The Louis Freeh report on Penn State's handling of Jerry Sandusky was released this morning. Now that the truth is fully out in the open, it is time for Penn State faithful to stop lying to themselves.
What was obvious to (almost) everyone since last October has been confirmed: Penn State leadership willfully covered up and enabled Jerry Sandusky's sexual abuse of children on PSU's campus. When faced with the choice of protecting abused children, or protecting the institution, Joe Paterno, Graham Spanier, Tim Curley and Gary Schultz chose to safeguard the institution.
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This Penn State scandal and cover up is a failure of monumental proportions for the University, the Penn State community, the football program and a number of key individuals who had the power to do the right thing and didn't.
The Freeh Report is nearly 300 pages long. In a summary of its findings, it reads:
"Our most saddening and sobering finding is the total disregard for the safety and welfare of Sandusky’s child victims by the most senior leaders at Penn State. The most powerful men at Penn State failed to take any steps for 14 years to protect the children who Sandusky victimized.
"Messrs. (PSU President Graham) Spanier, (vice president Gary) Schultz, (coach Joe) Paterno and (athletic director Tim) Curley never demonstrated, through actions or words, any concern for the safety and well-being of Sandusky’s victims until after Sandusky’s arrest."
Other noteable findings, according to Harrisburg Patriot-News reporter Sara Ganim:
- Joe Paterno lied to a federal grand jury, testifying that he had no knowledge of a 1998 criminal investigation into Sandusky's abuse. Freeh's findings show Paterno followed the criminal case closely.
- After Penn State graduate assistant Mike McQueary witnessed Sandusky raping a boy in the Penn State football showers, Joe Paterno disuaded Schultz, Curley and Spanier from reporting the incident to authorities.
- In order to avoid bad publicity, Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley "repeatedly concealed critical facts, relating to Sandusky's child abuse, from the authorities, the board of trustees, Penn State community, and the public at large," the report says.
The deceit and willful ignorance of coach Joe Paterno was passed on to many of Penn State football's devout fans who, in the face of mountains of evidence indicting Paterno and other PSU leaders, have chosen stubborn denial for the past nine months. Penn State fans were deceived. Some of them let themselves be deceived. Some of them have been willfully deceived. It is past time to face painful realities.
The Freeh Report is thorough and detailed, but it still boggles the mind how behavior as sickening and destructive as Jerry Sandusky's was sanctioned and allowed to continue by Penn State leadership. In an
Op-Ed letter Paterno wrote last winter that his family released this week, Paterno continued to try to isolate the football program from the scandal. "This is not a football scandal," Paterno wrote. But the blame for this tragedy cannot be isolated.
Sandusky, of course, is the poisonous, deceitful monster in the middle of this scandal. But this scandal is so much larger than one man. Regardless, the Paterno family and many in the Penn State community want to wash their hands by laying 100 percent of the blame on Sandusky alone.
The
Paterno family released a statement this week, calling Sandusky a "master deceiver," and saying, "Joe Paterno did not cover up for Jerry Sandusky. Joe Paterno did not know that Jerry Sandusky was a pedophile. Joe Paterno did not act in any way to prevent a proper investigation of Jerry Sandusky."
These are lies, and it is time for the lying, finally, to stop.
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