DETROIT – Former Michigan State University president Lou Anna Simon has been charged for lying to police in connection to the Larry Nassar sexual assault investigation.
Simon, who resigned in January as Nassar was being sentenced, was charged in Eaton County District Court with two felony counts and two misdemeanor counts, punishable by up to four years in jail. She has not yet been arraigned.
Read: Michigan State University President Lou Anna K. Simon's resignation letter
A charging document alleges that Simon told state police that she was aware that in 2014 a university sports doctors was the subject of an investigation, but she did not know it was Nassar. Police says she knew he was under investigation.
She is now the fourth person other than Nassar to face criminal charges related to his serial molestation of young female athletes under the guise of treatment. Numerous other people have lost their jobs or been sued.
Nassar was sentenced to 40 to 175 years in prison for sexually abusing more than 150 people while a physician at MSU and for USA Gymnastics.
Nassar was found guilty of seven counts of felony criminal sexual conduct in the first degree.
Last November, Nassar pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting young athletes including some girls under the age of 13. He originally was charged with more than 20 counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct. He admitted he sexually assaulted the girls for his own pleasure without any medical grounds.
He was also sentenced to 60 years in prison after pleading guilty to child pornography charges, including receipt and attempted receipt of child pornography, possession of child pornography, and destruction and concealment of records and tangible objects.
"The charges are ridiculous, untrue, political, and I tell you right now, the only crime committed is the charges against her," said Mayer Morganroth, who represents Simon. "The proper party will pay for what they have done."