The National Collegiate Athletic Association is the subject of a lawsuit that claims the organization has not done enough to shield women college students from sexual assaults by male student athletes. Plaintiffs in the case include students from the University of Nebraska and Michigan State University.
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Michigan, accuses the NCAA of negligence, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligent infliction of emotional distress, negligent supervision, fraud, breach of contract with student-athletes, and breach of contract with non-student athletes.
The suit says that the “defendants routinely issue harsh punishments against student-athletes who accept payments in exchange for use of their likenesses, or who accept free meals, but they have no specific penalty for student-athletes who commit sexual assault. Defendants have repeatedly and persistently failed to take any meaningful action to mitigate the severe issue of sexual misconduct perpetrated by male student-athletes against women at their member institutions.”
The suit makes the cases that the NCAA needs “to supervise, regulate, monitor, and provide reasonable and appropriate rules to minimize the risk of injury or danger to student-athletes and by student-athletes.” The brief goes on to state that the NCAA “knew or should have known that their actions or inaction in light of the rate and extent of sexual assaults reported and made known to [the NCAA] by male student-athletes . . . would cause harm to female student-athletes and non-student-athletes at NCAA member institution campuses in both the short- and long-term.”