JUSTICE DEPT. REPORT BLASTS FBI’S HANDLING OF NASSAR INVESTIGATION
The Justice Department’s inspector general released a longawaited report on Wednesday that sharply criticized the FBI’s handling of the sexual abuse case involving Lawrence Nassar, the former doctor for the USA Gymnastics national team and Michigan State sports, which led to Nassar’s continued abuse of girls and women.
Nassar, who is serving what amounts to life in prison, has been accused of abusing hundreds of female patients — including Olympic champion Simone Biles and a majority of the last two United States women’s Olympic gymnastics teams — under the guise of medical treatment.
The report, citing civil court documents, said that 70 or more young athletes had been sexually abused by Nassar between July 2015 — when USA Gymnastics first reported allegations against Nassar to the FBI’s Indianapolis field office — and August 2016, when the Michigan State University Police Department received a separate complaint.
John Manly, a lawyer for many of the victims, said that number is likely even higher — about 120 patients, including one as young as 8 years old.
“This is a devastating indict
ment of the FBI and the Department of Justice that multiple federal agents covered up Nassar’s abuse and child molestation,” Manly said. “They’ve failed these women. They’ve failed these families. No one seems to give a damn about these little girls.”
The inspector general’s report said senior FBI officials in the Indianapolis field office failed to respond to the allegations “with the utmost seriousness and urgency that they deserved and required” and the investigation did not proceed until after a September 2016 report by The Indianapolis Star detailed Nassar’s abuse.
FBI officials in the office also “made numerous and fundamental errors when they did respond” to the allegations and failed to notify state or local authorities of the allegations or take other steps to address the ongoing threat posed by Nassar, the report said.
According to the report, the special agent in charge of the Indianapolis field office, Jay Abbott, lied to the inspector general’s office numerous times when it asked him about the Nassar inquiry.
Abbott gave false statements “to minimize errors made by the Indianapolis Field Office in connection with the handling of the Nassar allegations,” the report said.
It also said Abbott violated FBI policy when he spoke with Steve Penny, then the president and chief executive of USA Gymnastics, about potential job opportunities with the U.S. Olympic Committee, even as the two discussed the allegations against Nassar. Abbott later applied for a job at the USOC, but twice lied to the inspector general about seeking that job.
The Justice Department declined to prosecute Abbott, who retired in January 2018, and an unnamed supervisory special agent in Indianapolis in September 2020, according to the report.
Abbott has reviewed the report, according to his lawyer, Josh Minkler. “Mr. Abbott thanks the law enforcement officers and prosecutors who brought Larry
Nassar to justice,” Minkler said in a statement. “Mr. Abbott hopes the courageous victims of Nassar’s horrible crime find peace.”
For Rachael Denhollander, a lawyer and a former gymnast who was the first person to publicly accuse Nassar of assault, the details in the report showed “an incredibly deep level of betrayal” that did not come as a surprise.
“When I came forward, I fully expected multiple levels of botched investigations and cover-ups because that’s what survivors are up against,” she said, adding that she assumed Nassar was abusing other women because he had worked with the national team for four years before abusing her, and she knew how abusers worked.
“(Survivors) constantly get asked the question, ‘Why don’t survivors report?’ This is why,” she said.
Earlier this year, on May 14, the Justice Department notified the inspector general that it was not opening a new investigation into whether the supervisory special agent had made false statements during interviews with the inspector general. The FBI said that agent was no longer a supervisor and was not working on FBI matters. It said the agent’s conduct was set for review by the bureau’s Office of Professional Responsibility.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., who worked with Sen. Jerry Moran, RKan., on a 2019 Senate investigation of the Nassar scandal, called the report “absolutely chilling” and a “gut punch to anyone who cares about effective law enforcement.” He suggested that the Senate hold hearings to hold the FBI accountable, and said he wanted to know why FBI agents had not been criminally charged for having made false statements.
The FBI in a statement said it had made changes so that similar abuse allegations would be shared promptly within the bureau and with other law enforcement agencies.
“This should not have happened,” the FBI said. “The FBI will never lose sight of the harm that Nassar’s abuse caused. The actions and inactions of certain FBI employees described in the report are inexcusable and a discredit to this organization.”
Manly said the report would give the gymnasts some relief by knowing what happened in the case. But he said their families wanted accountability and the report did not provide any.
“All those families have to live with the consequences while Jay Abbott and his cohorts can just live the rest of their lives and go off into the sunset with their FBI pensions,” he said.
Even when the FBI’s handling of the case came under scrutiny from Congress, the news media, and bureau headquarters in 2017 and 2018, Indianapolis officials did not take responsibility for their failures, the report said. Instead, it said, officials in the Indianapolis office provided “incomplete and inaccurate” information in response to the media and the agency’s internal inquiries.
After the delays, the FBI and local authorities ultimately found that Nassar had sexually assaulted more than 100 women and that he possessed child pornography, which led to convictions in federal and state courts, the report said.
More than 200 victims are suing USA Gymnastics, saying Nassar had sexually abused them, but those lawsuits were put on hold when the federation filed for bankruptcy in December 2018.
Earlier that year, the Nassar sexual abuse scandal shook the sport, and more than 150 girls and women testified at Nassar’s initial sentencing hearing in a Michigan courtroom.
Reeling from the scandal, USA Gymnastics, the sport’s governing body, filed for bankruptcy in 2018.
In 2020, the organization offered to pay $215 million to settle legal claims brought by athletes who said they were sexually abused by Nassar. The offer came after more than 300 plaintiffs, including Olympic gymnasts, sued USA Gymnastics for failing to protect them from Nassar.