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Police: Paterno Did Not Do Enough

#61
This reeks. D.A. missing and presumed dead. Cheese I understand what you're saying, head coaches have lots of pull. But when a parent goes to this guy and is wired or somehow the police can hear the SOB confess to the abuse there should've been a perp walk immediately. There should be a file with the detective(s) available too.
 
#62
Clark Dark said:
This reeks. D.A. missing and presumed dead. Cheese I understand what you're saying, head coaches have lots of pull. But when a parent goes to this guy and is wired or somehow the police can hear the SOB confess to the abuse there should've been a perp walk immediately. There should be a file with the detective(s) available too.
Click to expand...

Of course this is true.
 
#63
MJ5150 said:
Remember too folks that Paterno did not witness the assault, it was reported to him by someone else. So there was the possibility that the report was untrue, and that possibility still exists.

If I found myself in the same situation, I most likely would report what I had been *told* to our risk management office, and let them pursue the investigation. I'm not sure how comfortable I would be filing a police report based on what someone else told me they saw.

-Mike
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Now I'd really like to know why didn't the eyewitness report this directly to the police??

A clear crime in progress and they didn't call the cops themselves??
 
#66
Dr. Cheese said:
I had to do state mandated ethics training for my job today and one thing I noticed is that although we are obligated to report wrong doing to our appropriate superiors, we are also told to report any emergency directly to the police. If McCreary had done this, it would been handled on the spot.
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McCreary definitely should have reported the incident right after he saw it. However, from what I understand, by waiting a day, he couldn't report it to campus police. I have a guitarist friend who worked at Penn State, and from what he explained, emergency calls regarding crime should be reported to the police. However, once a crime is no longer considered an emergency, the protocol is to report it to the department head, who then sends it up the chain of command. In that regard, Paterno wasn't legally obligated to notify the police, since he learned about the incident the day after it allegedly occurred.

Of course, the existence of bureaucratic procedure doesn't make it morally right. :hmm:
 
#67
To me, people are too eager to blame people high up on the food chain as opposed to the guy who actually committed the crime.

If Sandusky committed the crime, then he needs to be punished. If people swept it under the rug, they need to be punished. The people who don't need to be punished are the kids that have to see their story all over the news, those who actually did what they should have in regards to reporting it, and those currently involved with the football team who aren't tied to the crime. Unfortunately, to me, it seems like the latter groups are being punished as much as, if not more than, the former groups.

Joe's attitude towards the event and his choice of words speaks volumes about the kind of person he is. Leave the 84 year old man out of this.
 
#68
I'm at a university and if something like this was reported to me (as it was to Joe Pa) I would not go directly to the police with hearsay. I would report it through university channels. However, given the severity of the issue, I would not report it and walk away, I would do all I could to make sure that there was follow-through. Frankly, if there wasn't follow-through on the part of the university within a few days, I might call the police (not campus but municipal). However, I would be taking a chance that the university might not like what I had done.

It's also true that Paterno could have taken more independent action than most people on the campus without fear of getting reprimanded for bypassing procedures.
 
#71
Dr. Cheese said:
I see both Coach Paterno and President Spanier were fired tonight.
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Yep, the outside pressure had to be tremendous. But the thought of him and McCrerry on the sidelines this weekend was raising talk of protests and even a possible boycott of the game. Herbstreet has already suggested that Penn State players should have unlimited penalty free transfer rights from the NCAA.

It will be interesting to see how this effects his legacy. His 24 hour wait to report a child rape has to be one of the heinous displays of a lack of judgement in history. And I suspect that he know that his good buddy Sandusky had a serious problem but was in denial.
 
#72
Joe Paterno getting fired is a classic example of the idea that it is better to leave a year too early than a year too late. Paterno hung on a good ten or fifteen years too long, and set himself up to have things blow up one way or the other.
 
#73
As a human being as well as a Penn State grad, this entire sordid situation is appalling and extremely disappointing. I'm not normally a prideful man, but I've always felt some degree of pride in being a Penn State grad. I thought that PSU was synonymous with high standards. Instead of strictly going after the best athletes (even if they were borderline illiterate), they tried to recruit student-athletes.

