2023 Valentine’s Day
Subject: Request for Investigation
Tue, Feb 14, 1:09 PM
To: president@uw.edu, salclark@uw.edu salclark@uw.edu, uciro@uw.edu
Cc: houghgkl@um.dk, marksc@umgate.dk, um@um.dk, whistleblower@um.dk
Dear President Cauce,
I am an alumni of the University of Washington, 2007, 2011. The UW played a pivotal role in shaping and enhancing my life and career path in my mid-50’s. My debt of gratitude for the opportunity I was given between 2005 to 2011 continues to be a cherished element of my life.
My concern in this matter is about ensuring that the UW remains a safe space especially for young people, students, and for others who carry out the important educational mission of the UW.
I believe it is important that this public institution be free as possible of rancor, predatory behavior, and misplaced backroom politics that can lead to emotional suffering and possible reputation killing damage for all concerned, including the University of Washington institution and its body at large.
Please find attached a copy of my request that the University look into the matter of years of ongoing harassment of a UW faculty member, Professor Hansen-Stecher by UW Scandinavian Advisory Board member Lars Matthiesen, as well as Mr. Matthiesen’s efforts to disrupt or dominate the business of the UW Scandinavian Studies department; and doing so in concert with others he has implicated in his schemes, including but not limited to past or present Scandinavian Studies advisory board members, Scandinavian Studies administrator(s) and faculty, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark, and its special consul(s).
Thank you for your time and attention to this matter.
Best Regards,
Elizabeth Campbell
Dr. Ana Mari Cauce, President president@uw.edu University of Washington
Sally Clark, Vice President for Campus & Community Safety salclark@uw.edu University of Washington Office of the President – Safe Spaces
uciro@uw.edu UW Complaint Investigation and Resolution Office
cc:
Mark T. Schleck, Honorary Danish Consul marksc@umgate.dk Danish Consulate in Seattle, Washington
Morten Siem Lynge hougkl@um.dk Consulate General of Denmark, Houston
um@um.dk Whistleblower@um.dk Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark, Copenhagen
UW Complaint Re LCM Scand Adv Board 01-25-23.pdf
January 25, 2023
Dr. Ana Mari Cauce, President University of Washington 301 Gerberding Hall Box 351230 1400 NE Campus Pkway Seattle, WA. 98195
Re: Years of Harassment of Professor Marianne Stecher-Hansen by UW Scandinavian Advisory Board Member Mr. Matthiesen Matthiesen
Dear President Cauce,
Introduction
These things inform my letter to you today – I am a graduate of the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance (2011). In 2005 at the age of 53 I entered the UW as a college transfer student from Shoreline College (2005) and graduated from the UW in 2011 after earning two BA’s, Law, Society and Justice/Sociology, and History, and a Masters Degree in Public Administration. To say I have a great deal of regard for the University of Washington, have so many fond memories, and continue to feel that my days there were a privilege is an understatement.
My UW experience and my values associated with it, a compassion towards others, pursuit of equity for all, being publicly engaged and informed in life, and acting in an equitable manner, those are my takeaway values I live by, those are what in part also inform my letter to you today.
As it was for me as a non-traditional student, an older, widowed woman in her 50’s, so it should be for everyone, the University of Washington should be a welcoming and safe place for students, staff, and for the people that contribute the most to the knowledge of individuals and society, and that in large part shape the collegiate experience at the UW, the faculty and the professors.
Another part which informs this letter is my lifelong devotion to and work advocating for civil and equity rights for women and minorities in society, and for the civic rights of citizens. I have worked tirelessly, for now over 40 years, and even have often self funded this work – it is one of my life’s callings – to spotlight injustice or inequities in how people or individuals are treated by institutions, governments, or others, and in so doing, if possible I devote what personal time or resources I have available to rectify a problem that has been identified. You could say I am a social justice problem solver.
It is true, justice delayed is justice denied. In this case I feel justice has been too long denied – I feel this is an important matter, that it is time to daylight what has gone, who has been doing it, and dispense with them, deliver them the “lecture” they have been intent on delivering to their target(s).
