OSU SEEKS TO DENY JUSTICE FOR SEXUAL ABUSE VICTIMS

The move comes even though the University’s “independent investigation” into the sexual abuse conduct by Dr. Richard Strauss has not been completed.

While Ohio State officials are defending the exorbitant $30 million in salaries paid to their coaches, they are also quickly moving to deny legal justice for hundreds of sexual abuse victims. Rather than taking the road paved by Michigan State when it worked out a settlement with hundreds of Larry Nassar sex abuse victims, the Ohio State University is moving in the opposite direction, taking steps to avoid accountability and responsibility for its failures that allowed Dr. Richard Strauss to molest hundreds, if not thousands, of OSU students and student-athletes.

Ohio State University hired Dr. Strauss as an attending physician and assistant professor in 1978. By 1981, Ohio State gave Dr. Strauss the authority to serve as team physician for 14 different team sports at the University. Despite the number of male athletes who immediately began talking about Dr. Strauss’ sexual misconduct, the Ohio State University did nothing to protect its student-athletes. In fact, the dean of Ohio State’s medical college in 1984, Manuel Tzagournis, characterized Strauss as an “outstanding individual in every sense.”

For nearly two decades, athletes whispered and talked while coaches and at least two athletic directors knew about the complaints against Dr. Strauss. Many of these former student-athletes have spoken to our Ohio State lawsuit team. They claim that the abuse was common knowledge and that Strauss was known to shower numerous times a day with the athletes. He was also known to walk around nude in the locker room, staring at the genitals of the young men.

At the beginning of the athletic season for each of the 14 teams under Dr. Strauss’ control, all athletes were required to have a physical examination. The sexually abused men all said that Dr. Strauss used these exams as an opportunity to hold, fondle, and play with genitalia. Any injury or illness would require his patients to “drop their shorts” and submit to unnecessary hernia checks, anal exams, and/or testicular fondling. He continued his pattern of sexual misconduct, without reprimand, until June 30, 1998, when he retired from the University with Emeritus status.

TENURE FOR DR. STRAUSS

During his tenure with Ohio State University, Strauss also became a part-time physician in mid-1994 with Ohio State’s Student Health Services, where he expanded his sexual predation of OSU’s male students beyond the locker rooms.  He left his post at Student Health Services in August 1996 after complaints, at which point he established his own private “men’s only” medical practice in Columbus, Ohio, specializing in treatments for sexually transmitted diseases and “genital/urinary” issues. The University allowed Dr. Strauss to recruit unsuspecting students for his medical clinic in the school newspaper, where he offered a student discount and saw student-athletes on a walk-in basis.

Ohio State quietly got rid of Dr. Strauss in mid-1998. His personnel file includes tenure-related letters from colleagues who praised him as a well-known author of articles in his field as well as a highly-respected educator although he did not retire as an Ohio State professor emeritus until mid-1998. Before retiring with tenure, it appears that OSU held a hearing on a complaint by a former OSU student. The results of that hearing are unknown, but Dr. Strauss retired with full tenure and Emeritus status shortly after that. He eventually moved to California, where he committed suicide in 2005. 

In April 2018, nearly forty years after the first victim of Dr. Strauss complained, the Ohio State University announced that it was investigating accusations that Strauss sexually abused athletes when he was the team doctor. In September 2018, with its investigation still incomplete, the University filed legal papers asking the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio to dismiss litigation by the victims and deny them their right to justice, all based on a waivable technicality of law.