By: Jeff Beach (ND Monitor)
A North Dakota University System internal review found no current employees violated reporting policies related to Ray Holmberg, the former state senator who traveled to Europe to pay for sex with boys, but an investigation will continue.
The University System announced last month that it would conduct the internal review after people connected to North Dakota higher education were named in investigation documents released by the state attorney general.
After going into a closed-door executive session to discuss the review by the system’s chief compliance officer, board chair Tim Mihalick read a statement saying that no policy violations, including failure to report criminal activity, were found among current employees.
Mihalick said the compliance officer reviewed thousands of pages of internal documents and law enforcement materials.
Mihalick’s statement said the University System would hire a neutral third party to complete the investigation.
Holmberg represented Grand Forks, home to the University of North Dakota, in the Legislature for 45 years. He was sentenced in March to 10 years in prison.
Holmberg pleaded guilty last year to federal charges related to his trips to the Czech Republic to engage in illicit sexual conduct.
Holmberg’s time in the Legislature included chairing a Higher Education Committee and the House Appropriations Committee that influenced university budgets.
One person named in the investigation documents released in April is Bruce Gjovig, who led the Center for Innovation at UND. Gjovig retired in 2017.
Records showed emails between Holmberg and Gjovig about his trips to Prague.
A statement from Gjovig issued through his lawyer said Gjovig was not aware of Holmberg’s crimes.
Holmberg also emailed Nick Hacker, who at the time was a member of the State Board of Higher Education, about a sexual encounter in Taiwan. Hacker has said the email was unsolicited and he didn’t respond to it.
Testimony at Holmberg’s sentencing in March included a former UND graduate student who described being manipulated by Holmberg to perform sex acts.
Court documents described Holmberg using access to the president’s suite at UND hockey games as a way to influence young men, an accusation his attorney refuted during a March sentencing hearing.
UND President Andrew Armacost said after Thursday’s meeting that the university is willing to help anyone who was negatively impacted by Holmberg’s actions.
“My main priority is to make sure that the members of the campus feel supported,” he said.
Armacost became UND’s president in June 2020, about two years before Holmberg resigned his Senate seat amid the sexual misconduct investigation.