Background For over 36 years, over half of my life, I was in a complex friendship and intimate relationship with Mr. Lars Matthiesen. I met him in the Summer of 1985 and continued our relationship until December 17, 2021. Mr. Matthiesen is a member of the UW Scandinavian Advisory Board
In January of 2019 Mr. Matthiesen and I took our intimate friendship to the next level based on a mutual understanding that it was part of our plans for a long term relationship we were entering into as we aged. I am 70, he is 76.
As that relationship developed Mr. Matthiesen started incrementally revealing a side of him that for three decades, 34 years to be exact, I never knew existed. To my deep sorrow I now know he had groomed me and fooled me all those prior three decades.
The man he revealed himself to be in 2020 and then 2021, and then others came to tell me more about that along the way, based on my experience and upon information and belief I can unequivocally say that Mr. Matthiesen is a serial sexual predator, womanizer, a liar to an almost eye watering degree; and a very cold, calculating, and cruel man that uses people, predominately women, especially women of color or ethnicity, to an astonishing degree of selfishness.
That is my sorrow I have to absorb, reconcile and live with. However, there are a couple of things I would like to make amends for or make right. This situation here at the UW is one of them.
Towards the last few months of our relationship Mr. Matthiesen continued on with his reveals about his woman using, abusing, and hating side to me. During several of these conversations that is when he told me about a very devious plot of his he had been carrying out for years at the UW under the guise of him being an interested Danish cultural ambassador. Some of it he did on his own, but from what he has told me he has been assisted in his exploits by others, both within the University of Washington community, other faculty member, past and present, staff, and at large, including using or collaborating with a member of the special consul corps for the country of Denmark.
The Revenge Plan
In early September 2021 Mr. Matthiesen shocked me and told me about why he had been so interested in and sought out appointment to the UW’s Scandinavian Department advisory board. He was agitated that day after my sharing something with him details of something that to me I would never have thought could upset anybody – a social dinner honoring a published UW professor, Professor Marianne Stecher-Hansen. The Swedish Club was holding a dinner in her honor for a recently published book she had penned, and the dinner was to have a Danish theme. Nina Pedersen, a UW donor, was also central to the dinner as she had agreed to underwrite a portion of the dinner. All of the parties related to this matter, including myself, we are members of the Swedish Club.
When I told Mr. Matthiesen about the dinner and who it was for – he immediately was angered and then went on to rail against Professor Stecher-Hansen, and to tell me about his association with the UW Scandinavian advisory board, that he was on it so that he could have access to Marianne, that it was an additional and very public platform he had used to carry out his then years long vendetta of harassment Mr. Matthiesen had devised and been conducting against her.
It may seem shocking that someone would go to such a degree as this to exact revenge, to try to demean and socially torture someone, but that is what I have learned is a key trait of Mr. Matthiesen, he likes the devious plot twist, he likes to be a clearing house for the gossip, and he immerses himself in machinations and will go to what some think are long and troubled depths to satisfy his what I feel is a deep and venal obsession with dominating women in whatever way possible.
And it can go both ways depending upon where you engage with him. You might be his best friend that he expresses his undying desire and love for for decades, or if you are the woman who displeases or rejects him, or
otherwise have drawn the line against allowing Mr. Matthiesen to use you – woe be to you – again the obsession can go on for decades – and it is active.
This latter category of Lars’ Enemy is where Mr. Matthiesen has cast Professor Stecher-Hansen into. He has told me he detests her – and that he has spent years seeking out or taking advantage of people and situations that will allow Mr. Matthiesen to be in proximity to her. He told me he seeks opportunities he can capitalize on, ones where he can cause her discomfort, distress, or that he can put himself in or has others give him access to so he can be in a position of influence against her, or just be in her presence or proximity in order to make her possibly feel uncomfortable, feel his wrath, or otherwise publicly or privately humiliate or otherwise treat her in whatever demeaning way he can.i
The Revelations
As noted above, his initial revelations to me came about because he and I were talking about an upcoming dinner at the Swedish Club. On the evening of September 3, 2021 I was at the Swedish Club socializing. I was invited by the Kristine Leander, the Club’s executive director, to join her and a group of ladies in conversation and to discuss some thoughts about an upcoming dinner that was being planned to celebrate both Danish culture but also a book recently published by Marianne Stecher-Hansen, Nordic War Stories: World War II as History, Fiction, Media, and Memory. Marianne and Nina were there along with two other members.
