LAKEVILLE, CT — A new report finds that at least seven former faculty members at an elite Connecticut boarding school sexually abused students in the late 1970s through the 1980s. The accusations in the report against the faculty members at the Hotchkiss School in Lakeville are from around the time period immediately following the school's transition to coeducational, the report notes.

The school engaged the law firm Locke Lord LLP to conduct the investigation. In its report, the law firm said it spoke with anyone who wished to speak on the topic. The firm received reports of sexual misconduct from as early as the 1940s to as late as the 2010s. No reports came from a current Hotchkiss student and the investigation did not substantiate sexual misconduct by a current faculty member with a student. "What emerges from our investigation is a series of missed opportunities stemming from cultural deficiencies around prioritizing student safety, particularly in the late 1970s through 1980s," the report says.

One of the faculty members named in the report was a member of the Classics department Leif Thorne-Thomsen, who also coached the bike team. Thorne-Thomsen is accused of sexual misconduct against female students over a two-decade period, the report says.

"Thorne-Thomsen abused girls who were vulnerable, a number of whom had experienced other sexual abuse earlier in life, and virtually all of whom felt they were outsiders of sorts," the report says. Thorne-Thomsen also went on to marry two of his former students.

Thorne-Thomsen was dismissed from the school in 1992 after an investigation the school commissioned to investigate the reports of sexual misconduct against him. Other faculty members named in the report include Christopher Carlisle, a member of the English department and sports coach who also led a small student band, George "Rick" DelPrete, the school's long-time football coach and Dr. Peter Gott, a former medical director at the school.

The allegations of seven female students against Thorne-Thomsen are detailed in the report. Thorne-Thomsen began "kissing and touching" one student who would go to his house to babysit or study in the evenings, eventually having sex with the 17-year-old one time while she was student, the report says.

The student was "very, very upset about what happened," and withdrew from his class, the report says. The two married in 1985 and had three children before getting divorced in 1993.

According to the report, Thorne-Thomsen also had sex with another student who enrolled in the school in the mid-1970s when she was 15 and continued to have sex with her while she was at the school. Another instance of sexual abuse involved a student who enrolled in the school in the early 1980s. According to the report, the student reached her breaking point when Thorne-Thomsen undressed her one evening at his house and kissed her all over her body and attempted to get her to kiss his penis and have sex with him, the report says. The student became frightened and left and did not see him throughout the rest of her time at Hotchkiss. The report documented multiple instances of Hotchkiss officials being made aware of Thorne-Thomsen's conduct during the mid 1970s to the late 1980s and failing to take effective action.