Former MSU president Lou Anna Simon charged with two felonies for lying about Nassar investigation

Former MSU President Lou Anna Simon has been charged with lying to police, making her the third person charged by the Michigan Attorney General’s Office in its investigation of the university related to Larry Nassar.

Simon was charged today in Eaton County District Court with two felony counts and two misdemeanor counts. She faces up to four years in prison if convicted.

Simon told State Police investigators that she was aware that in 2014 an MSU sports medicine doctor was the subject of a Title IX investigation. The AG’s Office says in the court documents that Simon knew that Nassar was the subject of that 2014 investigation.

Simon stepped down as president of MSU on Jan. 24, hours after Nassar was sentenced in Ingham County Circuit Court to 40 to 175 years in prison for sexual abuse.

MSU interim President John Engler said in a statement that the university is “aware of the charges brought today against former President Simon” and that Simon is taking  “an immediate leave of absence, without pay, to focus on her legal situation.” . . .

During testimony in front of a U.S. Senate subcommittee in June of this year, Simon repeated claims that no one at MSU knew of Nassar’s criminal behavior before 2016.

“Had I known that Nassar was sexually abusing young women, I would have taken immediate action to prevent him from preying on additional victims, including terminating his employment and reporting him to the police,” she told members of the subcommittee.

The utterly disgraceful conduct of Michigan State’s Board of Trustees during this horror show should never be forgotten.

Some further background facts here.

Simon’s criminal adventures — sorry, alleged criminal adventures — may end up costing her several million dollars, since she exited the president’s office with a golden parachute to cushion her fall from grace:

“In the 200+ presidential contracts we’ve reviewed, this is the only contract that provides for the president to receive 100% of their last presidential base salary for the first year that they return to the faculty,” James Finkelstein, a professor emeritus at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University and the leading researcher of presidential pay, told the Free Press in an e-mail.

He reviewed Simon’s contract at the Free Press’s request.

“This means that Dr. Simon will be paid at least $750,000 for her first year returning to the faculty from her research leave.  After that, she will be paid 75% of that base salary, or at least $562,500 per year.  Dr. Simon’s field is higher education. She received her PhD in education from MSU in 1974.

“So based on this contract, it would appear that Dr. Simon will be paid more than twice the amount of the most highly paid faculty member in the College of Education. In addition, she will be paid more than the most highly paid faculty member in the entire university, C. Konrad Gelbke who makes $433,441. He is one of the world’s leading physicists.”

The contract also spells out a number of lifetime perks Simon and her husband will receive.

• Parking passes for on-campus parking

• Two free tickets to home football games for the Spartan Club suites

• Two free tickets to women’s basketball games

• The option to buy up to four men’s basketball tickets in the same location she currently has seats

• Reduced-price tickets for bowl games and post-season play for football, men’s and women’s basketball and ice hockey

• Parking pass for all home sporting and cultural events

Hopefully there will be many more prosecutions of the scum who enabled Nassar to sexually assault hundreds of victims over many, many years.