While I was sitting at the table I got to thinking things through a little bit during this visit, I was surprised and very excited to remember that Marianne was the professor of a class I had enjoyed when I was at the UW those many years ago. It turned out she is also a member of the Swedish Club like me! While I was at the UW I took two Scandinavian Studies classes, one from Professor Emeritus Ia Dubois, the other from Professor StecherHansen during 2011 Winter Quarter.
After that evening I wanted to share my excitement with Mr. Matthiesen, the details about the planned Danish dinner, he is Danish, tell him about the connection I remembered with Professor Stecher-Hansen, and how I was excited to both attend the dinner and to hear her talk about her book. I wrote to him on September 4th , “I had a nice visit last night at Swedish Club, Kristine 1 invited me to sit with her, Nina, and Mariane, UW Professor – I’ll tell you about it all later – I took her WW II class when I was at UW, plans for a Swedish Club/Danish Club dinner a lot of other interesting talk.”2
I hadn’t expected the reaction I got from Mr. Matthiesen – resentment, anger, and an earful about his years of chasing Professor Stecher-Hansen down at whatever opportunity, spreading lies about her, and his many efforts to demean her to others, to in general cause her distress. The revelation was a stunner.
On September 16, 2021 Mr. Matthiesen and I were again talking about the plans for this Danish night dinner that featured Professor Stecher-Hansen and some of the things at the Swedish Club going on around it. To that end I wrote him, “Danish Night Dinner – well that’s part of the setup now that is one more time something that involves Malin and my interactions. Malin had asked me a couple of month’s ago to do the St. Martin’s dinner. I’ve been piecing it together, I had even looked through the old menu for it at the Swedish Club, I contacted Ann-Margaret and talked to her, but still I had not heard a lot about next steps from Malin.
“So that was the other thing Kristine and I talked about on Tuesday [9/14]. I brought up the St. Martin’s dinner and she told me that all had been changed, it was now going to be this other dinner that they were going to do with the Danish Club, with this Marianne Stecher-Hansen from the UW Scandinavian department, promoting her book.
“I mentioned to you the other day about having drinks last Friday [9/4] with Nina, Marianne, Kristine, and Carol Graves(? A heavy set gal that is part of the Swedish Club Guild). Marianne has edited a collection of stories for a book about Scandinavia and WWII.
“What was talked about was setting up a dinner so Marianne could present her book. Then to do it in conjunction with the Danish Club, getting in touch with Bodil and arranging everything. At that point it was independent of the St. Martin’s day dinner.”
- Kristine Leander, Executive Director of the Swedish Club. 2010 – 2023.
- Campbell, Elizabeth. Text message to Mr. Matthiesen. iMessage. Sep 4, 2021, 10:17 A
On September 24, 2021 when I was talking to Mr. Matthiesen he brought up Marianne again, launched into some shenanigans he had pulled related to his position with the UW advisory board, and other times and venues. He said he had others he was mobilizing from the UW to help him put a wrench into the Danish Night dinner. This is the gist of what Mr. Matthiesen said to me, “We are going to talk again tomorrow. We have been working on the Advisory Board, University of Washington Advisory Board. And I needed to have assurances that we are on the right track. There’s a lot of politics coming in and somebody is playing dirty in their faculty [Professor StecherHansen]. So we have to kind of have her put in her place. So that’s what I do. Because I’m old enough here that I know the old timers, I know the emeritusses, Those that were in charge, some of them still pull a lot of strings. And that’s what I’m good at, at figuring out who does that.”
Mr. Matthiesen also further explained some of his history with Marianne and his anger at her, he said, “I was the president of the Danish Club and I asked her to give a lecture on a literary subject, about Sandemose, to write about it. But she snubbed me and I decided to get on the board of the Scandinavian studies department and give her a lecture, and that’s what I did!”
On September 30, 2021 Mr. Matthiesen continued with his verbal rampage against Marianne. Mr. Matthiesen and I were again talking about the upcoming Danish Night dinner (to be held on October 29, 2021) at the Swedish Club. He said he was reaching out to people in the Danish community and trying to get them to not attend the dinner. I didn’t know what to say, it seemed a bit extreme that he was going to these lengths. However, Mr. Matthiesen said the ones he was talking to were not going to go to the dinner.
