Penn State shadow hangs over Michigan State
School authorities could be charged for not reporting abuse
LANSING, Mich. — Sports doctor Larry Nassar is on his way to prison for the rest of his life for molesting scores of young female athletes, but the scandal is far from over at Michigan State University as victims, lawmakers and a judge demand to know why he wasn’t stopped years ago.
Some are likening Michigan State to Penn State University, where three senior officials, including the school’s president, were sentenced to jail last year for failing to tell authorities about a sexual abuse allegation involving coach Jerry Sandusky.
Nassar, 54, a former member of the university’s sports medicine staff, has admitted penetrating elite gymnasts and other athletes with his fingers while he was supposedly treating them for injuries.
‘Can’t fix it now’
Some of the more than 150 women and girls who have accused him said they complained to the sports medicine staff, a campus counselor and the women’s gymnastics coach as far back as the late 1990s.
In Michigan, it is a misdemeanor punishable by up to three months in jail and a $500 fine for certain professionals to fail to report a suspected case of child abuse.
No one has been charged in the scandal besides Nassar.
Lou Anna Simon, who resigned under pressure Wednesday as Michigan State’s president, said, “There is no cover-up.”
But the university last week asked Michigan’s attorney general to conduct a review of the scandal.
Jennifer Paine, a Michigan lawyer who specializes in child protection law and is not involved in the Nassar case, said there are probably grounds for charging some Michigan State staff members for failing to report what victims were saying.
“The obligation to report doesn’t mean anything unless people enforce,” she said. “That’s why it’s there.”
John Manly, an attorney who represents more than 100 victims in lawsuits, said Michigan State, USA Gymnastics and the U.S. Olympic Committee “miserably failed children.” Nassar was a team doctor at USA Gymnastics, which trains Olympians.
“They had an opportunity, instead of being Penn State, to make them a beacon of how to handle this,” Manly said. “It’s too late. You can’t fix it now.”
Penn State’s former president, Graham Spanier, and two other former administrators, Tim Curley and Gary Schultz, were prosecuted for child endangerment for not reporting a 2001 complaint about Sandusky showering with a boy. Sandusky’s arrest a decade later blew up into a scandal that brought down legendary football coach Joe Paterno.
Kyle Stephens, who was a Nassar family friend, said he molested her for years at his Lansingarea home. She said she told a campus counselor, Gary Stollak, about the abuse in 2004. Nassar met with Stollak and denied it, and no police report was made.
Stollak, now retired, testified in 2016 that he couldn’t remember anything because of a stroke.
“He didn’t report it, and he’s a mandatory reporter,” Stephens said, referring to those who are legally required to report sexual abuse. “Michigan State keeps saying that ‘we didn’t know.’ Who should I have told? Tell me who I should have told so I know what I should have done.”
A 2014 police investigation into other assault accusations ended with no charges against Nassar. But the university told him that he needed to have a chaperone in the room during certain exams. He was fired in 2016 for failing to do so.
Some victims say they reported Nassar to Kathy Klages, who ran camps for teen gymnasts and was Michigan State women’s gymnastics coach until last February. She has denied wrongdoing.
Congress weighs in
In Washington, senators from both parties are calling for the creation of a select committee to investigate the U.S. Olympic Committee and USA Gymnastics.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., said the Senate should investigate how Nassar was given unsupervised access to the gymnasts.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, DCalif., called on the House to immediately take up Senate-passed legislation to prevent predators from abusing young athletes. A bill sponsored by Feinstein was approved unanimously in November, six months after a similar bill was approved in the House. Both bills require amateur sports groups recognized by USOC to promptly report claims of sexual abuse to police, but the legislative language is not identical.