Freeh also found that "although concern to treat the child abuser humanely was expressly stated, no such sentiments were ever expressed" by university officials, including Paterno and the university president, for Sandusky’s victims. The report says that five boys were assaulted by Sandusky on university property after officials knew about a 1998 criminal investigation.
Spanier never declared Sandusky a “persona non grata” on Penn State campuses as he did toward a sports agent who, before the 1997 Citrus Bowl, bought $400 worth of clothing for a Penn State football player. Spanier was very agressive in that case and banned the agent from campus. Spanier said the agent “fooled around with the integrity of the university, and I won’t stand for that.”You can hardly find a more blatant example of what actually matters to an institution -- the 1997 incident threatened the football program, while Sandusky's crimes only threatened a bunch of kids.
"Today with the report released by Judge Louis Freeh, the Penn State Board of Trustees delivered on the commitment we made last November when we engaged Judge Freeh to conduct an independent investigation into the University's actions regarding former Penn State employee, Jerry Sandusky, and the handling of allegations of the child abuse crimes of which he has since been found guilty.This afternoon's press conference should be very interesting.
Judge Freeh and his team conducted a rigorous, eight-month investigation into all aspects of the University's actions to determine where breakdowns occurred and what changes should be made for the future. We like many others have eagerly anticipated Judge Freeh's Report of the findings of his investigation.
His report has just been released at http://thefreehreportonpsu.com/ and we currently are reviewing his findings and recommendations. We expect a comprehensive analysis of our policies, procedures and controls related to identifying and reporting crimes and misconduct, including failures or gaps that may have allowed alleged misconduct to go undetected or unreported. We will provide our initial response later today.
We want to ensure we are giving the report careful scrutiny and consideration before making any announcements or recommendations. We are convening an internal team comprising the Board of Trustees, University administration and our legal counsel to begin analyzing the report and digesting Judge Freeh's findings.
As we anticipate the review and approval process will take some time, our initial response and immediate next steps will be presented at 3:30 at the Dayton/Taylor Conference Room at the Hilton Scranton & Conference Center.
These top-line reactions will provide an overview of our process for developing and implementing a plan once we have studied the report and have a better understanding of what it means and how we can implement findings to strengthen Penn State's role as a leading academic institution and ensure that what occurred will never be allowed to happen again." *
CBS Philly -- Vote: Should The Joe Paterno Statue At Penn State Come Down? Currently: 69.5% | Yes.posted by ericb at 9:19 AM on July 12, 2012
Star-Ledger -- Should Penn State take down Joe Paterno statue on campus? Poll. Currently: 75.36% | Yes.
NESN -- Vote: Should Penn State's Joe Paterno Statue Be Taken Down? Currently: 66.94% | Yes.
*A retirement agreement with Sandusky is reached in June 1999, including an unusual lump sum payment of $168,000, an agreement for the University to "work collaboratively" with Sandusky on Second Mile and other community activities, and free lifetime use of East Area Locker Room facilities.The football program, here, had an opportunity to quickly and discreetly get rid of Sandusky - give him the regular retirement package and say Bon Voyage. But instead they argued for a 'precedent-setting' emeritus rank.
*As the retirement package is being finalized, Curley requests the emergency re-hire of Sandusky for the 1999 football season, which is approved.
*In August 1999, Sandusky is granted "emeritus" rank, which carries several privileges, including access to University recreational facilities. Documents show the unusual request for emeritus rank originated from Schultz, was approved by Spanier, and granted by the Provost, who expressed some uneasiness about the decision given Sandusky's low academic rank and the precedent that would be set.
ABOUT THIS PROJECTposted by tonycpsu at 11:18 AM on July 12, 2012
NO ACT OF OURS has filmed since the story broke in early November and follows several Penn State students and the community in their quest for truth and justice. The film includes interviews with numerous State College community members, including sports fans, Penn State faculty, politicians, lawyers, and abuse survivors. NO ACT OF OURS examines what it means to be part of the “Penn State family” and how that family, like any other, deals with a member committing horrendous criminal acts.
This film makes the audience confront the question of what they would do if they witnessed or suspected someone close to them sexually abuse a child. Would they intervene? Why might they wait or simply not intervene at all? We discover that when loyalty is involved, doing the right thing is complicated. NO ACT OF OURS aims to hold a mirror up to a community reflecting their struggles with loyalty and feelings of betrayal.
In nearly every interview, the question of loyalty emerges. What am I loyal to if the administration I looked up to didn’t fulfill their legal responsibility to report alleged child sexual abuse? Can I be a loyal Penn Stater while also being critical of how the situation was handled? Betrayal also emerges from alumni feeling angry at the university and board of trustees for firing Joe Paterno, for administrators not reporting the allegations to police, and not to mention, from the alleged victims being betrayed by Jerry Sandusky as they were showered with gifts only to be subjected to serial abuse.
