Gymnaster: Vi pressades att träna med brutna ben
Skador för livet, ätstörningar och ångestattacker. Det vittnar flera tidigare gymnaster i USA:s landslag om i ett reportage av AP. Tretton gymnaster och tre ledare berättar för nyhetsbyrån om hur unga flickor tvingades till extrema dieter och pressades att träna med brutna ben i kroppen.
Bakom mentaliteten att vinna till varje pris låg förbundskaptenerna Bela och Martha Karolyi, säger gymnasterna. Landslagskulturen bidrog också till att läkaren Larry Nassar, som dömts för sexuella övergrepp på hundratals gymnaster, aldrig stoppades.
– Han var deras (Bela och Martha Karolyi) marionett. Han lät oss träna skadade. Förbundskaptenerna fick som de ville och Nassar fick som han ville, säger den tidigare landslagsgymnasten Jeanette Antolin.
bakgrund
Övergreppsskandalen i USA:s gymnastiklandslag
Wikipedia (en)
The USA Gymnastics sex abuse scandal involves the sexual abuse of female athletes—primarily minors—over the past two decades, in which over 368 individuals have been sexually assaulted by "by gym owners, coaches, and staff working for gymnastics programs across the country".
Particularly, Larry Nassar, a former USA Gymnastics (USAG) national team osteopathic physician, has been named in hundreds of lawsuits filed by athletes who said that Nassar sexually abused them under the pretense of providing medical treatment. Since the first public statements were made in September 2016, more than 265 women, including former USAG national team members Jamie Dantzscher, Jeanette Antolin, McKayla Maroney, Aly Raisman, Maggie Nichols, Gabby Douglas, Simone Biles, and Jordyn Wieber, have accused Nassar of sexually assaulting them. It is one of the biggest sexual abuse scandals in sports history. On July 11, 2017, Nassar pleaded guilty to federal child pornography charges; he was sentenced to 60 years in prison on December 7, 2017. On November 22, 2017, he pleaded guilty to seven charges of first-degree sexual assault and entered another guilty plea a week later to three additional charges of sexual assault. On January 24, 2018, Nassar was sentenced to an additional 40 to 175 years in prison, set to run after Nassar serves the 60-year federal prison sentence for child pornography. On February 5, 2018, Nassar received another 40 to 125 years.
An investigation over the period of nine months found that "predatory coaches were allowed to move from gym to gym, undetected by a lax system of oversight, or dangerously passed on by USA Gymnastics-certified gyms". USAG and Michigan State University—where Nassar was a faculty member—have been accused of enabling Nassar's abuse and are named as defendants in civil lawsuits that former gymnasts have filed against Nassar.
Besides Nassar, other coaches across the country were involved in the scandal, in localities such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, California, Rhode Island, and Indiana.
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