Lately, it seems, John C. Manly is everywhere.
A California lawyer specializing in sexual-assault cases, Manly’s services are in great demand in higher-education circles. He represents the nearly 200 women who say they were abused by Larry Nassar, the Michigan State University sports doctor effectively sentenced to life in prison for sexually assaulting women under the guise of medical treatment. Manly has about an equal number of clients who say that George Tyndall, a former University of Southern California gynecologist, touched them inappropriately or made degrading comments when they were in his care.
At both Michigan State and Southern California, Manly argues, top-level administrators failed to report credible accusations of sexual misconduct or later lied about what they knew. Those allegations are at the heart of a criminal case against Lou Anna K. Simon, Michigan State’s former president, and are central to civil lawsuits that have been filed against USC. Both cases have national implications, as they set precedent for the liability of colleges and individuals in abuse cases.
Both Simon and Tyndall have denied wrongdoing. USC, which allowed Tyndall to quietly retire in 2017, now acknowledges that years of complaints against the doctor might have justified his termination, and has agreed in principle to a $215-million class-action settlement with his accusers.
The only reason the Michigan State case settled for half a billion dollars is because John Engler handled it so poorly.
Manly describes the USC settlement, in which some of his clients will receive as little as $2,500, as a “horrific deal.” His clients, he says, will opt out of the class action to fight for bigger concessions, including a full accounting of who knew what and when. Manly wages war in both the court of law and the court of public opinion. He regularly skewers college leaders on Twitter for their handling of sexual-abuse cases, and his contempt for John M. Engler, the former interim president of Michigan State, is palpable. (Engler, who was forced out of the presidency for his treatment of survivors, once accused Manly of giving a “kickback” to a Nassar victim to stir up more business.)
Manly spoke recently with The Chronicle about his sexual-assault cases, his feuds with college leaders, and the criticism that he’s making a lot of money off abuse victims.
How did you come to specialize in these types of cases? Am I right that the first was a case of abuse by a priest?
The first case in ’97 was kind of a fluke. I believed the client, and I originally offered to settle the case for $150,000. At the time, I was Catholic, and I was convinced that the bishop was going to do the right thing. And essentially, they told us to go eff ourselves. So we filed the case, and in July of 2001 they settled it for $5.2 million.
Then my phone began to ring off the hook because we went right into the Boston scandal. And since then I’ve literally represented thousands of victims.
Did you leave the Roman Catholic church over the sex-abuse scandal?
Oh yes.
You certainly don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to, but have you had any personal experience with abuse?
I’ve disclosed that, yes. But I don’t want to get into it.
Part of your job requires asking survivors to describe their abuse, and I would imagine that can be incredibly difficult to do without retraumatizing people. What have you learned about how to do that in a way that gets the facts you need without doing more damage?
The first thing you need to say to any survivor is “This is not your fault.”
You need to be very confident that your client is under care and that the client is capable [of describing his or her abuse].
Second, make sure you don’t get what’s called “peritrauma.” Hearing about the sodomy of a 7-year-old boy by a priest dozens of times, and the physical details of that — the blood, the bodily fluids, the horror associated with that — you have to detach yourself. And that’s something you need help from a therapist with, in my opinion as the lawyer.
You have said that both Michigan State and USC mishandled abuse allegations. Is there something about these types of institutions that helps to explain why that might have happened?
They’re selling perfection, and in a way they’re selling purity. I think they believe their own B.S. They have this brand, and the administration believes any scandal damages the brand. So they stupidly make the decision to conceal it. The Catholic hierarchy has the same approach.
Graham Spanier, Penn State ’s ex-president, is facing jail time in connection with the Jerry Sandusky abuse case. Simon, of Michigan State, faces serious criminal charges. Are we going to see a lot of college leaders go to jail in cases like these?
Gosh, I hope not. What I want is students to be protected. I don’t have some agenda to put college presidents in jail.
Critics would say you have an agenda to get rich off these cases. That seemed to be John Engler’s beef with you at Michigan State.
Whether I got a fee on it or not, you allowed your doctor for 30 years to digitally rape the living hell out of your student body. And then you get mad at the lawyer who raises his hand and says, “What you’re doing is wrong.”
Without lawyers, and without civil litigation, this would never have come to light. And the victims would never have been able to accomplish what they have accomplished. So I make no apologies for that. None.
We’re talking about hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements. Is it fair to say you’ll be very wealthy at the end of this?
I was very wealthy before this; I didn’t need this case. I have been very successful, and that’s because I’ve had amazing clients. I don’t need the money. I don’t care except to the extent that my clients get their justice and get their day in court. Money is the reason this is changing.
Are you taking about 40 percent of these settlements?
Standard fees are between a third and 40 percent, and my fees weren’t anywhere near 40 percent in these cases. My fees are between me and my clients, so I’m not going to get into specifics.
The only reason the Michigan State case settled for half a billion dollars is because John Engler handled it so poorly. He made it worse and worse, because he attacked the victims. And it became a public-relations disaster.
If he wants to blame me, OK. I’ll take credit for it. I kicked your butt.
That kind of talk reminds me of how you communicate on Twitter, where you’re a real bomb thrower. Are you just venting your frustrations, or is there some broader strategic goal?
I have a responsibility as a lawyer to respond to what the defendants are putting out. My client’s voice is going to be heard, and the wonderful thing about social media is, it allows me to do that. And that’s why I do it. I tell the truth, from my perspective.
But a lot of it seems pretty personal to me. “Vile” is a word you use a lot to describe people.
Allowing somebody to abuse children sexually, it’s vile. What other word is there? Can you think of a better word for it? I can’t.
You’ve been Tweeting lately about Finding Neverland, the documentary in which two men accuse Michael Jackson of having molested them as children. I don’t want to overstate this, but is there a cultural trauma that happens when an iconic figure like Jackson is cast in such a monstrous light?
Perpetrators are almost always nice people, and there is a part of them that we love. A truly great perpetrator’s victims love him or her. That’s how the perpetrator grooms and accesses the survivor.
All of us who grew up in the ’70s and ’80s, we loved Michael Jackson. When that abuse is exposed, it forces us to evaluate our own perceptions of reality. People feel wrecked by it.
Can you still listen to his music?
I haven’t listened to his music for years. I’ve known for years what he was.
This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity. Michigan State declined to comment on Manly’s assertions about Engler’s handling of the case driving up the settlement.
Jack Stripling covers college leadership, particularly presidents and governing boards. Follow him on Twitter @jackstripling, or email him at jack.stripling@chronicle.com.