Then he went off on another rant about Marianne, he said, “She wouldn’t invite me [to the dinner]. She’s out of touch with the Danish community. And I talked to the dean about it. I was at a party a couple of weeks ago where there was also the chair of the Scandinavian department, and the chair emeritus Terje Leiren. Terje Leiren and I talked about it. He said yes, the reason she doesn’t have my job [Terje’s] she just carries a grudge, nobody likes her. He said yes, she’s hot headed, that’s the reason she doesn’t have my job. She carries a grudge, everybody is afraid of her. Nobody likes her.”
As I took this all in I realized that this was an ongoing, devious and certainly a terrible effort Mr. Matthiesen had gone to to hurt Marianne professionally and personally.
The Implications The reality is, I absolutely believe this is what Mr. Matthiesen has done. As much of a fantasist as he is I do believe his story about how he sought out and got himself on the UW Scandinavian Studies Advisory Board, and how he has used it all these years as a platform to focus on and in his own words harass a woman now for years. And truth be told, unfortunately based on what I know now, it is highly likely that Mr. Matthiesen uses his
advisory board position and associated meetings and activities as an opportunity to seek other opportunities to ferret out women young or old opportunities, that he can groom, engage in assorted grooming activities, and/or otherwise do the sexual harassing activities has spent an inordinate amount of time seeking and engaging in through the years – again in his own words.
Mr. Matthiesen does have a history of being a serial board member, joining boards and using his position on them to bully, create dissent, and engage in machinations and subterfuge. I honestly believe his board and committee activities have very little to do with civic or social awareness and contribution. According to what he has told me alone, he has done the same at the Scan Design Foundation, the Danish Club, the Swedish Club, the NW Danish Association (formerly the Danish Foundation), and the Scandinavian Studies Advisory Board. If all or part of this is true, they are part of or have been the platform for this pattern of harassment, sexual and otherwise, and gaslighting behavior Mr. Matthiesen has described vividly and often to me.
I have also confirmed Mr. Matthiesen’s efforts related to the UW’s Scandinavian Advisory Board, and what he had told me about seeking the revenge agains Professor Stecher-Hansen. It was all true.ii
On December 18, 2021 I wrote an email to Marianne about my concerns about what Mr. Matthiesen had told me he had been doing to her, about the efforts by “certain influences” to harm her standing at the UW. I did not name Mr. Matthiesen by name in that email. I made only a general reference to a person. Even with the scant details Marianne immediately pegged who it was that I was talking about! On December 20 th she replied, “Regarding the other matter, I can imagine that a font of gossip and half-truths (and worse) spill from a certain source (likely L.M.) in the Danish community – and that has always been the case — certain ‘influences’ as you say. There are some people in the world who like to stay ‘popular’ or remain ‘interesting’ by inventing stories about other people; usually these stories will teach you more about them than about the subjects that they malign.”
Involving Other People
During these conversations between him and I Mr. Matthiesen implicated UW Scandinavian Studies faculty, the department head, and several others who he said were in on it with him, the targeting of Professor StecherHansen; including that it sounds like they had their own axes to grind against her even. The whole things sounds pretty vicious, unbecoming, and certainly does not rise to the level of furthering academic inquiry and integrity at the University of Washington.
I believe this all should be thoroughly investigated, and request that it be investigated, if nothing else on the basis of my being a taxpayer interested in a public institution being operated with integrity, that it exists as a safe place for everyone.
Mr. Matthiesen made references to the dates of and things what he had done to manipulate or muscle others into doing his bidding against the Marianne in 2021, as well as he even implicated a special consul to Denmark from Houston, Texas, Anna Thomsen Holliday.
Mr. Matthiesen told me that Ms. Holliday and the people in the Danish government were helping him both to get Mr. Matthiesen’s revenge against Marianne, and to help him to also force the UW’s Scandinavian Department to put Mark Schleck on the UW Scandinavian Department Advisory Board.
