Several motions have been filed to add new plaintiffs to Denhollander et al v. Michigan State University et al, a lawsuit against former MSU employee Larry Nassar.
Nassar is accused of sexually abusing patients in his role as a doctor, including MSU student-athletes and members of the U.S. Women's Olympic Gymnastics Team.
The potential plaintiffs include a high school soccer player, a gymnast from Olympia Gymnastics Academy in Shelby Township and gymnasts from Geddert's Twistars-USA, a gymnastics club that has been named a defendant in the lawsuit.
Nassar worked with Twistars gymnasts from 1996 to 2016 and multiple assaults allegedly took place on the premises. A parent allegedly complained about Nassar’s conduct to Twistars owner John Geddert in 1998 though the allegations were never addressed, according to court documents.
A motion filed on Feb. 22 criticized MSU for failing to notify patients Nassar treated at the MSU Sports Medicine Clinic when he was charged with criminal sexual conduct.
"MSU failed or refused to notify (Nassar's patients), even though it was reasonably foreseeable that the allegations against Nassar would become public and Plaintiff and others like her would learn that the treatment they received was not treatment, but, instead, a sexual assault," the motion said.
MSU was also recently criticized for failing to notify former Nassar patients in a letter written by MSU alumna Catherine Hannum. Hannum, a former member of the MSU rowing team, learned about the charges against Nassar through a friend.
“It’s the school’s responsibility to have reached out to us and to ask us if we could provide information, if we were comfortable and did we need anything and could they provide us support, and nobody has done that," Hannum said.
If all current motions are granted, the lawsuit will have 56 plaintiffs.
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