Former PSU fencer sues Penn State, coach for alleged abuse

A former fencer at Pennsylvania State University has alleged in a federal lawsuit that her coach abused her with gibes about her weight and fencing talent and even dismissed her fear she had suffered a concussion.

Zara Moss, 22, once an Olympic hopeful from Pittsburgh, said Wes Glon, a coach at Penn State since 1985, injured her by forcing her to spar against him without protective equipment when she was a freshman and repeatedly disparaged her as too heavy, telling her she was “better when she was skinny,” according to the suit, filed Monday in the Middle District of Pennsylvania.

The coach, according to the suit, also told Moss she was a waste of his time and scholarship money and was “not good anymore” because she “needed a boyfriend.” And he prohibited her from seeking medical attention when she thought she had a concussion, instead accusing her of being emotional and sensitive because she was having her period, which she wasn’t, the lawsuit states.

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“Ultimately, I want to shed light on the situation to prevent any future student athletes ... from having to endure the trauma that I was put through,” said Moss, who got her bachelor’s in corporate innovation and entrepreneurship last May and works as an account coordinator for Del Monte Foods in Pittsburgh.

Both Penn State and Glon declined comment.

Glon is the same coach who was accused by North Carolina fencing coach Jennifer Oldham of failing to report a sexual-misconduct complaint she made against one of his assistants. The Denver-based U.S. Center for SafeSport, a monitoring agency, suspended Glon for three years last August in that case and Penn State placed him on interim suspension. But the SafeSport suspension was overturned in November and Glon instead received a six-month probation. Penn State reinstated him as coach at that time. Oldham has also brought a lawsuit, filing it in May 2020.

» READ MORE: Penn State fencing coach reinstated with probation for failing to report sexual misconduct

Moss, a four-time all American on the Division 1 team, said it was her dream to attend Penn State from where her mother and other family graduated. She first met Glon at a Penn State fencing camp when she was in sixth grade and he took an interest in her, eventually offering her a full scholarship, the suit says.

When she got to Penn State, the abuse began, she said. Glon treated female fencers like “second-class citizens,” forcing them to compete through injuries, while “prioritizing” his male athletes and allowing them time to heal, the suit alleges. Moss said she disclosed his treatment of her to a Penn State psychologist during her sophomore year but instructed him not to say anything because she feared it would hurt her career if she opposed Glon, a former Olympic coach with wide connections whose Penn State team for years has been a national contender.

Moss first went public with some of her allegations in a TikTok post when she was a senior in March 2021 and no longer feared Glon. That was the same month she made a complaint to Penn State’s Robert Boland, the former athletic integrity officer. Boland said the school had received other reports of sex discrimination on the team, threw up his hands, and remarked, “Well, it’s hard to find fencing coaches,” the suit says. Boland advised her to wait before pursuing her complaint rather than “rocking the boat” before the national championships, the suit said.

A university spokesperson declined comment when asked whether the school had investigated the complaint or taken any action.

Moss has also since filed a pending complaint with SafeSport, she said.

Moss can barely hold a sabre now and has developed an eating disorder, according to the suit.

“I haven’t fenced in a year because of panic attacks and I still have nightmares,” she said.