Though the mountain of legal evidence against Jerry Sandusky is overwhelming, and circumstantial evidence abounds of an institutional cover up at Penn State, the specific perjury cases against former Athletic Director Tim Curley and former administrator Gary Schultz are narrower -- at least for the time being. 

What led to the indictment of Curley and Schultz was the testimony of current Penn State assistant football coach Mike McQueary, who told the grand jury that he witnessed Sandusky having anal sex with a boy in Penn State team showers. According to grand jury testimony, the next day McQueary told coach Joe Paterno he saw something "of a sexual nature" take place between the boy and Sandusky. Paterno reported this to Curley -- technically Paterno's superior -- the following day, and McQueary later met with Curley and Schultz to report what he had seen.

Read the Full Grand Jury Report (Warning: Graphic, Explicit Contents)

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Timeline Of Abuse And Major Events In Jerry Sandusky Case

That meeting between McQueary, Curley and Schultz is the specific subject of the Attorney General's perjury charges. McQueary gave the grand jury a different account of the meeting than Curley and Schultz, and the grand jury deemed McQueary's testimony to be "extremely credible" and deemed Curley and Schultz' version to be not credible. But for as much detail as the grand jury report provides in its evidence against Sandusky, the portion of the report that refers to Curley and Schultz is somewhat unclear. Keep in mind, however, the grand jury needs only "probable cause" to indict. When the case goes to trial, prosecutors will have to prove the evidence against Curley and Schultz "beyond a reasonable doubt."

What did McQueary say?

The grand jury report says that Paterno reported to Curley and Schultz that McQueary had seen something of a "sexual nature" between Sandusky and the victim. In McQueary's subsequent meeting with Curley and Schultz, McQueary told the pair that he witnessed what he "believed to be Sandusky having anal sex with a boy." Curley and Schultz assured him they would look into it, and then "a couple weeks later" told McQueary that they had taken away Sandusky's locker room keys and reported the incident to The Second Mile, the charity for at-risk children that Sandusky founded and worked with.

What did Tim Curley say?

"Curley testified that [McQueary] reported to them that 'innapropriate conduct' or activity that made him 'uncomfortable' occured," the grand jury report says. Curley denied that McQueary reported anal sex or anything of a "sexual nature." The term Curley used was "horsing around." Three times Curley was asked directly about sexual contact or anal sex by reported by McQueary, and three times Curley denied. Curley testified that, after discussing the reports with the director of The Second Mile, Curley told Sandusky he was not allowed to bring children onto Penn State's campus. Curley says he told McQueary of this ban, and though he did not specify the language he used in doing so, also reported the ban to President Spanier. Curley did not report any incident to any police agency.

What did Gary Schultz say?

The testimony given by Schultz, who in 2002 oversaw the University Police, appears to be the most scattered of the three. Schultz said he was "very unsure about what he remembered [McQueary] telling him." 

Schultz testified "that he was called to a meeting with Joe Paterno and Tim Curley, in which Paterno reported 'disturbing' and 'innapropriate' in the shower by Sandusky on a young boy, as reported to him by [McQueary]". Schultz denied that sodomy between Sandusky and the boy was reported to him by Paterno or McQueary, but he also testified to having the impression that Sandusky "might have innapropriately grabbed the young boy's genitals while wrestling." Although the grand jury report says Schultz equivocated over the definition of "sexual" as it related to Sandusky wrestling with and grabbing the boy, Schultz did acknowledge that McQueary had reported "innapropriate sexual conduct by Sandusky."

Schultz also said he was aware of 1998 investigations into Sandusky, and that there were similarities between the situations in 1998 and 2002. He never reported the 2002 incident to police and never read, or was even aware of, the 1998 police report.

Possible legal defenses

Schultz' attorney, Thomas J. Farrell, has already accused prosecutors of "perjury trap," which is when a prosecutor brings a witness before a grand jury seeking to catch the witness in perjury, rather than seeking evidence against the accused. This article by the Texas Law Review explains that perjury trap is not a valid or effective legal defense. 

A more direct route to discrediting the charges would be to discredit the testimony of Mike McQueary. Understandably, McQueary was distraught after witnessing Sandusky having sex with a boy in the showers, and there is uncertainty as to what exactly McQueary told whom, and how that information was passed down the chain.

The attorneys for Schultz and Curley will have a difficult time arguing that McQueary was too traumatized to communicate effectively, or that his witness to them was unclear, since McQueary twice reported what he saw, and Schultz and Curley had the witness reported twice to them. However distraught McQueary may have been by what he saw, Schultz did indicate that McQueary's report did mention innapropriate sexual conduct by Sandusky toward a boy -- which contradicts what Curley claimed under oath. 

Of course, when the case goes to trial (assuming that Schultz and Curley don't plea-bargain first), the prosecution will have more time and resources to round out the case. McQueary is still the man to watch -- it was courageous of him to give grand jury testimony that has led to charges against two superiors, the firing of two others and the unprecedented dismantling of \what had been perceived as one of the cleanest college football programs in the country. But how will McQueary handle himself now that the spotlight is so squarely focused on him? How will he clarify his testimony in light of the way Curley and Schultz contradicted it? And will he have to account for why he did not make more forceful attempts to stop the horrific abuse that he knew Sandusky has been engaged in with children for the past nine years?

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[The Cautionary Instruction: PSU administrators circle the wagons]

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