So intent upon achieving his vengeful and power struggle goals and wanting to tell me all about it, this is when Mr. Matthiesen finally told me about why he had uncharacteristically returned so quickly to Denmark in early August, 2021. Mr. Matthiesen told me he had had to get to Denmark in order to have a meeting about Professor Stecher-Hansen, and about getting Mark Schleck appointed to the UW advisory board. He said he had a meeting scheduled with a representative from the Danish foreign office and with Ms. Holliday.
After elaborating on how he had put this meeting together, he was very specific about how he had arranged things and who he had arranged them with, then who had been in attendance, and what all he felt he had accomplished with everyone. Mr. Matthiesen told me that the Danish government was going to intervene and remonstrate with the UW about holding up Mr. Schleck’s appointment and exert pressure on the UW to put Professor Stecher-Hansen in her place! Mr. Matthiesen’s very words.
Personally, if all this is true, I was offended at the temerity of it all, including that the Danish government would overreach and think that it could come to the U.S., to the UW, and make such demands.
As much of a prevaricator as Mr. Matthiesen is, there are things he says which are true; his claims of what he has done to hurt Professor Stecher-Hansen – I believe this is one of Mr. Matthiesen’s perverse traits, he prides himself on being what he thinks of himself as, a slyly covert person who is tricking people – being what the rest of us think of as being sneaky and underhanded, and then his telling you, someone all about it!
Despite of what any of us might think, or the self evident nature of what it Mr. Matthiesen is doing, hurting people, women, he still wants people to know about what is a perverse point of pride for him, his deceiving, hurting, and otherwise socially or otherwise molesting predominately women spiritually, socially, in their careers, or physically.
By extension, I have also learned, in his own words, that Mr. Matthiesen is also proud of being a sexual predator. He even claims in moments of faux contrition that he is somehow a damaged person, he often stated to me, clear to 2023, “I’m a bad man,” acting as if his self-implication is laudable, while also being a justification for what he does. He has told me many a time how he is compelled in these behaviors, either his nature or by the failings of others in his eyes – that’s what makes him do the bad behavior.
Mr. Matthiesen often passes himself off as the victim, especially and despite 44 years in this country/community Mr. Matthiesen plays on a stereotypical version of the dumb immigrant card – claiming he doesn’t understand the customs or speak the language well. Therefore rather than his being intentional with his actions, and more importantly, he is culturally clumsy, stumbling and bumbling through these activities he engages in.
However, Mr. Matthiesen always goes on to resume and continue his preferred patterns of behavior, hurting others. In this instance it is Professor Stecher-Hansen.
The final and astonishing part I have found in all this, the involvement of other people that enable his behavior.
I’ve learned that Mr. Matthiesen’s penchant for abusing women, for being a sexual predator of the first degree, the grooming, the pawing of women, his back rubs, grabbing the boobs, and especially his almost trademarked “big hugs” he gives women, he is noted for that in many social circles – unfortunately I learned that it all has gone on for decades – at his work, in business and in social circles around Seattle, among friends, that is his reputation, well known – including by his wife, his business associates, the leaders of the organizations he belongs to, the members of them, his friends, and family.
However, despite knowing this, there are quite a few people in these circles of acquaintances, friends, and colleagues that circle the wagons around him when an incident comes up like what I am describing here. They often chalk off his behavior with a smile or chuckle, it is “just what Lars does,” the proverbial wink and a nod, men-will-be-men excuse, and they go on to protect and by extension enable his behavior.
That is what I believe has emboldened Mr. Matthiesen to do these things all these years – the bubble of wellconnected, self interested, and maybe uninformed or un enlightened excuse his behavior and protect him.
In closing, no person, no woman should have had to endure what is years of animus by this man, his at best, “boorish behavior”. I hope that you will devote an appropriate amount of University of Washington time and resources towards investigating this matter and give all concerned relief and resolution, as well as if possible restore their sense of well-being – and maybe even their good name. I feel this is a matter involving the UW’s honor as it were.
The University of Washington should be a safe place, not a hunting or proving ground for social or sexual predators. And I have to add this, life’s tough enough, I wouldn’t want anyone’s mother, grandmother, daughter, granddaughter, sister, or female friend, be they students or staff, subjected to or exposed to this kind of person, this person – it’s not nice and trust me, it’s very demoralizing and at some levels a demeaning experience.
Thank you for your time and consideration of my letter.
Sincerely,
Elizabeth Campbell
Note: I am informed and fully aware that this communication will be subject to Washington’s public disclosure law(s) and am providing you here and will in the future provide without reservation my consent to my communication(s) about this matter being released or published in whole or in part to others internally or to the public-at-large.
cc: Stephanie Court, Executive Assistant
End Notes:
I.
In my conversations with Mr. Matthiesen about this, a large part of this narrative that he has worked out is that he justifies his vicious treatment of Professor Stecher-Hansen by claiming that because many years ago she was a highly valued member of him and his family, his wife, his son Hans and daughter Anne Mette, his turning on Marianne and treating her in whatever disdainful way he can, he says this is proof he is justified – her transgressions against “him” or others was/is so great that Mr. Matthiesen would be pardoned for all that he has done; the rationale, Marianne’s transgressions against Mr Matthiesen are so great that it is exceptional that he would be harassing her. That is his logic and justification.
According to Mr. Matthiesen, Professor Stecher-Hansen at one time was best friends with his wife, Yara Silva, who in turn was the godmother of one of Professor Stecher-Hansen’s children. In this self-exculpatory narrative Mr. Matthiesen has cooked up he goes on to extol the virtue of Professor Stecher-Hansen’s mother, her former husband, and in part her children, they are all wonderful in his eyes, the mother and former husband were admirable. He tells about how he and his wife took care of one of Marianne’s sons, employed him even.
According to his narrative it is only because Marianne is a person of the worst degree that he is doing this. He went on to tell me that all this is exceptional that he is stalking her and treating her this way. In classic blame-the-victim style, according to Mr. Matthiesen it is Professor Stecher-Hansen who has made Mr. Matthiesen do what he is doing.
ii
On the evening of December 20th Professor Stecher-Hansen and I talked on the phone for an hour and a half about what had been going on, the assorted things that Mr. Matthiesen and his wife had done to her, to her family, to others for that matter, as well as she shared with me a fair amount of background information about Mr. Matthiesen, including the practically revolving door of affairs he has conducted, including with his and his wife’s attorney, his penchant for drawing women in and using them, abusing them, and then if they didn’t remain friends with him, subjecting them to whatever harassment he could come up with.
January 25, 2023
University of Washington Public Records and Open Meetings 4311 11th Ave NE Suite 360 Box 354997 Seattle, WA 98105 pubrec@uw.edu
Department of Scandinavian Studies University of Washington 318 Raitt Hall, Box 353420 Seattle, WA 98195-3420 Telephone: (206) 543-0645 Fax: (206) 685-9173 uwscand@uw.edu
Re: Scandinavian Studies Advisory Board (“Advisory Board”) Lars C. Matthiesen, Advisory Board Member
I am making a public disclosure request for the following documents:
- All documents related to the Advisory Board’s meetings, gatherings of every kind, or social events (any or all of which may have been held on or off the University of Washington campus), including but not limited to list(s) of meeting invitees and attendees, meeting minutes and any related handouts or meeting materials for each, meeting or event planning including the costs or expenses thereof; all held between January 1, 2018 to January 15, 2023.
- All documents related to the appointment(s) of Mr. Matthiesen to the advisory board and or his retention as a member of the advisory board; no time constraint.
- All documents related to any monetary or in-kind donations made by Mr. Matthiesen and/or Yara Silva to the University of Washington and or to any UW affiliated foundations, subsidiaries, or other spinoffs derived from it or related to the Scandinavian Studies department or its parent department; no time constraint.
- All documents regarding any subject that reference in any way Lars Matthiesen or Yara Silva; no time constraint.
- All documents regarding any subject that reference in any way Mark Schleck and the Scandinavian Studies Advisory Board; specifically related to Mr. Schleck becoming a member of the Advisory Board. Between January 1, 2019 to January 15, 2023.
- All documents exchanged between the government of Denmark and/or its special consul Holliday, and the UW Scandinavian Studies Department; January 1, 2019 to January 15, 2023.
Thank you in advance for your time and consideration of my request; please let me know at your earliest convenience if you require any clarifications from me about the documents requested. One request I would like to make is that any PDF’s released pursuant to this request not be compiled into a portfolio, and I am requesting that all documents be in their native electronic format and remain searchable.
Elizabeth A. Campbell, MPA