Dr. Robert E. Anderson
The University of Michigan failed to take action after it knew of Dr. Robert Anderson's sexual assaults on athletes and students, begining in the 1970s, which caused many years of pain and trauma, a new report concludes.
Anderson worked at U-M from 1968-2003. He died in 2008, leaving a mountain of accusations of sexual assault, misconduct and lawsuits.
The Detroit Free Press reports:
"A senior University administrator was told about Dr. Anderson’s misconduct several times between 1978 or 1979 and 1981 but did not take appropriate action," the law firm WilmerHale wrote in an investigative report commissioned by the university. "Concerning information was also shared with other University personnel. Although the information these individuals received varied in directness and specificity, Dr. Anderson’s misconduct may have been detected earlier and brought to an end if they had considered, understood, investigated, or elevated what they heard."
WilmerHale collected information from 800 people, with 300 taking part in interviews.
"The trauma that Dr. Anderson’s misconduct caused persists to this day. The experiences that many of Dr. Anderson’s patients relayed to us were widely consistent, containing similar details and key elements," the firm's report said. "We have no doubt based on the evidence available to us, including the first-hand accounts of his patients, that Dr. Anderson engaged in a pervasive, decades-long, destructive pattern of sexual misconduct.
