When Nichols College appointed Glenn M. Sulmasy, JD, LL.M, as its 8th President in 2021, an acclaimed international law and national security expert with experience in academics, law, and government service, with 24 years of prior experience in higher education, no one imagined he may have had a sordid past. Prior to joining Nichols College, he served as provost and chief academic officer of Bryant University. Before that he served as Deputy University Counsel and later led the Humanities Department at the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA), in New London, CT. However, now Sulmasy is tangled in allegations of a cover-up of a rape while he was an attorney working for the Coast Guard, and unfolding information about a questionable past.
Sulmasy has taken a voluntary leave from his position pending a Coast Guard investigation. The investigation was launched after an officer alleged she had been raped while at the Coast Guard Academy and that two lawyers for the Coast Guard had discouraged her from pursuing the complaint further. Things have taken a turn for the worst amid information uncovered by CNN claiming that when Sulmasy was a Dean with the Coast Guard Academy, he exchanged more than 100 sexually suggestive text messages with woman, prompting a recommendation in 2016 to bring charges against him in the military court. Further, the Coast Guard has now banned Sulmasy from the grounds of the Academy and is considering taking the rare step of demoting an officer after retirement.
Sulmasy earned his JD at the University of Baltimore School of Law (cum laude and his LLM from UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall).