Attorneys representing victims in cases against former University of Michigan assistant football coach Matt Weiss say more student athletes are coming forward daily, bringing the total number of accusers to 17 across five lawsuits so far.
Several of the victims, according to attorney Megan Bonanni, are also survivors of Dr. Larry Nassar’s abuse through USA Gymnastics at Michigan State University.
“They’re feeling angry, and they’re feeling completely traumatized,” Megan Bonanni, of Pitt McGhee Palmer Bonanni and Rivers, said. “There are also clients that were involved in the FBI case that we had related to the Nassar case — we sued the FBI for concealing information.”
The growing list of accusers comes after Weiss, 42, a husband and father of three and former Michigan Wolverines assistant football coach, was indicted on 24 felony counts of unauthorized computer access and aggravated identity theft.
Federal prosecutors allege that between 2015 and 2023, Weiss hacked into student athlete databases managed by Keffer Development Services, gaining access to the personal information, photos, videos, and medical records of more than 150,000 students across 100 universities.
Prosecutors also said Weiss kept notes on which athletes he was interested in.
Attorney Ryan Clarkson, managing partner with Clarkson Law, said Weiss’s actions could have lasting trauma for his victims.
“This, in some cases, to the extent that it involves intimate photographs or videos, is a form of digital sexual abuse,” Clarkson said. “And that presents its own unique kind of hell to the victims or survivors.”
One of the Jane Does, who also survived Nassar’s abuse, shared a statement to Local 4:
“The very institutions that were meant to protect me failed—first with Dr. Larry Nassar, and now again with Matt Weiss. These institutions must be held accountable, and I want to help create lasting change so future student-athletes are protected, respected, and truly safe.”
Attorneys representing the victims said a lack of transparency from the University of Michigan has made the situation even more distressing.
Local 4 has learned that a student-athlete received an unusual email notification in late 2022 and reported it to the university.
However, Weiss was not placed on leave until early 2023.
These attorneys said many victims only found out what happened through letters from the FBI or from media coverage.
“Why wasn’t he immediately placed on leave?” Parker Stinar, Founding Partner at Stinar Gould Grieco & Hensley and the first attorney to file suit said. “When you were aware of an investigation, why didn’t you reach out?”
Weiss continued to work for the Baltimore Ravens while allegedly accessing the databases from 2015 to 2020.
Even after being fired from Michigan, he was reportedly linked to the Cleveland Browns in 2023 and the Seattle Seahawks in 2024.
Bonanni believes Weiss’s actions have likely impacted many more victims than those who have come forward so far.
“This individual had a compulsion — it’s so clear that it is very likely that he was accessing information every day,” she said. “There could be others. We don’t know the full scope of everyone in those images.”
Attorneys involved in the lawsuits said they are receiving calls from individuals from across the country and from those who didn’t even attend the University of Michigan.
They said the Department of Justice is notifying people on a rolling basis, but warns that not everyone affected could receive a letter.
“You may never know if you were impacted,” said Bonanni. “That’s terrifying.”
