Attorney General Dana Nessel closes Nassar investigation

LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) — Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has announced her office’s investigation into the Larry Nassar-related documents from Michigan State University will now be closed.

In the emailed announcement Nessel said her office received more than 105,000 documents from Michigan State which eventually included 6,004 documents held back by MSU. The university had claimed attorney-client privilege before releasing the documents in March of this year.

“MSU has repeatedly justified withholding the documents because they contained information that was allegedly protected by the attorney-client privilege,” Nessel said in the statement. “Our review has revealed that this justification was not always appropriate. A significant number, if not a majority, of the documents did not appear to us to be covered by the privilege. Accordingly, there was no justifiable reason to withhold those documents for any period of time, let alone an extended period. Further, the documents that contained, or at least arguably contained, privileged information did not offer any new insight into MSU’s handling of Nassar’s abuse or who knew what about it and when. Indeed, most of the privileged information was not even related to those issues, but instead to tangential issues such as public relations, insurance, and funding.”

Michigan State has been criticized for its handling of the Nassar investigation and its dealings with survivors in the aftermath of his arrest and conviction. The school has settled lawsuits filed by Nassar victims for $500 million.

The Board declined several requests over the years to release the remaining Nassar documents and today Nessel did not hold back criticizing the university for the delay.

“This is a disappointing close to our years-long investigation into the abuse that hundreds of young women were subjected to over the course of more than a decade,” Nessel said.  “While I appreciate that MSU eventually cooperated, the withheld documents provided victims with a sense of false hope, for no justifiable reason. Simply put, there remains no fulfilling answer to the question of how this abuse was able to be perpetuated on so many, for so long, without MSU, or anyone else, putting a stop to it.”

The Attorney General’s office said it is now creating a digital, publicly available folder of all the documents, but this could take up to a year to complete.

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