Honolulu marathon CEO says he was abused by Michigan doctor

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — The president and CEO of one of the nation’s largest marathons has joined a chorus of former students who have complained about a late University of Michigan doctor by saying the physician performed a “completely inappropriate” act on him during a medical examination in the 1970s.

Dr. James Barahal, who himself is a longtime physician, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview that Dr. Robert E. Anderson gave him a digital rectal exam when the then-medical student visited the student health center in 1975 complaining of a sore throat.

“I remember leaving, and I can still picture the health center and walking through the waiting room, getting out on the street and it was like, ‘What was that?’ I knew it was completely inappropriate,” Barahal said Monday.

The 67-year-old who lives in Kailua, Oahu, has headed up the Honolulu Marathon for more than 30 years and has been inducted into the Hawaii Sports Hall of Fame.

Barahal was training with Michigan’s cross-country team in 1975 when he was “fast-tracked” in to see Anderson, who was the director of the University Health Service as well as a physician to some of the Ann Arbor school’s athletic teams. Anderson died in 2008.

University of Michigan officials were warned more than four decades ago that Anderson had been molesting patients during exams. He was demoted but continued working there and went on to allegedly abuse again as a physician with the athletic department, according to documents from a police investigation the AP obtained through a public-records request.

The probe began in October 2018 based on a letter sent by a former wrestler to athletic director Warde Manuel in mid-July. It was not made public until last week.