Inspector General Says F.B.I. Botched Nassar Abuse Investigation

The Department of Justice’s inspector-general released a long-awaited report on Wednesday harshly criticizing the FBI’s handling of the sexual abuse case of Lawrence G. Nassar, the former doctor for the U.S. National Gymnastics Team and Michigan State Sports, and continued abuse of girls and women.

Mr Nassar, who is serving a life sentence, has been charged with abusing hundreds of patients – including Olympic gold medalist Simone Biles and the majority of the last two US Olympic gymnastics teams – under the guise of medical treatment.

The report, citing civil court documents, said that between July 2015, when USA Gymnastics first reported allegations against Mr. Nassar to the FBI’s Indianapolis office, and August 2016, when the Michigan State University Police Department received a separate complaint.

Lawyer for many victims, John Manly, said the number is likely to be even higher – around 120 patients, including one only 8 years old.

“This is a devastating charge against the FBI and the Justice Department that several federal agents covered up Nassar’s abuse and child abuse,” Manly said. “You let these women down. You abandoned these families. Nobody seems to give a damn about these little girls. “

The Inspector General’s report said that senior FBI officials at the Indianapolis Field Office failed to respond to the allegations “with the utmost seriousness and urgency that they deserved and required,” and the investigation was only opened after a September report by The Indianapolis Star 2016 continued in which Mr. Nassars abuse.

FBI officials in the office also “committed numerous and fundamental errors in responding to the allegations,” failing to inform state or local authorities of the allegations or to take other steps to address the ongoing threat posed by Mr. Nassar the report says.

According to the report, W. Jay Abbott, who is in charge of the Indianapolis Branch, lied to the Inspector General’s office several times when it asked about the Nassar investigation.

Mr. Abbott made false statements “to minimize errors by the Indianapolis Field Office in handling the Nassar allegations,” the report said.

It was also said that Mr. Abbott violated the FBI. Politics when he spoke to Steve Penny, then President and General Manager of USA Gymnastics, about possible employment opportunities at the US Olympic Committee while the two discussed allegations against Mr Nassar. Mr. Abbott later applied for a position with the USOC but lied twice to the Inspector General that he was looking for the position.

According to the report, the Department of Justice declined to prosecute Mr. Abbott, who retired in January 2018, and an unnamed special adviser on regulatory agencies in Indianapolis in September 2020.

Abbott has reviewed the report, according to his attorney Josh Minkler. “Mr. Abbott thanks the law enforcement officers and prosecutors who brought Larry Nassar to justice,” Minkler said in a statement. Abbott hopes that the courageous victims of Nassar’s horrific crime will find peace. “

For Rachael Denhollander, a lawyer and former gymnast who was the first person to publicly accuse Nassar of assault, the details in the report revealed “an incredibly profound level of betrayal” that came as no surprise.

“When I got in touch, I was expecting multiple levels of botched investigations and cover-ups because that’s what survivors are struggling with,” she said, adding that she believed Mr Nassar was abusing other women for working with the national team four years before abusing them, and she knew how abusers worked.

“This is what the survivors have to struggle with,” she said. “And they are constantly asked, ‘Why don’t survivors contact us?’ Therefore.”

Earlier this year, on May 14th, the Justice Department informed the Inspector General that it was not opening a new investigation into whether the Oversight Specialist had provided false information during interviews with the Inspector General. The FBI said the agent was no longer a supervisor and no longer worked on FBI matters. The agent’s behavior was said to have been checked by the bureau’s professional responsibility bureau.

Senator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, who worked with Senator Jerry Moran, Republican of Kansas, on a 2019 Senate investigation into the Nassar scandal, called the report “utterly chilling” and a “belly blow to anyone who advocates effective law enforcement Interested”. He suggested that the Senate hold hearings to hold the FBI accountable and said he wanted to know why FBI agents had not been charged with false testimony.

Mr Moran said he wanted to partially investigate why the Justice Department refused to pursue someone in the FBI

The Inspector General’s report is another damage to the FBI’s reputation. In 2019, the Inspector General sharply criticized the office for making many errors and omissions in a series of wiretapping applications used in the FBI’s Russia investigation. As part of the investigation, a former FBI attorney pleaded guilty to altering a document as part of the investigation into Russia.

The FBI said in a statement it had made changes so that similar allegations of abuse would be promptly shared within the office and with other law enforcement agencies.

Basics of the Summer Olympics

“That shouldn’t have happened,” said the FBI. “The FBI will never lose sight of the damage Nassar’s abuse has wrought. The actions and omissions of certain FBI employees described in the report are inexcusable and represent a discrediting of this organization. “

Mr Manly said the report would bring some relief to gymnasts since he knew what happened on the case. But he said their families wanted accountability and the report did not contain one.

“All of these families will have to live with the consequences while Jay Abbott and his cohorts can just get on with the rest of their lives and walk into the sunset on their FBI pension,” he said.

Even as the FBI’s handling of the case came under scrutiny in 2017 and 2018 by Congress, the news media and the bureau’s headquarters, Indianapolis officials took no responsibility for their failures, the report said. Instead, officials from the Indianapolis office provided “incomplete and inaccurate” information in response to the media and internal inquiries from the agency.

After the delays, the FBI and local authorities finally discovered that Mr Nassar had sexually abused more than 100 women and was in possession of child pornography, which led to convictions in federal and state courts, the report said.

More than 200 victims are suing USA Gymnastics, saying Mr Nassar sexually assaulted them, but those lawsuits were put on hold when the association filed for bankruptcy in December 2018.

Earlier this year, the Nassar sexual abuse scandal rocked the sport, with more than 150 girls and women testifying at Mr. Nassar’s first hearing in a Michigan courtroom. Everyone confronted Mr. Nassar and described how they were injured from the abuse. Many spoke with tears.

Following the scandal, USA Gymnastics, the sport’s governing body, filed for bankruptcy in 2018.

In 2020, the organization offered to pay US $ 215 million to resolve legal claims from athletes who reported having been sexually assaulted by Mr Nassar. The offer came after more than 300 plaintiffs, including Olympic gymnasts, sued USA Gymnastics for failing to protect them from Mr Nassar. This year’s U.S. women’s Olympic gymnastics team was traveling to Tokyo when the report came out on Wednesday.

In 2019, a Senate report found that officials from the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committees, USA Gymnastics, Michigan State University, and the FBI “sat on evidence of his sexual misconduct for over a year – adding to the sexual abuse of dozens of others made possible “. Girl.”

Adam Goldman contributed the reporting and Alain Delaquérière contributed the research.