3 more MSU Title IX inquiries find Nassar violated policies

EAST LANSING - Three more internal Title IX investigations have determined that former MSU doctor Larry Nassar violated university policy, but the university won't make details public.

The investigations were the second, third and fourth that Michigan State University has closed since March 17, when a university Title IX investigator determined that in 2000 Nassar sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl during a medical appointment at his university office.

University spokesman Jason Cody declined to comment on whether the latest investigations involved sexual assault allegations or on which policies Nassar violated. Cody added that there's one more investigation that remains open.

Cody also said that the university closed a reopened Title IX investigation from 2014 with no policy violation finding. MSU closed that case, Cody said, due to lack of participation from the claimant, a woman who told police and the university in 2014 that Nassar sexually assaulted her during a medical appointment. He added that the university's Title IX office received no response after repeated attempts to contact the woman.

Jim Graves, the woman's attorney, said the university sent two emails to his client in December, which went to an old email address and were filtered into the spam folder. Graves said his client recently located the emails after receiving questions from the State Journal.

Graves said he and his client didn't know the reopened investigation had been closed, and that he was preparing a formal request to the university to reopen the investigation once again, which the second email to the woman indicated was possible.

Even though MSU sent two emails to his client, the university and its Title IX office have known for months that the woman had retained Graves as her attorney.

"MSU has had since 2014 all the information from my client it needed to make current findings," Graves said in an email. "My client has always maintained she was sexually assaulted. If MSU had an interest in speaking with my client it knew how to contact me.

"The MSU Police did exactly that when it contacted me this year. My client has responded in full to all MSU Police requests for information received through my office."

Cody said the university's policy is to only communicate with the complainant and respondent in Title IX investigations.

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The initial investigation from that woman's complaint took three months and cleared Nassar of any wrong doing, in part, based on the opinions of four medical experts who worked for MSU and had close ties to Nassar. The Title IX investigator determined in 2014 that the woman didn’t understand the "nuanced difference" between sexual assault and osteopathic manipulative medicine procedures.

The woman also spoke with police in 2014, but prosecutors declined to issue charges after a criminal investigation that, like the Title IX investigation, was reopened after dozens of women told police late last year that Nassar sexually assaulted them.

That wave of complaints was prompted by an Indianapolis Star report that detailed the accounts of two women who said Nassar sexually assaulted them. Rachael Denhollander was one of those women and in September filed a Title IX complaint against Nassar. Her Title IX investigation concluded March 17 and, based on the preponderance of the evidence standard, determined that Nassar sexually assaulted her in 2000 at his MSU office.

Denhollander and the complainant from 2014 provided copies of their Title IX reports to the State Journal.

More than 90 women and girls have filed lawsuits in federal and state courts against MSU, USA Gymnastics and Nassar, saying that the former doctor sexually abused them and the organizations didn't do enough to protect them.

Nassar, through his attorneys, has denied any wrongdoing and said he performed legitimate medical procedures.

Nassar worked at MSU and for USA Gymnastics for decades. The university fired him in September and he left USA Gymnastics with little notice in 2015.

Nassar faces 28 criminal charges split between state and federal courts, including 22 sexual assault charges related to his role as a doctor. The state revoked his medical license this month.

ContactMatt Mencarini at (517) 267-1347 or mmencarini@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter@MattMencarini.