Lauren Spierer Update: Lawsuit Targets Last People to See Her

With two years having passed since the disappearance of Lauren Spierer on June 3, 2011—and no significant news of her whereabouts from the police investigation—the parents of the former Indiana University fashion-merchandising major have taken the law into their own hands.
Attorneys at the Indianapolis firm of Barnes & Thornburg recently filed a civil suit on behalf of Robert and Charlene Spierer, against three of the young men who came into contact with Lauren on the morning she went missing: Jason Rosenbaum, Corey Rossman, and Mike Beth. The complaint accuses the defendants of “negligent actions” resulting in “the disappearance, injury, and death of Lauren Elizabeth Spierer.”
The Spierers’ lawsuit contradicts some information included in IM’s report from June 2011, printed one year after Lauren went missing. Among the facts alleged in the filing—drawn from tips, law-enforcement sources, defendant interviews, and private investigators hired by the family—are claims that Beth had visited Rosenbaum’s apartment on the morning of the disappearance, returned to his apartment to find Rossman and Spierer, and then escorted Spierer back to Rosenbaum’s apartment. Beth’s attorney, Ron Chapman, previously told IM that Beth had stayed in his apartment all night to work on school papers; a fellow IU student who lived in the same building recalled a conversation in which Beth reportedly said he had seen Spierer in his apartment, walked upstairs, and then returned to find that she had already left.
In December,IM reported that since leaving IU, Rosenbaum—the last known person to see Spierer—had launched a tech startup in Michigan with friend David Bleznak. Rosenbaum’s attorneys, Jim Voyles and Jennifer Lukemeyer, previously described their client’s meeting with Spierer’s parents to IM. “He was pretty frank with them,” said Lukemeyer. “Some of it, they admitted, they may not want to hear, but they’ve been pretty realistic, I think.”
Rossman was quoted in May in a story by Shawn Cohen of the Journal News in Westchester County, New York, saying, “It’s inappropriate the way [Spierer’s parents] are harassing people that are also victims in this case.” However, in reply to a follow-up email from IM, Rossman wrote that “the comments which were reported by Shawn Cohen to be said by me in a recent article were falsified and I am still not speaking to any reporters at this time.”
Although he would not answer questions about his clients’ lawsuit on the record, attorney Jason R. Barclay did provide IM with a statement. “We intend to use the rights afforded by the civil justice system to obtain answers to questions that have gone unanswered for too long,” he wrote.
See the complete timeline of the Lauren Spierer disappearance and investigation here.