Here's a very interesting look at the PSU investigation from the perspective of Pennsylvania Governor Corbett, who was the state's Attorney General when the grand jury investigation began in 2009. As reported in the New York Times:
What was so amazingly weird to me is the second to last full paragraph of the story. That a "computer glitch" (no other explanation offered) was the reason for the report being made available to the public. A computer glitch !?!?
As lawyer myself, I have been wondering for days why we had been given a view of the grand jury's written report, which isn't a formal charging document, but we had not seen the formal indictment, which I gather might have been filed under seal. (Filing under seal in a case like this would not be uncommon nor improper, although I make no personal judgment about this case.) Usually, grand jury reports are not released but charging documents -- indictments -- are publicly filed.
This is an interesting veiwpoint, and some mildly astonishing and unexplained info about the case.
I'm amazed at how badly Penn State as an institution has handled this. It looks like the confluence of politics, through the governor's office, and a university administration that is so eager to protect itself from any political incorrectness that it will do almost anything, the costs be damned.
Now, granting the obvious -- that the allegations made against Sandusky are appalling and as serious as can be -- I see a lot of evidence of a hasty overreaction on the part of Penn State with respect to everything else. In the calm light of day, with Sandusky's innocence presumed as a matter of law, and no indictment of anyone other than Sandusky, Curley and Schutlz (the latter two for perjury only); why wouldn't the fair and proper thing to have been to suspend everyone named in the report; Curley, Schultz, Spanier, Paterno, McQueary, etc., with full pay pending a fair investigation of what really happened?
I am reading the Penn State blogs and among the calls for riots, and the pleas for everyone to stop rioting, and the pledge drives for victimized children... among the few sensible posts are the ones that circle around to detailed analysis of what has really happened and due process for Joe Paterno. I sit in judgment from afar, not being any sort of a Penn State fan. To me, the Nittany Lions belong in the Big East or something. But I do relate, to the home-team bloggers who probably know more about their program than the reporters who are on national tv spouting off about what Penn State should be doing. Sort of something I learned from being an active part of the Michigan blogosphere, 2009-10...
I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.