◆Part 1: The Report
On 28 July 2015 USA Gymnastics officials met the FBI Indianapolis Field Office. President and Chief Executive Officer Stephen D. Penny Jr. reported sexual assault allegations against Lawrence Gerard Nassar, then the USA Gymnastics National Medical Coordinator and a Michigan State University physician. Penny described graphic accounts from three gymnasts. All three had been minors at the time of the alleged assaults. He said they were available for interview. He handed over a thumb drive of material Nassar had given USA Gymnastics.
The U.S. Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General opened an investigation into how the FBI handled those allegations. Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz released the report on 14 July 2021 as Report 21 093.
The OIG found that senior officials in the Indianapolis Field Office failed to respond with the utmost seriousness and urgency the allegations deserved and required. The office made numerous and fundamental errors. It violated multiple FBI policies. It failed to notify the FBI Lansing Resident Agency or state or local authorities. It failed to take other steps to mitigate the ongoing threat Nassar posed.
◆Part 2: The Delay
The Indianapolis Field Office took no investigative step until 2 September 2015, five weeks after the meeting. Agents then interviewed one of the three athletes by telephone. They never interviewed the other two gymnasts they had been told were available.
The office did not formally document the July meeting. It did not formally open an assessment or investigation. The only 2015 Indianapolis documentation the OIG later located consisted of five pages of handwritten notes from the July meeting, three pages of notes from the September interview, a handful of emails with Penny, and about 45 emails and text messages among agents and prosecutors.
In September 2015 prosecutors and agents concluded there was no venue in Indianapolis. They had serious questions whether the allegations supported federal jurisdiction. An Assistant U.S. Attorney advised Indianapolis on 2 September to transfer the matter to the FBI Lansing Resident Agency, where Michigan State University sits and where Nassar treated patients. On 4 September Special Agent in Charge W. Jay Abbott emailed Penny that pertinent interviews had been completed and the results provided to the FBI and the U.S. Attorney Office in Michigan for appropriate action. The OIG found that information was not provided. The transfer did not happen.
◆Part 3: The Gap
Nassar retired from USA Gymnastics in September 2015. He kept treating patients at Michigan State University, Twistars USA Gymnastics Club, and Holt High School.
For more than eight months after the September 2015 interview the FBI conducted no investigative activity on the matter. In May 2016 USA Gymnastics, frustrated by the silence, took the same allegations to the FBI Los Angeles Field Office. Los Angeles opened a federal sexual tourism investigation and interviewed several alleged victims. Like Indianapolis, Los Angeles did not notify state or local authorities and did not tell the Lansing Resident Agency.
In August 2016 the Michigan State University Police Department received a separate complaint from a gymnast who said Nassar had sexually assaulted her when she was 16. On 12 September 2016 the Indianapolis Star published allegations by former gymnasts. The university police then received similar complaints from dozens of additional young females. On 20 September 2016 they executed a search warrant at Nassar residence and found child pornography.
The FBI Lansing Resident Agency first learned of the Nassar allegations from that local investigation. It opened its own case on 5 October 2016. Neither Indianapolis nor Los Angeles had informed Lansing before then. Lansing ultimately found over 30000 images of child pornography on devices seized in the search.
According to civil court documents cited by the OIG, approximately 70 or more young athletes were allegedly sexually abused by Nassar under the guise of medical treatment between July 2015, when USA Gymnastics first reported him to Indianapolis, and September 2016.
◆Part 4: The Convictions
Nassar was arrested and charged by the Michigan Attorney General in November 2016 with multiple counts of criminal sexual conduct. In December 2016 the FBI arrested him on federal possession of child pornography charges tied to the seized images. He was not charged with child sexual tourism, the federal offense Indianapolis had considered and Los Angeles had investigated.
In July 2017 he pleaded guilty to Receipt and Attempted Receipt of Child Pornography, Possession of Child Pornography, and Destruction and Concealment of Records and Tangible Objects. In December 2017 he was sentenced to 60 years in federal prison.
In November 2017 he pleaded guilty in Michigan state court to seven counts of First Degree Criminal Sexual Conduct. An addendum to the plea agreement indicated 115 alleged victims. In January 2018 he was sentenced to 40 to 175 years in Michigan state prison. In February 2018, after pleading guilty to three further counts of criminal sexual conduct, he received an additional 40 to 125 years.
The OIG press release recorded that the investigations determined Nassar had engaged in sexual assaults of over 100 victims and possessed thousands of images of child pornography, and that the sentences totaled incarceration for over 100 years.
◆Part 5: The False Record
When reporters questioned the FBI in 2017 and 2018 about the gap between the July 2015 report and the September 2016 search, Indianapolis officials did not take responsibility. The OIG found they provided incomplete and inaccurate information to make it appear they had been diligent.
In February 2017, 17 months after the September 2015 interview, the Indianapolis Supervisory Special Agent drafted an FD 302 interview summary. The OIG concluded that summary contained materially false statements and omitted material information. The gymnast later told the OIG she had not made statements attributed to her. Those statements were not in the agent notes. The co interviewer did not recall them. They conflicted with what she told Los Angeles in 2016 and USA Gymnastics in 2015.
The same agent told colleagues and the OIG that he had created an FD 71 complaint form in 2015 to transfer the case to Lansing. The OIG found no evidence such a form ever reached Lansing. Searches of the FBI case management system did not locate it.
Abbott falsely asserted in two OIG interviews that he had communicated with the Detroit and Los Angeles Special Agents in Charge about the allegations in 2015 and sent electronic communications to both offices. The OIG found no evidence to support those claims. After retiring, Abbott told a reporter there was no delay by the FBI on this matter and that Indianapolis had provided a detailed report to Detroit and Los Angeles. The OIG found those claims inaccurate.
The Department of Justice declined prosecution of Abbott and the Indianapolis Supervisory Special Agent in September 2020. On 14 May 2021 the Department notified the OIG it was not opening a new matter on whether the Supervisory Special Agent made false statements in his compelled OIG interviews.
◆Part 6: The Job
In the autumn of 2015, while the Nassar matter was still pending at the FBI, Abbott met Penny at a bar. Penny discussed a potential job for Abbott as U.S. Olympic Committee Chief Security Officer. Abbott later communicated with Penny about both that job and the Nassar investigation. He took part in FBI discussions about public statements on USA Gymnastics while knowing Penny appeared willing to put in a good word for him.
Abbott applied for the U.S. Olympic Committee position in February 2017. He was not selected. In two OIG interviews he denied that he had applied and said applying would have presented a conflict of interest. The OIG found evidence confirming the application. It concluded Abbott violated the FBI conflicts of interest policy, exercised extremely poor judgment under federal ethics rules by failing to consult an ethics official, and made false statements about the job discussion and the application.
◆Part 7: The Record
The OIG interviewed more than 60 witnesses and reviewed thousands of documents. It made four recommendations to the FBI. The FBI agreed with them.
The documents show when the allegations reached the FBI. They show how little Indianapolis did. They show the transfer that was promised and not made. They show months in which Nassar kept treating patients. They show false statements after the failures came under scrutiny. They show a Special Agent in Charge discussing a job with the man who had brought him the case.
No federal official from the Indianapolis Field Office was prosecuted for the handling failures or the false statements the OIG found.
U.S. Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General. Investigation and Review of the Federal Bureau of Investigation Handling of Allegations of Sexual Abuse by Former USA Gymnastics Physician Lawrence Gerard Nassar. Report 21 093. July 2021. DOJ OIG Press Release. 14 July 2021.