These professors' harassment inspired a warning years ago

Before starting as interim president of Michigan State University, John Engler wanted a favor.

Senior administrators were each instructed to provide him with lists of quiet issues that could bubble up into another embarrassing, public “crisis.” 

At the time, in early 2018, the school was shaken by revelations of serial sexual abuse by its sports doctor, Larry Nassar. The wide-ranging scandal had just toppled the university's longtime president. Engler, a former Michigan governor, was charged with stepping in to clean up the mess.

After some discussions with staff, MSU’s top lawyer wrote an email telling what Engler should prepare for. The final item: “Several ongoing sexual harassment investigations involving prominent or nationally known faculty members.”

The email then appears to list three names. 

One was William Strampel, the dean overseeing Nassar who would soon face criminal charges stemming from years of alleged sexual harassment against students.

Who were the other two professors under investigation? That remains a mystery to this day.

MSU has fought to ensure that redactions stay on their names, obfuscating not just who they were — but what they do now. 

They could still be teaching at MSU. Or, they could have moved to another university despite the investigations, a phenomenon in higher education deemed “pass-the-harasser.”

While their identities are concealed, other records obtained by The State News do shed some light on the allegations investigated, most of which were eventually deemed true by the university: Quid-pro-quo propositions of sex for professional favors, affairs in university buildings and retaliation against those who spoke up about issues.

Disputes over records

The email to Engler was among thousands of long-secret MSU documents sought by the state attorney general, who wanted to investigate how the institution may have failed to protect victims from Nassar’s abuse.

The records were a small sect of a larger universe of records sought by investigators, only including those which a judge ruled were subject to attorney-client privilege.

Last year, following years of advocacy and a renewed plea from investigators, MSU’s board voted to waive privilege over the records and turn them over to investigators. After closing the investigation without any new charges, the attorney general made the documents available to the media, including the redacted Engler email.

After reviewing the documents, The State News requested an unredacted copy from MSU, but the university’s FOIA office declined to provide one, saying the content was privileged. The State News filed an appeal with the university challenging the decision, arguing that privilege was wrongly asserted and inconsistently applied.

In response, President Kevin Guskiewicz authored a letter defending the redactions, arguing that the board’s waiver of privilege said explicitly that it does not apply to “communications concerning matters unrelated to Nassar.”

“Unlike the Strampel matter, other ongoing sexual harassment investigations had nothing to do with Nassar,” he wrote.

After a series of records requests, MSU did agree to provide The State News with the underlying case files in the referenced investigations, though the university did redact all information in them that could identify the involved professors. MSU charged $199 to make those redactions and took four months to produce the records.

‘What are you going to give me?’

One case began in 2011, when someone emailed a professor seeking help on a project. It’s unclear if the person is a student or employee.

The professor arranged a meeting, asking that they meet on a Friday evening after everyone else in the office had gone home, according to MSU’s investigative report.

After briefly discussing the project and what help was needed, the professor asked, “What are you going to give me?”

The person was confused, and said they would be thankful for the help and that the professor will get “the satisfaction of doing your job.”

The professor didn’t like that response, and became agitated, according to the report.

“You can’t expect me to do something for nothing,” the professor said, before adding: “Quid pro quo.”

The person left the meeting upset, and soon received an email saying the professor would not be helping with the project. It was the last time the two communicated.

To the person seeking help, the professor’s comments “sounded like a sexual ask.” They told some friends what happened, and they had conflicting interpretations, according to their eventual interviews with investigators.

One person said it immediately sounded “icky and creepy” to them, and that the use of the phrase “quid pro quo” made it clear that a sexual proposition was being posited. Another person disagreed, saying it didn’t seem like “anything specifically sexual,” just “something an asshole would say.”

The person who sought help initially decided not to report what happened and kept it a secret for years, according to their interview with investigators. They eventually came forward in 2018, saying they were inspired by the #MeToo movement and the broader understanding of sexual harassment it brought.

After interviewing witnesses and the professor, then analyzing the statements against MSU’s sexual harassment policies, a university investigator found that the professor had sexually harassed the person who sought help with the “quid pro quo” comments.

‘Would you consider having an affair with me?’

The case file also reveals other investigations into the same professor, who seemed to repeatedly — and sometimes successfully — make blunt requests for affairs at work events.

One such incident occurred at the end of a long conversation at a pub. The professor was there with a large group as part of “a tradition for all (redacted) to go bar hopping,” according to the investigative report. In the past, the professor did not attend such events, but did this time.

The professor spent most of the night talking to one person. It’s unclear if they are a student or colleague, though the professor did tell investigators that they first noticed the person’s “name in the attendance sheet.”

“Would you consider having an affair with me,” the professor said, according to the report. The person declined to answer the question and went home.

The person was “shaken” by the question, and the cold treatment from the professor in subsequent weeks. They discussed the saga with friends, but decided not to say anything.

Again, inspired by the #MeToo movement, the person eventually reported the incident to MSU in 2018.

MSU investigators also briefly examined another similar allegation, but closed the case because they “did not have the jurisdiction to investigate,” according to the case file. An email obtained by investigators also alleged that the professor propositioned someone else about an affair, and that person did “go ahead with it.” Someone had investigated that case and found a violation of a “sexual harassment policy,” though redactions obscure who exactly conducted that probe.

Another case investigated by MSU involved the professor coming into an office, closing the door and asking the person inside if they “would like to pursue a relationship.”

The person was surprised by the questions, and “immediately worried about what would happen if (they) refused.” They tried not to answer either way. 

The professor “took ‘maybe’ as a ‘yes’ and made a physical advance at that very moment,” kissing the person, the report says.

What started in that office became an extended affair, with the professor and the person regularly becoming intimate in university offices (the professor insisted to investigators that it was only kissing, not sex).

To the professor, the affair was “the (redacted) relationship I’ve ever been in,” according to the case file. For the other person, their views on the saga evolved over time.

They “knew what sexual harassment was ‘in theory’ but, at the time, thought ‘this was just a relationship that had gone bad’.” Years later, with an increased understanding of the issues at hand, the person began to consider the relationship differently. Given the power dynamics, they “questioned whether the relationship was truly consensual,” according to a private essay they wrote, which was obtained by university investigators.

‘Fears of possible retaliation’

Another case against one of the professors centered around allegations of sexual harassment raised in 2016. 

Investigators interviewed five people, but none of them were willing to be named as claimants in the case, “as all were concerned about having their identities shared with (the professor) because of their fears of possible retaliation.” Thus, the case was closed.

Even so, those fears appear to have come true a year later, when MSU found that one of the professors retaliated against someone interviewed in a previous investigation.

The person was an anonymous witness, but the professor was able to piece together their identity from the content of their statements. The professor then retaliated against them by refusing to discuss or give feedback on a work project, according to MSU’s investigation.

All of that occurred before the 2018 email to Engler about the professors, but it isn’t the end of their run-ins with MSU’s investigators.

Just months after the Engler email, MSU received another report of sexual harassment by one of the professors, which said that people “were receiving unwanted text messages and emails from” the professor. (The nature of the communications is redacted.) MSU closed that case because the alleged victims did not want to participate in a formal investigation, according to the case file.

In 2019, another case was brought against one of the professors. Someone told MSU that the professor had been sexually harassing someone and they claimed to have witnessed it and other inappropriate behavior.

Their allegations are heavily redacted, but what can be seen is broad and not necessarily sexual. They described the professor as “aggressive” and “creepy,” noting that “meeting the (redacted) who have worked with (redacted) has been like watching domestic violence victims.”

MSU chose not to investigate that case because the allegations didn’t meet the standard for inquiry under university policies.