USC has settled a lawsuit with a former high-ranking athletic department official who alleged the university allowed former athletic director Mike Bohn to racially harass and discriminate against her, then fired her when she voiced concerns about Bohn’s behavior.
Joyce Bell Limbrick was the highest-ranking Black and female official in USC’s athletic department when she was fired by the university in September 2023, four months after Bohn resigned amid an internal investigation into his conduct and the culture of the department. Bell Limbrick filed suit early last year, accusing USC of wrongful termination.
That dispute was settled out of court this week. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.
When reached by The Times, Bell-Limbrick declined to comment. Bohn has never publicly addressed the allegations.
While the lawsuit never made it to trial, it nonetheless offered the most detailed account yet of the conduct that led to Bohn’s resignation.
Bell Limbrick filed a Title IX complaint with the university against Bohn in October 2022, after an incident in which she says Bohn punched her on the arm at a USC volleyball match. That complaint ultimately compelled an investigation, during which, according to her complaint, Bell Limbrick told USC officials of “Bohn’s history and rumors of inappropriate and unwanted touching involving … other females at both Cincinnati and USC.”
The university hired an outside law firm that specializes in institutional responses to racial and sexual harassment and discrimination to investigate Bohn five months later. The Times learned of that investigation shortly thereafter, as well as a previous investigation into Bohn’s conduct at Cincinnati, and in May, asked both Bohn and USC about those concerns.
Bohn resigned a day later.
Soon after that, the university fired Bell Limbrick, citing “a pattern of poor performance.” She was the only member of an 11-member executive team to lose her job and, according to the complaint, had just been awarded a “merit increase” on account of her “overall job performance.”
Bell Limbrick worked at USC for nine years, initially as the director of athletic compliance, before Bohn was hired in 2019. Shortly after he became athletic director, Bohn promoted Bell Limbrick to senior woman administrator, one of the highest-ranking positions in the department. According to her complaint, she had been one of the few Black women to hold such a position at a major American university.
“Ms. Bell Limbrick had a thriving career at USC and she loved her work. Then, Mike Bohn arrived,” her attorney, J. Bernard Alexander, said in a statement in 2025.
”[Bohn’s] incessant, racially charged remarks made Joyce feel uncomfortable and undervalued, but more than that — he actively isolated her from the executive team and undermined her work. She already was vulnerable as the only Black woman on the team, and rather than support her, the university allowed Bohn to make her life hell.”
Her complaint detailed inappropriate comments made in front of USC donors and staff, as well as insensitive or discriminatory remarks made in her presence. At the time, the Times spoke with six people with knowledge of the department’s inner workings who largely corroborated her claims about Bohn’s conduct.
Bohn declined to respond to The Times’ questions about his conduct leading the athletic department, but he provided a statement to The Times on the day of his resignation in May 2023 stating he would “always be proud of leading the program out of the most tumultuous times in the history of the profession.”
“In moving on, it is important now that I focus on being present with my treasured family, addressing ongoing health challenges, and reflecting on how I can be impactful in the future,” Bohn said in the statement.
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