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Primum non nocere (First, do no harm)
-- The Hippocratic Oath

Shock and disgust are immediate reactions to news that Michigan State's past medical dean, already reviled as a serial molester's enabler, is accused of loading his office computer with sexually explicit images. "A video of Dr. Larry Nassar performing 'treatment' on a young female patient" is part of Dr. William Strampel's collection, a state police detective says.

The initial revulsion leads to a behavior-connecting path that links the third floor of East Fee Hall at MSU's College of Osteopathic Medicine to Hollywood suites, executive offices and other places where men in power preyed on women starting careers.

Settings vary, but the pattern is similar.

 
Dr. William Strampel and Harvey Weinstein

Authority, arrogance, privilege and a sense of unaccountability unite MSU's 70-year-old disgraced osteopath with a 66-year-old dethroned studio head, Harvey Weinstein. That film producer's downfall five months ago awakened a #MeToo and #TimesUp maelstrom that has swallowed male careers.

Weinstein's hush-money payoffs to sexual harassment victims, revealed in October by The New York Times, dated back to the 1990s. He lost the Miramax studio he and his brother started, but faces no criminal charges.

Harassment and groping accusations against Strampel are more recent -- 2011-17 -- and landed him in a county jail Monday night and in East Lansing District Court for arraignment on four counts Tuesday afternoon. (One charge, willful neglect of duty, relates to the Nassar case.)

What makes their side-by-side photos fitting is the because-I-can mindset behind revelations of each man's reported actions. Both are accused of misusing leadership roles for unwelcome sexual access to women decades younger.

Weinstein's use of hotel room "meetings" and career-controlling leverage fit a Hollywood cliché -- the "casting couch." 

Now Strampel is formally accused of using his 15-year medical school deanship for clinical couch privileges.

Both senior executives allegedly exploited professional gate-opening positions, as did similarly accused editors at a few national magazines.

♦ Main coverage: MSU's Disgraced Ex-Medical Dean, William Strampel, Accused of Sex Crime

A seven-page Michigan State Police court affidavit describes the East Lansing case starkly:

As Dean of the College, Strampel used his office to harass, discriminate, demean, sexually proposition and sexually assault female students in violation of his duty as a public officer [at a state university].

Identical words could fit a case against Weinstein, based on published accounts, although he had no public duty obligation.


MSU's College of Osteopathic Medicine website.

A sense of can't-touch-me arrogance emerges from a look at the timeline behind one of Tuesday's disclosures about MSU's former administrator. Consider this timeline and think about what Strampel left on his university computer throughout:

  • 2014: MSU Police begin investigating a sexual abuse complaint against Nassar.
  • Sept. 20, 2016: MSU fires Nassar.
  • Feb. 22, 2017: Nassar charged with 22 felony counts of criminal sexual conduct.
  • December 2017: Strampel resigns as dean
  • Feb 2, 2018: State investigators with a search warrant take Strampel's computer.  
  • March 27, 2018: Authorities say they found "approximately 50 photos of bare vaginas, nude and semi-nude women, sex toys and pornography. Many of these photos appear to be 'selfies' of female MSU students . . . Also uncovered on Strampel's work computer were pornographic videos."

Think about it: A lavishly paid ($412,000) medical school dean, in office since 2002, left dozens of explicit images on his work computer for 16 months after Larry Nassar's dismissal as a state investigation continued. 

"Strampel's receipt and possession of this graphic material was in violation of the Acceptable Use Policy" set by his employer, notes the court affidavit submitted Tuesday by First Detective Lt. Ryan Pennell of the Michigan State Police. It also accuses the ex-dean of abusing "the authority of his public office, through threats and manipulation, to solicit, receive and possess pornographic images of women who appear to be MSU students."

He evidently felt beyond reach, above suspicion, out of harm's way. So did the co-founder of Miramax, until he wasn't.