DETROIT — NFL coach Jim Harbaugh was added Friday to a lawsuit in opposition to the College of Michigan and a former assistant soccer coach who’s accused of hacking into the pc accounts of faculty athletes throughout the U.S. to search for intimate photographs.
Attorneys declare Harbaugh, who was Michigan’s coach, and others knew that Matt Weiss was seen viewing non-public data on a pc in December 2022 however nonetheless allowed him to proceed working as co-offensive coordinator in a nationwide playoff sport roughly per week later.
Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel and different officers have been additionally added to the lawsuit in federal courtroom in Detroit.
“The college’s delay in taking significant protecting motion till after a high-stakes sport sends a transparent message: Scholar welfare was secondary,” mentioned Parker Stinar, who’s the lead lawyer in a class-action lawsuit arising from a prison investigation of Weiss.
Messages looking for remark from Manuel and Harbaugh, who’s presently the top coach of the Los Angeles Chargers, weren’t instantly returned Friday.
Individually, Weiss has been charged with id theft and unauthorized laptop entry from 2015 to 2023. The indictment says he bought entry to the social media, e-mail and cloud storage accounts of greater than 2,000 faculty athletes, in addition to greater than 1,300 college students or alumni from colleges throughout the U.S., to seek out non-public pictures, primarily of girls. He has pleaded not guilty.
“Had Harbaugh applied fundamental oversight of his employees, plaintiffs and the category would have been protected in opposition to predators similar to Weiss,” the up to date lawsuit states. “As a substitute, Weiss was a extremely compensated asset that was promoted by and inside the soccer program, from which place he was in a position to, and did, goal feminine scholar athletes.”
The lawsuit says a employees member noticed Weiss viewing non-public data at Schembechler Corridor, headquarters for the soccer staff, round Dec. 21, 2022, and reported it earlier than Michigan performed Texas Christian College in a playoff sport days afterward Dec. 31.
Weiss was fired just a few weeks later in January 2023 throughout an investigation of his laptop use.
Earlier this yr, after prices have been filed, Harbaugh advised reporters that he did not know something about Weiss’ troubles till after the playoff sport. He mentioned the allegations have been “surprising.”
Weiss labored for Harbaugh’s brother, John, on the teaching employees of the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens earlier than becoming a member of the Michigan staff in 2021.
The lawsuit says Weiss’ college laptop had encryption software program that needed to be disabled by an exterior vendor as a part of the investigation. Authorities disclosed in April that hundreds of intimate photographs and movies have been discovered on his digital gadgets and cloud storage accounts.
