Leaders and the best!

[Matt]

Interesting note from the Michigan beat writer from the time…

https://bsky.app/profile/nickbaumgardne ... ts7wr6ss2z

“Shouldn't be understated how much John Harbaugh went to bat for this guy and how quickly Jim Harbaugh hired him without so much as asking a single question to anyone about him outside of his brother.”

What's interesting about it? Clearly, no one knew what he was doing on his own time.

[Honeyman]

Interesting note from the Michigan beat writer from the time…

https://bsky.app/profile/nickbaumgardne ... ts7wr6ss2z

“Shouldn't be understated how much John Harbaugh went to bat for this guy and how quickly Jim Harbaugh hired him without so much as asking a single question to anyone about him outside of his brother.”

What's interesting about it? Clearly, no one knew what he was doing on his own time.

Of course they didn't. No clue about "Lone Wolf" Stallions either. Dusty didnt know about the 30 year tradition of MSU kissing the court on Senior Day. And clearly, beloved statue-honored Bo didn't know about Dr. Anderson. Michigan never does anything wrong.

.

[Robert Faygo]

When do we start putting responsibility for personal failings on the person actually responsible instead of deflecting up the chain?

I mean... I have zero doubt that the Harbaughs are enablers for stupid and questionable stuff when it comes to football. There is tons of evidence that says so. At the same time, throwing them under the bus for this kind of thing is a stretch.

Baumgardner is trolling. In spite of all the idiotic stuff that happens in the football building, the university itself still does vetting (I guarantee they ask much more than a single question) on people they hire.

Was it Beekman's fault that he didn't know Tucker was a sexual deviant? Hardly.

[Matt]

Interesting note from the Michigan beat writer from the time…

https://bsky.app/profile/nickbaumgardne ... ts7wr6ss2z

“Shouldn't be understated how much John Harbaugh went to bat for this guy and how quickly Jim Harbaugh hired him without so much as asking a single question to anyone about him outside of his brother.”

What's interesting about it? Clearly, no one knew what he was doing on his own time.

Of course they didn't. No clue about "Lone Wolf" Stallions either. And clearly, beloved statue honored Bo didn't know about Dr. Anderson. Michigan never does anything wrong.

You really think that anyone knew the guy was too good for pornhub? I don't get what you were trying to prove by posting sparty Baumgardner's comment. The guy worked for Jim previously at Stanford - how many reference checks would you do for someone you previously employed?

[DefendTheDen]

Weiss needs a lot of jail time for what he did.

[Honeyman]

Asking seriously, doesn't this possibly open Michigan up to a massive lawsuit from every single person that got hacked due to the use of university computers?

[MWmetalhead]

Potentially, but I'll leave that question for someone who holds a law degree.

Large institutions suffer data breaches on occasion - hospital systems, banks and Equifax come to mind. Often what happens is a class action lawsuit gets filed and those impacted receive identity theft monitoring and perhaps some very tiny monetary form of consideration.

[Honeyman]

Potentially, but I'll leave that question for someone who holds a law degree.

Large institutions suffer data breaches on occasion - hospital systems, banks and Equifax come to mind. Often what happens is a class action lawsuit gets filed and those impacted receive identity theft monitoring and perhaps some very tiny monetary form of consideration.

But aren't most of those data breaches due to outside bad actors, not an actual employee using company property? I would think a university employee hacking in and obtaining sexually explicit content of unsuspecting coeds a whole different level than an outside actor infiltrating to get data on folks.

Again, over my pay grade. If Faygo or anyone more connected with the law can give insight it might help.

[Robert Faygo]

It's one of those "it depends" situation.

Any organization where an employee was using company IT resources to break the law could be liable. If I'm the one suing though, I'd probably need some reasonable proof that the organization was being reckless- ,ie not following its own policies, knowingly allowing an employee to break the law, etc. and doing nothing about it.

The H*** thing here is that it appears the university's IT department flagged what was going on and went to the university's police department who appeared to follow the right protocols to get this dude caught.

If he'd been found out by a victim first and the prosecution went from that direction instead, the liability on Michigan would be a lot easier to prove to a jury / judge.

The Ravens organization appears to be a lot more culpable here if it's true he was doing this at work there from 2015-21. This is the time period he did the bulk of his hacking / gaining initial access. He just kept it going while at Michigan.

If I was looking for restitution, I'd be going after the software vendor and the Ravens/NFL. In this case, it appears Michigan (their IT and police departments anyhow) are the good guys that stopped the bad guy. Their athletic department at least knew it was best to heel. They didn't defend the guy at all.

Edit: Punishing whistleblowers is generally not good form. All that does is encourage organizations to cover up this crap and hope it never comes out. Michigan had that "option".

[Matt]

The policy that Weiss violated is publicly available: https://spg.umich.edu/policy/601.07

Seems pretty cut and dry.

[Robert Faygo]

What's not cut and dry is the willingness to enforce these policies when you know it's going to make your organization look bad. It's how we end up with the Andersons and Nassars. Too many are willing to look the other way to avoid bad press because there is a bad actor within.

Maybe these schools are learning to do the right thing immediately to stop more bad things from happening. Even if you take a grilling for it.

[Honeyman]

[Robert Faygo]

Not sure how much they expect to get from Wiess himself. I'm popping some popcorn to watch how their suit proceeds. If Michigan opts to settle, look out.

https://www.freep.com/story/sports/coll ... 639533007/

[Honeyman]

https://abcnews.go.com/US/alleged-victi ... =120139679

"I've been a fan of the university my entire life," Jane Doe said. "To know that I put so much trust and so much faith into that institution, and they have betrayed me in such a significant way -- I mean, it's terrifying."

"I obviously am afraid of an individual that's capable of doing something like this, but I'm possibly more afraid of a university that has the opportunity to prevent it from happening and doesn't," the Jane Doe said.

************

"We're talking about the University of Michigan, one of the largest, most powerful and respected academic institutions in the world, that allowed this to take place by one of their employees," Stinar told "Good Morning America."

Stinar said this "isn't the first time that we have seen the University of Michigan fail their alumni and their athletes," pointing to the case of the late Dr. Robert Anderson, who served as the school's sports team physician for decades and was accused of molesting or sexually abusing more than 1,000 victims. In 2022, the university reached a $490 million settlement in connection with the allegations.

"We're seeing it again, where the university has failed to protect those that give their blood, sweat and tears to the school," Stinar said.

[Matt]

"I obviously am afraid of an individual that's capable of doing something like this, but I'm possibly more afraid of a university that has the opportunity to prevent it from happening and doesn't," the Jane Doe said.

It shouldn't need to be said that Matt Weiss is a despicable piece of shit, but this quote is nonsense. When the predatory behavior was discovered, it was handled properly. I understand the purpose of such a quote, but it does not pass the smell test and is an attempt to create a narrative in a civil case.