EAST LANSING – Former Michigan State football coach Mel Tucker is asking a federal judge to consider an Ingham County judge’s finding that conversations he had with Brenda Tracy were consensual, not sexual harassment.
Tucker’s attorney Rita Glavin argued in a Feb. 19 federal filing that because Ingham County Circuit Judge Wanda Stokes ruled that conduct at issue in a lawsuit between Tucker and Tracy was consensual, Tucker’s lawsuit against MSU should not be dismissed, as the university has requested.
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Tucker is suing MSU for wrongful termination and argues he is owed more than $80 million on what was a 10-year, $95 million deal he signed two years before he was fired.
Stokes dismissed a lawsuit filed by Tracy against Tucker during a Jan. 28 hearing. Tracy filed the lawsuit in 2024, claiming Tucker intentionally tried to ruin her public image and reputation by making false statements, including stating she made up the sexual harassment allegations to extort him and MSU for money.
Tracy’s lawsuit against Tucker came two years after her initial complaint was filed to the university’s Office of Institutional Equity, where she said the coach made sexual comments about her and masturbated during a phone call with her.
Tucker has repeatedly denied claims of sexual harassment and said their relationship was consensual.
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In dismissing Tracy’s nine-count lawsuit during the Jan. 28 hearing, Stokes said the claims were either barred by statutes of limitation or that there was no factual issue for a jury to consider. An appeal of Stokes’ ruling in a separate lawsuit Tracy filed against Tucker in 2023, which contained similar counts, is still pending with the Michigan Court of Appeals.
Stokes also said she believed all the information included as a part of the lawsuit “points to the fact that these were consenting adults,” according to the court transcripts from the Jan. 28 hearing.
Tracy’s attorney, Karen Truszkowski, argued there was nothing in the record that states anything was consensual, and pointed to MSU’s investigation into Tucker as support.
Brenda Tracy, right, and attorney Karen Truszkowski look over a revised agreement between Tracy and former MSU football coach Mel Tucker’s legal team during her appearance in front of Judge Rosemarie Aquilina at the Ingham County Circuit Court in downtown Mason, Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023. Tucker did not appear.
Tracy is a speaker and advocate for victims of sexual assault, and has spoken to many college athletes throughout the country, including MSU’s football team, as a part of work with her nonprofit Set the Expectation.
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MSU’s own internal investigation prior to the lawsuits found Tucker sexually harassed and exploited Tracy when he masturbated and made sexual comments without her consent during an April 2022 phone call; made unwanted sexual advances toward Tracy in months before the call; and engaged in quid pro quo sexual harassment after, when he ended their business relationship. The decision was formally issued in January 2024 after a failed appeal attempt from Tucker, who in his original lawsuit filing said MSU conducted a “sham investigation” and discriminated against him as a Black man.
“She did not give him permission to do it, and in the OIE investigation … that was the finding,” Truszkowski told Stokes, according to the court transcript. “There is nothing in the record even remotely stating that any of this was consensual.”
While Tracy is not a part of the lawsuit between Tucker and MSU, his attorney argues in the Feb. 19 filing that Stokes dismissing the separate case supports the claim that Tucker was fired unjustly.
MSU fired Tucker for cause in September 2023 after an investigation found that he had sexually harassed Tracy. His firing came just weeks after a USA Today report made the allegations from Tracy public.
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Tucker filed the lawsuit against the university in August 2024, aiming to receive the remainder of his salary, totaling more than $80 million, according to the filing. That’s what was left unpaid from his 10-year, $95 million extension.
There have been at least four state or federal lawsuits related to Tucker’s firing, including at least two between Tucker and Tracy. In addition to the recently-dismissed case, Tracy sued Tucker in 2023 after his attorneys released text messages shared between herself and her friend Ahlan Alvarado, who has since died. The lawsuit was dismissed in May 2024. Tracy also filed a federal lawsuit against the Board of Trustees alleging someone at the university leaked her name to the press.
On Feb. 20, attorneys for MSU filed a motion to dismiss Tracy’s federal lawsuit against the university, alleging two university trustees, Rema Vassar, D-Detroit, and Dennis Denno, D-East Lansing, leaked her name to the press during her OIE investigation.
MSU hired the law firm Jones Day to conduct the investigation, which was unable to identify any leak, the firm announced to the board in December 2023. Denno was not interviewed as a part of the investigation, and declined to turn his university phone over to investigators.
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Contact Karly Graham at kgraham@lsj.com. Follow her on X at @KarlyGrahamJrn.
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: Mel Tucker, after court win, asks federal judge to find he was wrongfully fired
