Noting “concerns” about Rankin’s credibility, a “lack of corroborating evidence,” and “the fact that there were no credibility issues” with LaDuca, OIE concluded that it was “impossible to conclude by a preponderance of the evidence that the disputed events occurred” as Rankin alleged.

The 2017 Office of Institutional Equity report clearing Rob LaDuca of sexual harassment against Joy Lisi Rankin is now available. Noting “concerns” about Rankin’s credibility, a “lack of corroborating evidence,” and “the fact that there were no credibility issues” with LaDuca, OIE concluded that it was “impossible to conclude by a preponderance of the evidence that the disputed events occurred” as Rankin alleged.

Olds Hall, the home of the Office of Institutional Equity. Photo via MSU Infrastructure Planning and Facilities.

The document, authored by former OIE Senior Investigator Liz Abdnour, was redacted when On the Banks obtained it. On the Banks redacted further information to protect the privacy of the witnesses interviewed.

The 77-page report contains analyses of Rankin’s claims against LaDuca, as well as Rankin’s claim that then-Dean of Lyman Briggs College Elizabeth Simmons retaliated against Rankin for reporting LaDuca. OIE concluded that neither LaDuca nor Simmons had violated University policy.

Rankin’s November 28 essay detailing her claims against an unnamed associate dean of Lyman Briggs College captured the attention of thousands. The OIE report provides significant context to Rankin’s essay and provides details about what she alleged.

Claims of LaDuca Staring at Rankin

In her essay, Rankin wrote, “an associate dean of [Lyman Briggs] ogled me. In faculty meetings and in the hallways around the College, he stared at me, and my breasts, looking me up and down.”

The OIE report notes that in Rankin’s first meeting with OIE, she stated that LaDuca has been staring at her in meetings, but in a meeting six months later, Rankin amended her complaint to include that LaDuca was staring at her breasts and “ogling” her. OIE cited this as an example of a communication suggesting that Rankin “was either providing inconsistent information, and/or was changing or did not accurately recall events she was describing.”

LaDuca denied staring at or ogling Rankin. After conceding that Rankin might simply have felt uncomfortable describing details in her first meeting with OIE, the investigator wrote that due to the inconsistency and lack of witnesses, Rankin did not prove that it was more likely than not that LaDuca had stared at her.

Conversations about Sex

“On one occasion, he spoke to me about dildos,” wrote Rankin in her essay. According to the OIE report, the incident occurred in Rankin’s car following an academic governance meeting.

Dr. Rankin. Photo via Medium.

The parties agree that LaDuca told a story about his then-elementary-aged son asking what a dildo was. According to Rankin, LaDuca says he responded, “Son, ask your mom. I’m sure she knows,” apparently in an effort to disparage his ex-wife. LaDuca claims that he responded, “It’s a deer that eats pickles.” LaDuca admitted that the joke was inappropriate, and told OIE, “I need to clean that up in my attitude of professionalism going forward. I’m mortifided that I went there, even slightly.”

OIE concluded that “LaDuca’s comments, while clearly unwelcome to the Claimant and not what might reasonably be expected of an associate dean in terms of professionalism, were not sufficiently severe, persistent, or pervasive” enough to constitute sexual harassment.

Abdnour concluded the same thing about an incident which Rankin’s essay described as LaDuca making “a comment about a dick.” There, Rankin was in LaDuca’s office when she provided LaDuca with her email address, then “profjoy@msu.edu.” LaDuca remarked that Rankin must have requested that moniker, and then told a story a former student whose email address was “dickinme@msu.edu.” MSU’s People Search tool did not indicate that any such email address exists, though On the Banks cannot confirm that is the case.

LaDuca admitted to describing the email address to Rankin, which she says LaDuca wrote down on a piece of paper. OIE said that while the comment was sexual in nature, it was “insufficiently severe, persistent, or pervasive enough that a reasonable person in the Claimant’s circumstances would feel that their work environment was substantially affected,” even when combined with the anecdote about LaDuca’s son.

Incidents of LaDuca Touching Rankin

In her essay and in her complaints to OIE, Rankin describes LaDuca touching her back during a faculty meeting and touching her arm in the Briggs mailroom. LaDuca denied ever touching Rankin other than a possible handshake at the end of her job interview.

Citing a lack of corroborating witnesses or evidence, OIE concluded that there was insufficient evidence to determine whether the touches occurred. In many ways, this incident is an example of the inherent difficulty in investigating so-called “he-said, she-said” incidents. However, OIE also wrote that even if Rankin’s account was accurate, it could not be shown whether the touches were intentional or sexually-motivated.

Inappropriate Exposure by LaDuca

Dr. LaDuca. Photo via MSU.

Rankin’s essay included the allegation that LaDuca “exposed his chest” to Rankin while in his office. The OIE report provides further detail about Rankin’s allegation. Specifically, Rankin said that LaDuca “pulled off his sweatshirt and shirt” in such a way that she could see “his entire chest and torso.” LaDuca said that any such exposure was accidental, telling OIE, “I gained some weight. There may have been a little view. It was nothing intentional.”

OIE could not determine whether any exposure occurred, but wrote that even if it had, there was no evidence that LaDuca “had any sexual intent or meaning or was in any way related to sex.”

Threat to Rankin’s Job by LaDuca

According to Rankin, LaDuca threatened Rankin’s job while walking across campus by saying something to the effect of, “You better stay close to me…I’d hate to have to do another search to replace you.”

According to the report, Rankin told OIE that LaDuca had asked inappropriate questions during this walk at her first meeting with the investigator, but did not bring up the threat until a meeting six months later.

