According to a lawsuit in 2022, some of Larry Nassar’s victims alleged that the FBI mishandled credible complaints of sexual assaults and failed to act on them seriously.
The 139 claimants included US Olympic gymnastics gold medalists Simone Biles, Mckayla Maroney, and Aly Raisman. According to confirmed sources, Nassar is currently serving up to 175 years in prison for sexual assault.
Previously, in 2021, the Department of Justice’s Office of the Inspector General, which serves as a watchdog for the FBI, concluded that the agency disregarded allegations about Nassar and made a raft of errors.
The FBI investigation into Nassar began in 2015, but the police officers found some mistakes in the inquiry, which includes a failure to formally document meetings with USA Gymnastics officials after they concluded their own 5-week internal probe into Nassar’s behavior.
It also cited a failure by authorities about the potential to contact state and local authorities about the potential risk he continued to pose to athletes.
Nassar continued to see patients for over a year after allegations against him were first made to the FBI.
Many of the claimants in the lawsuit said they were assaulted after Nassar’s abuse was first reported in 2015. The majority were athletes with the USA Gymnastics programme or with Michigan State University, where Nassar maintained a clinic.
Acting Associate Attorney General Benjamin C Mizer said that “For decades, Lawrence Nassar abused his position, betraying the trust of those under his care and medical supervision while skirting accountability”.
Further, “these allegations should have been taken seriously from the outset” as per the statements of Mr Mizer, “while these settlements won’t undo the harm Nassar inflicted, our hope is that they will help give the victims of his crimes some of the critical support they need to continue healing.
In total, legal pay-outs stemming from Nassar’s actions and their aftermath have totalled more than $1bn.
Those payments included a $500m settlement between Michigan state and hundreds of survivors in 2018, as well as a $380m settlement with athletes from USA Gymnastics and the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee.
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