged abuse were athletic trainers, assistant coaches, a university police detective and an official who is now MSU’s assistant general counsel, according to university records and accounts of victims who spoke to The News.

Collectively, the accounts show MSU missed multiple opportunities over two decades to stop Nassar, a graduate of its osteopathic medical school who became a renowned doctor but went on to molest scores of girls and women under the guise of treating them for pain.

Nassar, 54, pleaded guilty to assaulting nine girls in Ingham County but faces more than 150 civil suits that also involve MSU and others. Already sentenced to 60 years in prison for child pornography in federal court, Nassar will be in Ingham County Circuit Court on Thursday for the third day of his sentencing hearing for seven counts of criminal sexual conduct.

Asked about the women who said they tried to alert MSU to Nassar’s misconduct, Simon declined to comment.

“Those issues are points of dispute and part of civil litigation and I am not going to comment on,” she said. “What I can tell you is what I knew, straight up. My standard response is to tell people to play things straight up and I did not receive a copy of the report.”

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Nassar’s case has drawn comparisons to that of Jerry Sandusky, the former Penn State assistant football coach who was found guilty in 2012 of molesting boys on campus. Three university officials, including president Graham Spanier, were sentenced to prison for failing to report Sandusky to authorities.

Former gymnast Rachael Denhollander, who in September 2016 became the first to publicly accuse Nassar of molesting her, says MSU officials should be held accountable for Nassar’s crimes.

“A monster was stopped last year, after decades of being allowed to prey on women and little girls, and he wasn’t stopped by a single person who could have, and should have stopped him at least 20 years ago,” Denhollander told The News last week. “He was stopped by the victims, who had to fight through being silenced, being threatened, being mocked, by the officials at MSU who they appealed to for help.

“And now the very people who should have been protecting us all along ... have thumbed their nose at any semblance of accountability.”

Two candidates for statewide office have called for Simon’s resignation, despite claims that the university’s legal defense team found no evidence that anyone other than Nassar knew of his criminal conduct.

In a response to a request for information from Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette, former federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, who led an internal MSU inquiry into the Nassar case, wrote: “While many in the community today wish that they had identified Nassar as a predator, we believe the evidence in this case will show that no one else at MSU knew that Nassar engaged in criminal behavior.”

More: Larry Nassar: A trail of sexual abuse

Six women with ties to the university, however, each told The News that they complained to at least one person at MSU when they believed Nassar’s conduct crossed from medical to sexual, and a seventh woman outlined her report to MSU during sentencing. The eighth woman complained to the Meridian Township Police.

Andrea Bitely, a spokeswoman for Schuette, declined to comment on whether his office is investigating who knew what at MSU.

MSU spokesman Jason Cody said the school responded vigorously once Nassar’s crimes came to light in 2016. He said campus police took 135 reports of criminal sexual conduct and executed a search warrant that contributed to Nassar’s convictions. MSU also established a $10 million counseling fund last month.

He said it was “not appropriate” to compare the Nassar case with that of Penn State, where leaders discussed “and illegally ignored” allegations against Sandusky.

“We want to reiterate again that we are truly sorry for the abuse Nassar’s victims suffered, the pain it caused and the pain it continues to cause,” he said. “As the president said at the December board meeting, this situation also reinforces the importance of taking a hard look at ourselves and learning from what happened — because it should never happen again.”