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Woman who had an affair with Bo Ryan sues Wisconsin officials

Bo Ryan

Bo Ryan

AP

A woman who was involved in an affair with former Wisconsin head coach Bo Ryan has filed a lawsuit against top university officials, according to the Wisconsin State-Journal.

The woman, Robin Van Ert, 42, named Chancellor Rebecca Blank, athletic director Barry Alvarez and six other UW-Madison officials in the lawsuit. The crux of the lawsuit stems from what she called a “sham” investigation into her accusations that Ryan used inappropriately used university funds during their affair, which spanned from 2009-2014.

Van Ert also claims that the university violated her privacy rights by publicly revealing her identity when they released an email in 2015 in which she detailed her affair.

“As a direct and proximate result of defendants’ actions, Van Ert has suffered severe emotional and physical distress and illness, loss of privacy, harm to her reputation, loss of business and has incurred substantial damages and legal fees,” the complaint states, according to the WSJ.

Ryan originally announced that he would be retiring from Wisconsin at the end of the 2015-16 season, but he abruptly announced his retirement after a win over Texas A&M-Corpus Christi on a Tuesday night last December.