This scandal has drawn tremendous local and national media attention and is described as the biggest scandal in college football history. NO ACT OF OURS captures not just the facts of the case that the media has reported but takes the story further by immersing the viewer inside the community. This film demands that not just Penn State but the nation reflect on the pervasiveness of child sexual abuse in society. It takes a even closer look at why this crime is so underreported.
On the academic side, Penn State athletics annually contributes about $225,000 to university programming just from its cut of the Big Ten Network profits; those profits, of course, are predominantly driven by football telecasts. Athletics spends nearly $3 million on scholarships for football players alone, and that’s just for students attending the university. Home football games generate an estimated economic impact of over $55 million each year for the local economy. Remove those games, and you also remove the single reason why many local businesses are able to thrive during the football season.Is that "enough"? Reasonable people can disagree, but the fact remains that some money does make its way to the non-athletic parts of the university. Also, there really are prestige benefits that accrue directly and measurably.
I don't think deterrence through harsh punishment is ever effective. Do you think there's some coach who's watching the Penn State thing and thinking, "Well, if all that's going to happen if it comes out is that half the coaching staff and administration (including me) will be arrested and the program will get put through a years-long brutally embarrassing scandal in which I'll end up best known as a craven, pathetic enabler and unemployable hypocrite, why not cover up a molestation scandal?"Yeah, the next person in Mike McQuery's position isn't going to think "Shit, I better report this, and if that doesn't work I'll need to report it again and again until someone does something". They're going to think "I should probably just not tell anyone what I saw, if I value my future career". This guy's life is basically over because he reported what he saw to authorities that were conspiring to keep it covered up (which he was unaware of)
I also don't think that threatening severe punishment is likely to frighten wrongdoers into repenting as much as it's likely to frighten them into doubling-down on their attempts to cover up their sins and the sins of their subordinates.
My solution: make NCAA student athletics programs 100% student run and operated. Student coaches, student assistants, student administrators. No full-time salaried employees at all... in other words no Joe Paternos to worship and revere. The budgets would automatically fall and them with them the cover-ups, scandals, and greed. Just pure amateur athletics.The budgets come from ticket sales and donations. I don't see why making the whole thing student run would make people stop going to the games or donating. All you'd be doing is putting teenagers (and people in their early 20s) with little personal investment in charge of million dollar budgets. That sounds like a recipe for disaster to me. "Student Run" and "Professional" are hardly synonymous. There are all kinds of goofball scandals involving student government, but they usually involve pretty small stakes.
In my mind it's a collective crime, so I have no problem with collective punishment. It wasn't just the few who actually committed crimes who are at fault, it was the many who produced a culture that allowed and encouraged those crimes.
sotonohito: "tonycpsu I haven't seen anyone suggesting killing Penn State University, have I missed something?Try reading the thread. At least two comments have called for shutting down the entire university.
And I honestly wonder if the lack of concern was because they were boys? It just feels that this was ignored and more shameful to the school's eyes because of the victims' gender. -- stormpooper---
This all makes me feel so bummed and terrified. I can't shake the feeling that there's some freaky gendered crap happening here, where if the victims were all little girls, people would stop still trying to minimize what happened to them. But because they were little boys, and we have a lot of vague, contradictory beliefs about The Ways In Which Male Sexuality Is Different, it's somehow, you know... it's bad, but it's not as bad.-- thehmsbeagleI seriously doubt it. I think male on male sexual abuse tends to squick people (or at least men) out most of all, because of the fear that it "turns kids gay". I think it has more to do with the gender of the abuser then the gender of the victim.
If I rob a bank and die, I'm pretty sure that the money I stole isn't going to be distributed as part of my inheritance.Just ask the people who got scammed by Enron. That's exactly what happened. Ken Lay died, all the current lawsuits ended. I'm not sure what happens in the bank robbery situation, obviously if you get shot on the way out of the bank, the money would go back to the bank. If you got away with it, had the money all squared away in bank accounts under your name, if you were caught and put on trial and died half way through (suicide, whatever), I'm pretty sure the money would still be distributed to your heirs.
I imagine that similar statutes are in effect here... otherwise, you'd probably have a lot more terminally-ill people acting out the plot of Breaking Bad to ensure their family's financial security with minimal risk to themselves...
Penn State, Bain Capital, and American Lying Inc.Comparing Mitt Romney to a guy covering up child abuse? Classy.
The NCAA reiterated Thursday that it will wait to make any decisions on penalties for Penn State after a report criticized school officials for failing to act appropriately to sex abuse allegations against Jerry Sandusky.posted by ericb at 1:35 PM on July 12, 2012
... NCAA vice president for communications Bob Williams released a statement minutes after the report led by former FBI director Louis Freeh was made public.
