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 school 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 personal info on a pc in December 2022 however nonetheless allowed him to proceed working as co-offensive coordinator in a nationwide playoff recreation roughly per week later.
Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel and different officers have been additionally added to the lawsuit in federal court docket in Detroit.
“The college’s delay in taking significant protecting motion till after a high-stakes recreation sends a transparent message: Scholar welfare was secondary,” stated Parker Stinar, who’s the lead lawyer in a class-action lawsuit arising from a legal investigation of Weiss.
Messages looking for remark from Manuel and Harbaugh, who’s at present 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 obtained entry to the social media, electronic mail and cloud storage accounts of greater than 2,000 school athletes, in addition to greater than 1,300 college students or alumni from colleges throughout the U.S., to seek out personal pictures, primarily of girls. He has pleaded not responsible.
“Had Harbaugh carried out fundamental oversight of his workers, plaintiffs and the category would have been protected in opposition to predators comparable to Weiss,” the up to date lawsuit states. “As a substitute, Weiss was a extremely compensated asset that was promoted by and throughout the soccer program, from which place he was in a position to, and did, goal feminine pupil athletes.”
The lawsuit says a workers member noticed Weiss viewing personal info at Schembechler Corridor, headquarters for the soccer group, round Dec. 21, 2022, and reported it earlier than Michigan performed Texas Christian College in a playoff recreation days in a while Dec. 31.
Weiss was fired a couple of weeks later in January 2023 throughout an investigation of his laptop use.
Earlier this yr, after expenses have been filed, Harbaugh informed reporters that he did not know something about Weiss’ troubles till after the playoff recreation. He stated the allegations have been “stunning.”
Weiss labored for Harbaugh’s brother, John, on the teaching workers of the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens earlier than becoming a member of the Michigan group 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 units and cloud storage accounts.
