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Some 90 Olympic gymnasts have demanded more than $1 billion from the FBI for ignoring sexual abuse claims they filed against Larry Nassar, a former USA Gymnastics doctor. Last April, 13 athletes denounced the agency for the same thing. Although this case was revealed in 2015, and the defendant has already been sentenced to prison, there are still issues to be resolved.
This Wednesday, June 8, some 90 US Olympic gymnasts, including gold medalists Simone Biles, Aly Raisman and McKayla Maroney, filed lawsuits against the FBI. This was reported by the California law firm Manly, Stewart and Finaldi in a statement.
The gymnasts asked the agency to pay a total of more than a billion dollars in damages. This, because in 2015, the FBI was aware that Larry Nassar, a USA Gymnastics doctor, was accused of assaulting athletes.
However, the officers did not act, leaving him free to repeatedly abuse more than 330 young men during his time with the national team.
“If the FBI had done their job, Nassar would have been stopped before he had a chance to molest hundreds of girls, myself included,” former University of Michigan gymnast Samantha Roy said in a statement.
This group of women joins a lawsuit filed in April by 13 Nassar abuse survivors, who claimed $130 million from the FBI for failing to investigate allegations of sexual abuse against the doctor.
“It’s time for the FBI to be held accountable,” said Maggie Nichols, a national champion gymnast in Oklahoma in 2017-19.
However, FBI officials have yet to comment on the matter.
Under federal law, a government agency has six months to respond to tort claims. This law makes it possible to compensate people who are harmed by the negligence or wrongful act or omission of the federal government.
Errors by the FBI
In July 2021, a report by Michael Horowitz, the Justice Department’s inspector general, uncovered FBI errors that allowed Nassar to continue abusing at least 70 more victims before he was finally apprehended.
Former special agent in charge of the Indianapolis field office, W. Jay Abbott, and a former supervisory special agent identified as Michael Langeman, were named in the report.
Horowitz said agents waited five weeks before conducting a phone interview with only one victim, Maroney, leaving out the other victims. In addition, he charged that Langeman did not properly document the interview with the gymnast until more than a year later, and when he did, it contained errors and omissions.
As for Abbott, he was accused of violating ethics rules by trying to get a job with the US Olympic Committee amid the investigation and lying during his interview with the inspector general’s office.
And while FBI Director Christopher Wray lamented “that there have been people in the FBI who had their own chance to stop this monster back in 2015 and failed,” the Justice Department said in May that it would not pursue criminal charges against them. exagents.
For its part, Michigan State University, which was also accused of missing opportunities for many years to stop Nassar, agreed to pay $500 million to more than 300 women and girls who were assaulted by the doctor.
USA Gymnastics and the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee also reached a $380 million settlement.
Investigation of sexual abuse against gymnasts in the United States
In 2015, Indianapolis-based USA Gymnastics told local officials that three gymnasts said they were assaulted by Larry Nassar.
However, the FBI did not open a formal investigation or inform federal or state authorities in Michigan.
It was in 2016 that Los Angeles agents launched an investigation against Nassar and interviewed several victims.
In the fall of that same year, Nassar was arrested during a police investigation at Michigan State University, where he practiced as a doctor.
The accused is serving a sentence of between 40 and 175 years added to another of 60 years for child pornography. He received his sentences between December 2017 and February 2018, in trials that coincided with the outbreak of the #MeToo movement.
Since then, several public figures have been accused of sexual abuse in the United States. Among them, producer Harvey Weinstein, actor Kevin Spacey, singer R. Kelly, among others.
With EFE, AP, Reuters
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