by Kyle Hopkins, Anchorage Daily News, and Casey Grove, Alaska Public Media

This article contains descriptions of sexual violence.

This article was produced for ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network in partnership with the Anchorage Daily News and Alaska Public Media. Sign up for Dispatches to get stories like this one as soon as they are published.

The Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race on Thursday voted to disqualify a former champion from this year’s event following accusations he sexually assaulted multiple women.

The decision on Brent Sass, 44, came nearly four months after the race received a letter from an official at Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates Alaska on behalf of women who the letter writer said had accused Sass of sexual assault. The unanimous vote by the Iditarod Trail Committee Board also came a week after Alaska Public Media, the Anchorage Daily News and ProPublica first asked it about sexual assault allegations against Sass. The news organizations sent the Iditarod additional questions on Wednesday, and other outlets have made inquiries.

Sass denied the accusations in an interview on Tuesday with the newsrooms. “It’s all made up. None of this is true,” he said. “This is because they want to ruin my career.”

The Iditarod Trail Committee Board said its decision was based on the race rulebook’s personal conduct policy, which includes the statement, “Musher conduct that is recklessly injurious to the Iditarod, Iditarod competitors, sponsors or anyone associated with the race is strictly prohibited.” The 2024 event begins on March 2.

Sass on Friday posted a message on social media linking the disqualification to sexual assault allegations.

“You are giving the accusers exactly what they are hoping for and in the end this hurts the actual victims of sexual abuse and the sport of mushing,” he wrote. He did not respond to requests for comment after he was disqualified.

Sass, who won the Iditarod in 2022, was the second competitor to be disqualified this week by the race’s board. It said on Monday it would not allow musher Eddie Burke Jr., who faced a felony domestic violence charge, to compete, but the Iditarod reversed itself Friday after the state Department of Law said it was dropping the case. Burke said on Facebook that he is innocent.

The Planned Parenthood letter about Sass did not provide the names of any accusers. Independently, the newsrooms spoke with two women who said that Sass forced them to have sex within otherwise consensual sexual relationships that took place more than a decade ago. The newsrooms typically do not name people who allege sexual violence unless they choose to be named. The women did not file complaints with the police nor did they file lawsuits against Sass, who has not been charged with a crime.

The news organizations obtained correspondence and conducted interviews indicating the women shared information in the past about the events they are now describing. The accounts these sources provided generally supported what the two women say now.

One of the accusers said that on one occasion, Sass choked her and forced her to have sexual intercourse after she told him no. A different time, she said he forced her to have anal sex. She said on both occasions she was unable to physically stop Sass. Two of the woman’s friends also spoke to the newsrooms and, in separate conversations, said she had told them years prior about Sass having nonconsensual sex with her. The newsrooms also obtained a sworn and notarized statement that the woman prepared saying Sass had twice sexually assaulted her.

The second woman told the news organizations that Sass hit and slapped her during sex without her consent, forced her to perform oral sex on multiple occasions and forced her to have intercourse in one case after she said no. She provided the newsrooms with a letter from the Interior Alaska Center for Non-Violent Living dated Dec. 30 stating that in 2015 she had been a client of the Fairbanks domestic violence shelter, which describes itself as a provider of support and advocacy for victims of domestic violence and sexual assault, and had “identified Brent Sass as her abuser.” The woman also provided three emails sent over a two-year period telling friends and family that Sass had sexually assaulted her.

The first accuser said she didn’t go to the police at the time because she was not thinking clearly, depended on Sass for shelter at his remote dog kennel and worked for him. She said it took her time to realize what happened to her was wrong.

The second accuser said she considered going to the police but had little faith it would do any good. “Our society is highly prone to victim shaming,” she wrote to a family member at the time.

Dog mushing is the official state sport in Alaska, where sexual assault rates are highest in the nation. The Iditarod, a 1,000-mile race across the........

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