"Like everyone else, we are reviewing the final report for the first time today. As President Emmert wrote in his November 17th letter to Penn State President Rodney Erickson and reiterated this week, the university has four key questions, concerning compliance with institutional control and ethics policies, to which it now needs to respond. Penn State's response to the letter will inform our next steps, including whether or not to take further action. We expect Penn State's continued cooperation in our examination of these issues."
Whether Penn State's failure to act after allegations were made against Sandusky, who was a football assistant under Paterno from 1969 to 1999, will cause sanctions is unknown.
The main issue will be whether the concealing of the allegations will lead to a finding of lack of institutional control. That type of violation typically will draw the ire of the NCAA and result in serious penalties.
Also critical will be Penn State's cooperation in the case. The NCAA looks favorably at schools that work with the organization to uncover all the facts in an investigation.
"... [L]ast week brought a bombshell that shook the proceedings: Matt Sandusky, 33, was now willing to testify that the man he first met through the Second Mile charity repeatedly molested him while he was a child [starting at age 8], according to Matt Sandusky's lawyers. The revelation kept Jerry Sandusky from taking the stand in his own defense." *posted by ericb at 1:50 PM on July 12, 2012 [3 favorites]
backwords: CBrachyrhynchos 2: Campus police no longer have jurisdiction when it comes to major felonies committed by faculty or staff.So, what's your point? That they shouldn't have bothered to report it? You have no way of knowing what would have happened, regardless of your opinion of the local cops - even if you're right about their incompetence and insularity.
The community surrounding Penn State is so insular and so wrapped up in the university that refering criminal issues to the local police could lead nowhere as well. Also, the local State College police aren't exactly top notch and are used to dealing with drunk college students, not major felonies.
delmoi: This guy's life is basically over because he reported what he saw to authorities that were conspiring to keep it covered up (which he was unaware of)Incorrect. 100% wrong. This guy's career is basically over because he only reported it to someone outside of law enforcement, and he did nothing - nothing - to follow up on it, which was his moral responsibility as a human.
backwords: The community surrounding Penn State is so insular and so wrapped up in the university that refering criminal issues to the local police could lead nowhere as well. Also, the local State College police aren't exactly top notch and are used to dealing with drunk college students, not major felonies.Part of the problem is that local police are campus police. I guess it depends on the state, but in most states campus police are real police officers with regular police powers. But they're run by the university, so it's an obvious conflict of interest. The same problem could crop up if a politician or someone was molesting children, if you have machine style politics in a town. In a functioning democracy that information would get leaked to the press/opposition, whereas with a university it's not democratic.
Incorrect. 100% wrong. This guy's career is basically over because he only reported it to someone outside of law enforcement, and he did nothing - nothing - to follow up on it, which was his moral responsibility as a human.Right, his career is over because he reported it. Had he not reported it, nothing would have happened to him. So punishing him for reporting it is a bad idea. (And how is that "100% wrong"? What does that even mean? Most people would consider "their life" over if they were no longer employable in the job that they had spent their life training for.)
"A culture of reverence for the football program that is ingrained at all levels of the campus community."An institution of Higher Education should have a culture of reverence for learning, knowledge, human development, truth, and more. Penn is a Football Team that happens to have a University (why, yes, I *am* exaggerating)
MSNBC
Of course he knew what McQueary told him, and he told the athletic director and the head of campus police about it, but nothing I saw in the presentment or in the initial flurry of news coverage made anything resembling a clear case that Paterno knew about the cover-up, which is what I'm talking about when I say there was a rush to judgement.Reality made the case that Joe knew about the cover up.
delmoi: Right, his career is over because he reported it. Had he not reported it, nothing would have happened to him. So punishing him for reporting it is a bad idea.Nothing, except for possibly serving time for covering up a child's rape. Two are already under indictment for doing so (lying to the Grand Jury), and more may follow. But, yeah, other than potentially serving a felony sentence, nothing.
Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish: But had he not reported it, nobody would have known he saw anything. I think that's the point.Ah. Well, for McQueary, that is true. For everyone else, it's not true - so McQueary's "lesson" is only useful if you see someone committing a crime, and have the opportunity to walk away unnoticed.
Etrigan: No one would be suggesting that the professor's entire department be closed down either.Your analogy is incomplete.
If the department leaders had engaged in an illegal cover-up while allowing the perpetrator to stick around and continue abusing people? Yeah, they would be.
Nonsense. If a Professor of German at Penn State had committed these acts and the Chair of the Department of German Language and Literature had covered it up, the Chair would be fired. No one would suggest that German should never be taught at Penn State again -- hell, no one would even suggest that German shouldn't be taught for ten, five or even two years.