I now feel ashamed to even claim PSU as my alma mater. I think they did the right thing by cleaning house, but the damage is already done.

How many of those poor boys might have been protected from the monster that is Sandusky had the PSU personnel done the right thing?

For McQueary to turn tail and run while a child was being sodomized is disgraceful. This guy was a quarterback. A "leader". Protect the child first, and THEN worry about who to report it to. And after telling Paterno about it, he should have followed up if nothing was done about it after a few days. All he had to do is say, "Coach Paterno, this guy is a monster. If you don't go to the police, then I will."

Same with Paterno. Yeah, he told his bosses. But how could he (and they) allow Sandusky to have free rein on campus after knowing what he had done. How could they stand to even look at him if they saw him on campus?! Absolutely appalling. There is a lot of failure on the part of a number of individuals. Apparently nobody was thinking about those kids. At a university that prided itself on developing strong character in their students. What a disappointment on so many levels. But more importantly, those poor kids are scarred for life...
 
#75
Jeff K said:
For McQueary to turn tail and run while a child was being sodomized is disgraceful. This guy was a quarterback. A "leader". Protect the child first, and THEN worry about who to report it to. And after telling Paterno about it, he should have followed up if nothing was done about it after a few days. All he had to do is say, "Coach Paterno, this guy is a monster. If you don't go to the police, then I will."
Click to expand...

There is some interesting scuttlebutt regarding the possibility of McQueary himself having been a victim or having witnessed some victimization by Sandusky as a child. His family knew Sandusky, he was friends with the Sandusky children, and apparently spent some good amount of time in their household.
 
#76
aborgman said:
There is some interesting scuttlebutt regarding the possibility of McQueary himself having been a victim or having witnessed some victimization by Sandusky as a child. His family knew Sandusky, he was friends with the Sandusky children, and apparently spent some good amount of time in their household.
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Two other proposals:
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#77
Mike Madden is reporting that Sandusky may have been involved in "pimping out kids" to wealthy donors of his foundation. Remember these were already "at risk" kids who were far more likely not to complain or have adults who would stand up for them.

"I can give you a rumor and I can give you something I think might happen," Madden said. "There's a rumor that there will be a more shocking development from the Second Mile Foundation -- and hold on, this is gross, I will use the only language I can -- that Jerry Sandusky and Second Mile were pimping out young boys to rich donors. That is being investigated by two prominent columnists even as I speak."
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Madden: Possible Sandusky 'pimped out kids'

This whole thing from the retirement at 55 years old (quite young for a successful coach who was on the short list for a head coach job) to the lack of follow up shrieks of a criminal cover up that involved a majority of the program leadership at PSU.
 
#78
burk48237 said:
This whole thing from the retirement at 55 years old (quite young for a successful coach who was on the short list for a head coach job) to the lack of follow up shrieks of a criminal cover up that involved a majority of the program leadership at PSU.
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Bingo right there. I heard that many a team would have loved to talk Sandusky out of retirement to be a head coach, yet none did. Why is that? Sandusky retires at 55, Paterno coaches until 84.

Face it Penn State fans and apologists - ugly, stinking cover up. They tried to spare "JoePa" from the embarrassment; Joe was at ease to turn a blind eye to the evil that was until he grabbed the NCAA All Time Wins record.

Sad day for college football, but more importantly, humanity.
 
#79
burk48237 said:
Mike Madden is reporting that Sandusky may have been involved in "pimping out kids" to wealthy donors of his foundation. Remember these were already "at risk" kids who were far more likely not to complain or have adults who would stand up for them.

Madden: Possible Sandusky 'pimped out kids'

This whole thing from the retirement at 55 years old (quite young for a successful coach who was on the short list for a head coach job) to the lack of follow up shrieks of a criminal cover up that involved a majority of the program leadership at PSU.
Click to expand...

I hope I don't come of insensitive, but the first thing I thought of when I read about the pimping of young boys was 'how does that initial conversation start?'
 
#80
At least Sandusky will likely spend the remainder of his life behind bars and won't be victimizing children anymore. Good news there.

How he was allowed to continue his predations at the school for so many years seemingly shows failure and/or complicity at an institutional level. There is a whole lot of explaining yet to be done.
 

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