Sexual Molestation Charges Against Ex-Team USA Doctor 'Tip of the Iceberg'

Dr. Larry Nassar, who was fired by Michigan State University while under the cloud of a sweeping investigation into sexual allegations against USA Gymanstics, was charged Tuesday in the ongoing sexual assault of a child under the age of 13, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuett said Tuesday.

Schuette and Michigan State University Police Chief James Dunlap announced the against the former former USA Gymnastics team physician at a news conference and in a news release.

Schuette said the charges against Nassar — three counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct, punishable by up to life in prison — are “just the tip of the iceberg.”

Some 50 criminal sexual abuse complaints have been lodged against Nassar, 53, Schuette said at the news conference. At least one was a member of the Team USA women’s Olympic gymnastics team, and several others filed reports with MSU police. But the victim in this case was neither an athlete nor a patient in his care, and the charges stem from incidents that allegedly occurred in his home in Holt from 1998 to 2005.

He said the victim was “just a child, a little child.”

In the news release, Schuette accused Nassar of stealing the victim’s childhood, and said that “can never be undone.”

“As a father that thought is heartbreaking,” he said. “Today’s charges are the first step toward providing long overdue justice for this victim and will help take someone who appears to be a predator off the streets.”

The woman, now in her 20s, will testify against Nassar, a decision Schuette said should provide “fortitude to every woman, every girl and every daughter.”

• See Also: Ex-MSU Doctor in Olympic Sexual Abuse Scandal Charged

According to records obtained by the Lansing State Journal, the woman told police that Nassar exposed his erect penis to her, mastubated in front of her, rubbed his exposed penis on her feet and penetrated her vagina with her fingers. The alleged abuse continued every other week for about five years, Det. Sgt. Andrea Munford told an Ingham County magistrate.

Also, according to those records, the girl told her parents, who took her to counseling, but didn’t report the allegations to police. When the parents and the counselor confronted Nassar, he denied it, Munford said, and the parents didn’t believe their daughter.

She reported the sexual abuse allegations to multiple therapists and counselors, even reporting Nassar by name to some of them, and in September, the woman’s attorney contacted MSU Police and an official investigation was launched.

By then, the Indianapolis Star had already published its exposé into decades-old sexual abuse complaints against Nassar and others connected to USA Gymnastics, some of them involving victims as young as 7 years old. According to the newspaper’s investigation, USA Gymnastics officials brushed off at least 14 reports of sexual abuse by team officials.

Nassar was the team physician for USA Gymnastics during four Olympic Games, and was also a professor at MSU’s College of Osteopathic Medicine. He resigned abruptly from Team USA in the fall of 2015, and Michigan State University fired Nassar in September. He had been relieved of his clinical responsibilities in August after the Indy Star report broke.

As many as 18 law enforcement investigators are looking into complaints against Nassar, Dunlap said.

“I think within a very reasonable time frame we'll be able to submit those for review,” he said. “If you look through the dates again, particularly with this case that's charged, advocacy is a long time in coming. Now that we have these (complaints) filed I'm really confident they're going to get that advocacy that they haven't had all those decades of time in some cases.”

Schuette’s office is also working with the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Grand Rapids on the investigation.

During Nassar’s arraignment, 55th District Court Magistrate Mark Blumer set Nassar's bond at $1 million/10 percent, saying the allegations involved “clear predatory behavior.”

Nassar posted bond, but was required to surrender his passport and wear a GPS tether.

Multiple lawsuits have been filed against USA Gymnastics, including one that claims team coordinators Bela and Martha Karolyi hid the abuse at their training facility in Texas. USA Gymnastics has hired a former federal prosecutor to review its handling of sexual misconduct allegations.

Photo via Michigan State University