Amy Davidson for the New YorkerBy advising Sandusky, rather than the authorities, that they knew about the February 9, 2001 assault, they exposed this victim to additional harm because only Sandusky knew the child victim’s identity at the time.What happened to that child? We don’t know; neither the university nor the prosecutors got his name. We do know that a jury agreed that something terrible had happened to him in that shower. And we know that Sandusky would have realized that the boy could be a witness against him. How did he treat the boy afterward? Based on the pattern of victims, he was likely someone Sandusky go to know through Second Mile, which was meant to help vulnerable children who came from difficult homes. Apart from possibly threatening or intimidating the boy (something he did to other victims), did Sandusky, over the next years, do anything to shape the boy’s life, to make him less credible—to direct him to grow into the kind of man whom others might not believe? A push, a word, a bad choice at a key juncture: whoever that boy became, or never had a chance to become, Sandusky helped make him. So did Penn State.
The report makes it clear that Penn State football was Sandusky’s bait. The administrators repeatedly approved Sandusky’s requests to make his connection to the university real and visible, both as part of his retirement package—negotiated just months after the 1998 incident—and long afterward. He was able to offer children sideline access and tickets, camps and clinics on university property, and Second Mile-Penn State playing cards. Football players regularly volunteered for Second Mile.posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 9:58 AM on July 13, 2012
I don’t care if Michael Jackson freaked off with little boys or not. It doesn’t bother me. Fuck those kids. And fuck their greedy parents too. What’s important to me is that Michael is the greatest entertainer who ever lived. Bar none. Watch him dance; pay attention to the showmanship. No one ever came close. Elvis was a bogus white guy with sex appeal and good looks who ripped off a lot of great black music, watered it down, and made it safe for lame whites who couldn't handle the experience of raw, emotional black music. Never grew as an artist; remained an entertainer. Fuck Elvis. Sammy Davis Jr.? Nice try. Ordinary dancer, ordinary singer, second-rate impressionist. I also didn’t like the insincere sincerity. But he was a nice man, personally; I give him credit for that. Frank Sinatra? Great singer of songs, among the best. Superb musician. Grew as an artist. No showmanship, though. Arrogant, too. And mean to ordinary people. Fuck him. Michael Jackson buries them all. I say give him a bunch of kids and let him dance.I've never been sure if Carlin was joking or not. But I do know that a lot of people would, completely seriously, say the same about Paterno. And because of that nothing will change. I have no idea what it'd take to make things change. Raped kids aren't enough, that's self evident. I'm not sure murdered kids would be enough.
localroger: The thing is, Penn State didn't just have a football program; it had a cult. It's not just a matter of punishing individuals; the cult itself and its perceived importance is what seduced the leaders into committing there awful mistake, and it is the cult which must be taken down a peg if not destroyed. There is no way to do that without hurting the cultists.Very well put. People at every level and station at Penn State and the wider community (from the university leadership to the community police down to the janitors) valued football above all else (above basic human decency, NCAA rules, and even the law) and were more concerned about harming the football program than harming children.
From her office on campus in the Agricultural Analytical Services Laboratory, university employee Donna Maurer saw the plane flying over after her boss alerted her and her co-workers about it. For her, what was most upsetting was that “someone would have the nerve to do it.”That comment and those feelings make me shiver and quail inside. I don't even understand the rational though process that would cause someone to think much less say something like that. If anyone is responsible for putting "bad, negative light on the university" it is not the author of the banner.
“We’ve all suffered enough already,” she said.
“It’s just putting such a bad, negative light on the university,” Maurer said.
The NCAA has a system in place in which it conducts its own investigations, issues a notice of allegations and then allows the university 90 days to respond before a hearing is scheduled.I suspect it has occurred to someone important in the NCAA that this has the potential to be a survival matter for their whole organization. This has gotten people asking a lot of questions that go far beyond PSU. Lots of people who don't give a rat's ass about college football are now asking how it got so important that important, respected people let kiddie rape slide to protect a football program. And if you follow that logic too far you end up at the NCAA, the other schools, and find yourself asking as I did upthread what the fuck a public university needs a goddamn lear jet for.
Following the hearing, the Infractions Committee then usually takes a minimum of six weeks, but it can take upwards of a year to issue its findings.
But in the case of Penn State, the NCAA appears to be using the Freeh report -- commissioned by the school's board of trustees -- instead of its own investigation, before handing down sanctions.
"Unbelievable," said a Penn State trustee informed of the NCAA statement, speaking to ESPN.com senior writer Don Van Natta Jr. "Unbelievable, unbelievable."
dw: Can someone offer a breakdown for the non-football crowd on how this ruling is more/less severe than the "death penalty" option?Yup, I was thinking about this last night.
Well, now they have to play with years of fewer scholarships, no hope for post-season money, and a massive debt they won't easily repay with TV and bowl money (which the Big Ten stripped from them). If they took a one year death penalty, they could reconstitute the football program pretty quickly and just let the media firestorm blow over.
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posted by ericb at 8:03 AM on July 12, 2012