What We Know About the Sexual-Abuse Investigation of a Former Ohio State Doctor

An NBC News investigation, published on Tuesday, provides more details about sexual-abuse allegations against Richard Strauss, a now-deceased team physician who worked for Ohio State University from the 1970s to the 1990s.

The NBC report, which focuses mainly on allegations that Rep. Jim Jordan, an Ohio Republican, knew of the abuse during his time as an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State, contains specific accusations by former wrestlers and includes more information about Ohio State’s investigation into Strauss’s conduct, which has not yet yielded publicly available findings on Strauss’s conduct. Jordan has denied any knowledge of abuse.

In April, Ohio State announced an investigation into allegations against Strauss, who died by suicide in 2005. Strauss served as the wrestling-team physician and also treated athletes in other sports and worked in Student Health Services, according to the university. The investigation is being conducted by the law firm Perkins Coie.

Strauss started at Ohio State as an attending physician in September 1978 and served as a team doctor in the athletics department from 1981 to 1995, the university told NBC. His part-time work in student health lasted from 1994 to 1996.

Here’s what we know about Strauss, the allegations, and the investigation:

Allegations involve showering and inappropriate touching.

Ohio State opened its investigation into Strauss’s conduct after Mike DiSabato, a former wrestler, approached the university with allegations of sexual abuse, NBC reported. Since then, former athletes in 14 varsity sports, as well as former patients from the university’s Student Health Services, have come forward with similar allegations, Ohio State confirmed to NBC. Three former wrestlers told NBC that Strauss would regularly shower with athletes and would inappropriately touch them during appointments. The athletes described Strauss’s abuse as an open secret in the locker room.

“Everybody used to snicker about how you go into his office for a sore shoulder, and he tells you to take your pants down,” a former wrestler told NBC.

In a video made by DiSabato and sent to Ohio State in June, a former head wrestling coach, Russ Hellickson, said he had told administrators about Strauss’s behavior and had personally warned Strauss to stay away from the athletes, NBC reported.

There are also allegations of abuse related to Strauss’s private and off-campus medical office, in Columbus, the Associated Press reported, and investigators are looking into whether Strauss examined high-school athletes as well, the university said.

Strauss may have worked at other colleges.

Strauss may have worked at up to five other institutions before moving to Ohio State’s Columbus campus, according to his résumé. He was employed in some capacity at Harvard University, Rutgers University, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Washington, and the University of Hawaii, according to the document. However, a spokesman for Rutgers told the AP that the university had found no record of Strauss’s employment there.

The universities have remained largely tight-lipped about Strauss’s time at their institutions. The University of Hawaii told the AP that it had found no record of complaints against Strauss but that it was still looking.

Strauss’s résumé lists him as a doctor for “university diving activities” at Washington and Hawaii, but the institutions said they couldn’t provide more details about his work, according to the AP. A Harvard spokeswoman responded similarly, and Penn did not respond to an inquiry from the AP.

The investigation’s scope is wide.

It’s unclear just how many students Strauss may have abused in his career and at which institutions. In an email to Kathleen M. Trafford of Porter Wright Morris & Arthur, the Columbus-based law firm representing Ohio State, DiSabato said he estimated that Strauss could have abused or assaulted more than 1,500 athletes at Ohio State, NBC reported.

The university said Perkins Coie had interviewed more than 150 former students and witnesses, and had reached out to students and athletes who may have been in contact with Strauss during his time at Ohio State. The university has also reached out “to the Columbus Division of Police and the Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office for any potential criminal investigation,” it told NBC.

Clarification (7/3/2018, 6:46 p.m.): This article has been updated to clarify a sentence about Ohio State’s investigation of Richard Strauss. The inquiry has not yet produced public findings about his conduct. But it has not been kept under wraps.