SALT LAKE CITY — After a nearly seven-week investigation into Utah State University's handling of allegations of sexual misconduct within the music department, independent investigators are preparing to release a report of their findings and recommendations on Friday morning, according to Tim Vitale, a spokesman for the university.
The Deseret News talked to 25 former and current Utah State music students, several of whom have reported their experiences to the investigators in recent weeks.
Details gathered by the Deseret News include:
- A male former student who said he was groped by a music professor on an overnight trip in 2006;
- A police report from the 1990s describing the alleged sexual assault of a teenage student by a USU music department employee, who is now a music faculty member at the university;
- A former piano student, Whitney McPhie Griffith, who said she was raped by a piano instructor in 2009; and
- Thirteen women — current and former USU piano students between 1998 and now — who said they had been subjected to various forms of mistreatment by faculty members, ranging from sexism to harassment to intimidation.