Rachael Denhollander Closes Out Another Round Of Devastating Larry Nassar Testimonies

Larry Nassar spent another week hearing from his victims, this time in an Eaton County courthouse in separate proceedings from his high-profile Ingham County sentencing. Even before today, Nassar already was expected to spend the rest of his life in prison. A federal judge sentenced him to 60 years in prison, and last week in Ingham he was sentenced to 40 to 175 years in prison.

To close out two full days of testimony, Rachael Denhollander once again gave the final statement. Denhollander was the first woman to speak publicly to the Indianapolis Star about Nassar’s sexual abuse, and she was the final person to give a victim impact statement during his Ingham sentencing

Denhollander asked the court: “How much are these little girls worth? How much are these women worth?”

Earlier in the day Randall Margraves, a father of multiple victims,  lunged to attack Nassar, in the first display emotion that has boiled over during the Eaton hearings. Margraves was tackled to the ground, but Judge Janice K. Cunningham said later in the day that she would not charge him for the outburst.

A total of 73 women and girls gave statements in Eaton. One victim, Katie Black, said she was first abused by Nassar when she was 11 years old. Black told the court: “He ruined my sport and my body and he ruined me. Larry was a master manipulator.”

Gymnast Katherine Ebert told Nassar: “You are the most vile, disgusting creature I have ever met. There are black holes in my memory that come back as nightmares or flashbacks, not wanting to believe they’re true.”

Gymnast Annie Labrie said that during the five years Nassar treated her, she saw him not only at Twistars and Michigan State, but at Nassar’s own home:

She said his treatments “made my skin crawl. I rejected my intuition anyway because every adult and authority figure around me assured me that this, that competing was the only option.”

Labrie said she hid it from her parents, “because in Larry’s words, ‘They wouldn’t understand.’”

“A pedophile cannot flourish in the way Larry did and in an environment that is not conducive to his behavior. … It is imperative we as a society do not view this as an isolated incident.”

“You didn’t just hurt us. You hurt everybody who cares about us. Sometimes I think you hurt my dad more than me.”

While victims continued to read their statements to Nassar throughout the day, U.S. women’s gymnastics coordinator Valeri Liukin resigned from his position, citing “far too much stress, difficulty and uncertainty.”