Nessel renews plea to MSU board to release 6,000 pages of Nassar records

More than six years after the Larry Nassar sexual assault scandal broke at Michigan State University, Attorney General Dana Nessel on Friday renewed a request to the university's board of trustees to release the remaining 6,000 documents related to MSU's handling of complaints against the former sports medicine doctor.

The documents have been withheld by the board for nearly five years under attorney-client privilege — a decision upheld by a Michigan circuit court judge. But Nessel suggested Friday that new members and new leadership on the board might have a change of heart. She asked the records be provided by April 28.

"Since 2018 the department has repeatedly called upon the board of trustees to release approximately 6,000 documents that were previously withheld under a claim of privilege," Nessel wrote in the letter. "We are again asking the MSU Board of Trustees to vote to release the remaining documents our office requested and to fulfill its stated pledge to continue cooperating with the investigation through its conclusion."

She asked the university for records of any internal investigations, records for former employees who worked with Nassar, and all emails related to Nassar exchanged by various MSU leaders, trustees, and employees.

Nessel also requested a pledge to cooperate with the department through the conclusion of the investigation, including responding within three days to new questions and correspondence that may come up after viewing of the documents.

"In addition, no member of the board, the university administration nor any of its employees, past or present, will be in contact through any form of communication with any individual perceived to be a Nassar victim," Nessel wrote.

The MSU board is next scheduled to meet next Friday.

The board rejected the requests for Nassar documents from Nessel and former Attorney General Bill Schuette's special prosecutor under former chairs Bill Breslin and Dianne Byrum.

But the board this year made history by electing Trustee Rema Vassar as the new chair — the first Black woman to lead the board and among the few trustees who have lived outside Lansing elected to serve in recent memory. Vassar, a Wayne State University education leadership and policy professor who lives in Detroit, prevailed over Trustee Renee Knake Jefferson in a 5-3 vote.

An Ingham County circuit judge maintained in 2019 that the university was within its legal rights to protect the documents under attorney-client privilege. But others have argued the university should waive its privilege and release the documents to increase transparency around the scandal.

Nessel officially closed the MSU investigation in March 2021 after the board refused for more than three years to release the documents.

Nassar, the former MSU and USA Gymnastics doctor, is serving an effective life sentence in prison after being charged with 10 counts of sexual assault in Ingham and Eaton counties for assaulting young women and girls under the guise of medical care over more than two decades, as well as federal child porn charges.

After his sentencing, MSU reached an unprecedented $500 million settlement with more than 500 reported victims.

eleblanc@detroitnews.com