The Chronicle of Higher Education published a Sandusky related story on Sunday which heretofore escaped this Turkey’s attention. I can understand why not much has been made of it, because its details are sketchy. The article, written by Brad Wolverton, begins with the following paragraph:
Top Pennsylvania State University officials held a three-hour meeting to discuss Jerry Sandusky in 2001 over concerns about the former coach’s behavior with a boy in the football showers. A law-firm billing record from that conversation describes a “report of suspected child abuse,” according to a person with knowledge of an independent investigation into the matter.
Next to that paragraph were pictures of Curley and Schultz.
Wolverton wrote nothing else about who attended the meeting or which law firm was involved. Perhaps the pictures suggested that Schultz and Curley were involved, but Wolverton never gets around to saying so. Thus, the first paragraph, quoted above, was the only new information for most of us.
The remainder of the article merely provides background information that is well known, including the leaked emails, the non-reporting of the incident, and even an unrelated story about Joe Paterno taking charge of a disciplinary issue in the past, much to the chagrin of then VP of Student Affairs, Vicky Triponey.
In that 2007 incident, six members of the football team invaded an apartment and beat up people inside. Paterno and Triponey differed in their ideas about how discipline should be meted out. Joe, as usual, did it his way, even having a text message sent out to all the players warning them not to respond to Student Affairs’ inquiry about the incident or they would risk being thrown off the team. Ms. Triponey resigned that year, citing “philosophical differences.”
This story is well known, and nothing about Joe Paterno grabbing power where the team was involved would turn many heads. The Chronicle included it to corroborate whatever point it was trying to make, of which I’m still not certain.
If the point is that Joe had total control of the football program, trumping even university administrators, then big surprise! If the point is that Spanier and his top-level administrators consulted counsel about the Sandusky situation, then we can only draw the conclusion that high level Penn State operatives were worried about what would happen in the event that they skirted the law to try to handle the matter internally.
In the latter case, this Turkey would have loved to have been a fly on the wall. I do hope that further details of that meeting emerge, although it might well be that only billing records are still available. (If I ran the law firm involved, I would make damn sure that all the damning evidence was shredded and burned, lest it all blow up in the face of the firm and its lawyers, as the advice to circumvent the law would be a serious ethics violation.)
I hope that all of these loose ends will be tied up in the Freeh report.
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K. John says
If the meeting did happen and did concern the issue at hand, it all but falsifies the media’s obviously manufactured story of a cover up in its entirety. It proves they were concerned but had doubts about the events that transpired in 2001 and supports Schultz and Curley’s claims regarding McQueary’s report.
The Nittany Turkey says
It proves nothing until more details are known. A meeting occurred that resulted in three billable hours of legal fees to Penn State under the caption of “suspected child molestation”. We don’t even know who attended the meeting, and we certainly don’t know what was discussed.
Furthermore, would an attorney just give a client the OK to sit back and ignore an incident as serious as this one?
—TNT
K. John says
I said it all but disproves the cover up story meaning there is some doubt, not much but some. In fact, there is no evidence at all supporting the cover up angle.
As for the following statement
“Furthermore, would an attorney just give a client the OK to sit back and ignore an incident as serious as this one?”
They did not sit back and ignore the incident. They banned him from campus with second mile kids and if you look at the charges, it worked. There were no more allegations on Penn State property following the corrective action. As for legal advice, given the less than serious (relatively speaking) of the allegation as told by Paterno, Dranov, Curley and Schultz as opposed to Mike McQueary’s (whose ever evolving story has been contradicted by at least four people as well as his own testimony) version, it is entirely possible they received guidance to handle it the way they did. Afterall, McQueary did not witness only assumed one happened. Please keep in mind that it is very likely that Curley and Schultz are not subject to the mandatory reporting law which likely means they or the University would be legally liable for a false report if word got out.
The Nittany Turkey says
I suppose we could arrive at any number of speculative conclusions as to the purpose of the meeting with counsel, who participated, and what legal advice they received. All that the Chronicle reported was that it was a three-hour meeting.
When I referred to sitting back and doing nothing, I meant with respect to reporting the incident(s). I can understand why Curley and Schultz might not be legally subject to Pennsylvania’s mandatory reporting law because they are Spanier’s underlings, but either Spanier or Paterno—whichever one was running the university at the time—was required to report a crime, if it actually occurred. Hmmm, I’m beginning to see your point. A lawyer might look upon McQueary’s supposed witnessed crime with a jaundiced eye.
And then, there was the 1998 cover-up and non-prosecution. Perhaps the attorney felt that PSU’s exposure would be too great because of the tangled web they started weaving back then. No one could reverse the clock to undo what was done back then and would surely emerge for all to see if the shit hit the fan.
So, stonewall it, boys! Call Dean and tell him to start working on a fallback position with Haldeman and Ehrlichmann.
But seriously, things didn’t quite work out that way. The “would be” is now going to come back to haunt the unnamed law firm because it is what it is and obfuscation begets obfuscation.
—TNT
K. John says
There was no cover up of the 98 incident. Where are you getting that nonsense from? An incident was reported and investigated. The DA chose not to pursue charges. The 98 incident is irrelevant to the matter at hand.
The Nittany Turkey says
There are lots of unanswered questions about the 1998 incident, not the least of which was Sandusky’s sudden “retirement” in 1999. How much did Joe know back then, and under what conditions was Sandusky retired and given an emeritus appointment? This is completely relevant to the issue of whether Joe had too much power and whether he had prior knowledge of Sandusky’s predatory behavior, which he ignored when allowing Sandusky full use of the Lasch facilities.
Why is that irrelevant? Tell the Turkey. I’m all ears.
—TNT
K. John says
I already addressed your baseless speculation regarding the 1998 incident once, I won’t do it again. Unless you have something to share that isn’t publicly available, the incident is irrelevant.
The Nittany Turkey says
In your mind, General, it is irrelevant. In mine, it is not. I’m not talking legal technicalities. I’m talking about internal corruption in the PSU hierarchy. You can stick with your technicalities, but I’ll continue to speculate on the 1998-1999 time frame issues, as I feel that failure to act strongly back then (beyond merely reporting it to authorities) led to more incidents, more victims, and more exposure for the university. It will be interesting to see what the Freeh report divulges.
Did Sandusky actually retire voluntarily in 1999? Was he forced? What happened behind closed doors in the ivory tower that led to his premature “retirement” and the consolation of an emeritus appointment and an office on campus with full use of the facilities, especially the dreaded showers? This all smacks of yet another Paterno “I’ll handle it my way” episode.
I don’t care about the decision by the late Mr. Gricar at the time. He wasn’t running the university. Beyond the prosecutorial aspect of this case, there existed some weighty responsibilities that needed to be handled by Penn State. Hindsight being 20/20, we now know that those decisions were botched.
It all speaks to the culture of secrecy not just in football programs, but in modern universities. It is not unlike any public organization in that respect. The military, police departments, Executive Branch departments, and so forth, all have their secrets that would outrage the public. The alumni and public deserve to know why these decisions were made and by whom. Subpoenas and investigations should not be necessary to determine responsibility for critical decisions.
We’ll keep coming back to Spanier and Paterno. Or just Paterno. Curley is liable to take the fall for much that was beyond his grasp. But we need to know what went on there.
If you’re satisfied with allowing 1998-1999 to rest, K. John, that’s fine. I’m not, and we’ll agree to disagree.
Dismissed.
—TNT
K. John says
That is a nice tin-foil hat type of argument you are pushing and I am not going along for the ride as it can’t be proven or disproven.
K. John says
Nice tin-foil hat.