Judge Says Speedskating Sex Abuse Case Can Go to Trial

A former US speed skater who says she was sexually abused by her mentor will get her day in court. Bridie Farrell's long-running case against two of the sport's top governing bodies is headed toward trial, the Washington Post reports. Nearly six years after she sued the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee and US Speedskating, a federal judge has ruled that her negligence claims can go forward, rejecting the organizations' bid to end the case early. The judge said key questions remain about what they knew about four-time Olympian Andy Gabel and what duty they had to protect Farrell. Claims against a local club were dismissed.

Farrell alleges Gabel abused her over seven months beginning in 1997, when she was 15 and he was 33, and that officials had prior warnings about his behavior with underage skaters. Gabel denies abusing her but has admitted a "brief, inappropriate relationship." The trial is set for next June and Gabel remains a defendant.

• Farrell tells the Post that the legal process has been "grueling" but she's proud to have made it this far. "I feel slightly better. I feel heard," she says. "When I first read it, I teared up, because it was like: 'Yes, it's worth speaking up. Survivors, keep speaking up. Although this is very, very hard, we have to keep doing this."
• Gabel, who won silver at the 1994 Lillehammer Olympics, was president of US Speedskating from 2002 to 2010. He stepped down from leadership committees in 2013 after Farrell went public and another former skater, Nikki Meyer, said he had also abused her when she was 15. The organization later cut its ties with him. Gabel "is no longer a member of US Speedskating," the organization said in a statement in 2016, per the Chicago Tribune. "USS retained a firm to investigate claims related to alleged conduct of Mr. Gabel. Following the investigation, Mr. Gabel's membership in USS was terminated and subsequently, he resigned from USS."