According to LaDuca, a car approached the pair too quickly while they were walking down the street. LaDuca claimed that he said “switch with me” rather than “stick with me,” as Rankin was closer to the car. “I *switched* positions with her so that another car would hit me and not her, and my comment was to reference that HER set of expertise and qualifications is more difficult to find and retain than a simple general chemistry professor [like myself],” LaDuca told OIE in an email. Rankin disputed this account, saying that she was “confident that [she] was walking on the inside of the sidewalk,” so switching with LaDuca wouldn’t have made sense.

Whether LaDuca said “switch with me” or “stick with me,” neither was “indicative of sexual harassment or any type of threat,” according to OIE.

Accusation of OIE Gaslighting Rankin

Rankin said that she reported LaDuca to OIE twice, but that after the second request for investigation, “OIE claimed that I had requested no investigation at all [the first time]. (Remember, this is the same university that gaslit Larry Nassar’s sexual assault survivors for years . . . ).”

Liz Abdnour, former OIE Senior Investigator and author of the report. Photo via Justia.

The controversy centered on whether Rankin asked for an informal resolution or a formal investigation in her first contact with OIE. According to the report, the investigator maintained that “based on OIE’s recollection and records, the Claimant requested an informal resolution of the matter both at the December 2016 meeting and in her February 10, 2017 email to OIE.” Rankin said she requested both. OIE cited notes from the December 2016 meeting indicating that Rankin asked for OIE and Simmons to meet with LaDuca and tell him his behavior was inappropriate. OIE said that “generally, this type of claim was not handled informally, and that her request to handle the manner informally would have to be approved by” Ande Durojaiye, then the Director of OIE. The next day, OIE says they “advised the Claimant that her request to resolve the matter informally was approved.”

In January 2017, Rankin emailed others, writing, “[Durojaiye] is meeting with the Dean of the college and the offender next week to address the situation, so I hope that will be the end of it,” and “[Durojaiye and Simmons] are meeting with this colleague next week to address his behavior, so I think (hope, pray) it should end.” It is unclear whether “it” refers to LaDuca’s behavior or the investigative process.

OIE’s Conclusions

While OIE said that “[t]he inconsistencies in the information the Claimant has presented to OIE” and “the inaccurate information the Claimant has presented about her interactions with OIE itself” indicated “concerns with respect to the Claimant’s credibility,” OIE stopped short of saying that Rankin had lied to them. “The evidence is inconclusive with regard to whether the Claimant has engaged in intentional misrepresentations, or if she simply misunderstood and/or miscommunicated about numerous interactions and pieces of information she was given.”

OIE acknowledged it was possible that LaDuca had lied and that Rankin’s allegations were true, but Abdnour concluded that based on the evidence provided, it was “impossible” to find that LaDuca had sexually harassed Rankin by a preponderance of the evidence.

Responses to Requests for Comment

When reached for comment on the OIE report, Rankin said,

I do not have a comment on the OIE report itself, but on OIE’s processes. It is clear from my and others’ experiences that OIE’s goal in these investigations is to protect the university at all costs.



As we’ve seen, OIE has demonstrated a pattern of mishandling sexual misconduct cases, including delaying and stalling, discrediting survivors, and deferring to those with power at MSU.



For example, I am attaching my 10-page response to the OIE draft report. As you can see from the final report, almost none of my corrections and clarifications were incorporated in the final report. (For comparison, I understand that other universities include such responses in full as addenda in final reports.) In sum, I do not feel that OIE exhibited due process in this case.

When investigating complaints, OIE issues a draft report to the parties and allows them to comment on each other’s statements, as well as those of themselves and the witnesses. Rankin’s response to the draft report is available in full; On the Banks redacted the names of witnesses.

In an email, LaDuca stated, “I am confident that OIE performed a thorough, fair, and well-considered investigation that interviewed numerous people and focused on the facts of the case.”

The author of the report, former OIE Senior Investigator Liz Abdnour, provided the following comment by email:

As with all investigations I performed while I was at OIE, I did the best I could to apply all of the relevant information I obtained to the applicable MSU policy to assess whether or not a preponderance of the evidence indicated that a policy violation had occurred. I believe my report thoroughly outlines all of the factual information I gathered and explains in detail how I analyzed the information I obtained. In any investigation, there is always room for human error, and there is no way for me to be certain that I might not have missed something important or analyzed something incorrectly. However, I think it’s important to note that at the time I worked in OIE (I don’t know the specifics of their procedure now), all investigative reports were reviewed, edited, and approved by OIE’s director and MSU’s Office of General Counsel. Therefore, if there had been any error in my investigation or analysis, those two entities would have had the opportunity to catch it. I don’t recall what feedback or edits I may have received on this specific report, but I am certain that this report went through that review process, as did all others I completed during my time in OIE. Therefore, I believe I did the best I could with the information that was available to me during this investigation, and the investigation process involved thorough review of my work by others. I certainly understand and empathize with parties who may disagree with the outcome of any investigation I conducted. They are looking at the situation from their perspective, and were uniquely affected in a way that I was not. In any Title IX investigation, at least one of the parties is going to end up with a result that they do not agree with, and I don’t think there is any way for any individual investigator to say with complete certainty that they got everything absolutely right, because we are all human, and have the potential to get things wrong by nature. All that being said, I did the best I could with the information I had, and I believe the report explains sufficiently how I reached the conclusions I did.

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Tyler Silvestri Tyler Silvestri is a third-year law student at MSU who received his bachelor’s degree in Political Theory & Constitutional Democracy from MSU’s James Madison College in 2017. He spent one year as the Assistant Director of ASMSU’s Student Rights Advocates and two years as a Resident Assistant. He is the Chairperson of the University Committee on Academic Governance. He can be reached at Tyler@onthebanksmsu.com. See author's posts