OT - McQueary suing PSU in whistle-blower suit...

Submitted by myrtlebeachmai… on

Suing the school, terms not disclosed.  Whistle blower suits, to my knowledge, would be for one of two reasons....  One, he feels his job/reputation was damaged by something he tried to point out that was flawed and management did nothing about;  or Two, I believe such suits entitle the whistleblower to some fraction of punitive damages as compensation for bringing it to light - maybe he'd get a portion of any settlement $$?

http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/7906713/key-penn-state-nittany-lions-witness-seeks-whistle-blower-lawsuit 

Also, probably not safe to go there yet, but...  a sex crime related lawsuit with a Plaintiff named McQueary and his lawyer named Strokoff???   just saying.... if I were him, I would have had to think twice about hiring a lawyer with such an unfortunate name...

PlayByPlay

May 8th, 2012 at 11:32 PM ^

With the focus on him as a key witness and a lot of people blaming him for Joe's dismissal, dude has zero chance of being gamefully employed in college football or the state of Pennsylvania. I think the best he can hope for is some film assistant/scout job for the NFL or moving to the middle of Montana and becoming a lumberjack.

WolverineHistorian

May 8th, 2012 at 11:42 PM ^

Does he have much of a case?  Technically he was a whistle blower by coming forward but like JoePa, he knew PSU didn't do anything about Sandusky and continued on for 8 years like nothing had happened.  Are you still a whistle blower when you go on for nearly a decade crossing paths with this monster while doing no follow up? 

vbnautilus

May 9th, 2012 at 12:16 AM ^

I think you are.  The whole reason whistleblower protection exists is because employers often have an incentive to ignore or supress the information given to them about wrongdoing. 

Although the 8 year period might come into play if there is a statute of limitations that relates to the time the whistle was blown.

 

LSAClassOf2000

May 9th, 2012 at 7:14 AM ^

It could depend a lot on which of the nearly two dozen major statutes (or the countless state-specific ones) which contain whisteblower protections they believe they are covered under as to whether or not they  would have exhausted any statute of limitations. In my rare dealings with items which have gone all the way to the DOL or NLRB, things covered under the Fair Labor Standards Act (which are typically management-union tiffs, mind you, nothing on the PSU scale), for example, have a 2-3 year limit. 

At least at the federal level, as I recall, most of the whistleblower statutes cover federal contractors and industries which operate "critical" assets, if you will. We have the laws posted around the company because we operate nuclear facilities, for example. 

I am curious to see under which law they would seek protection. I wonder if there is an MGoLawyer  with a background in labor law around here, or at least someone who may know if Pennsylvania has its own statutes for employees of public or state institutions (something along the lines of CEPA in New Jersey, for example). 

Seth9

May 9th, 2012 at 12:50 AM ^

I sincerely doubt that PSU wants to discuss the full particulars of their response to McCreary's initial allegations in open court. I also doubt that they want to deal with the media attention that would result as well.

emozilla

May 9th, 2012 at 1:32 AM ^

Given PSU's willingness to essentially though limitless amounts of money in vain attempts to make this whole debacle go away, I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't end up getting some sort of pay day.

Mgodiscgolfer

May 9th, 2012 at 7:17 AM ^

But I will ask did he win his job at PSU by being qualified? Maybe he has already reaped the benefit because of seeing what he saw whatever it was, then taking the action he took and not following it up. I am guessing thats what his case will be based on but not sure if he can be punished for what he may have gained already, or will the school be punished for prematurely pulling the rug out from under him for whistle blowing.

ijohnb

May 9th, 2012 at 9:13 AM ^

also has a SOL problem I believe.  And that is not "shit out of luck" but is essentially the same thing.

Duck4President

May 9th, 2012 at 9:57 AM ^

McQueary has recently amended his police report on th acusations so that rather than saying he witnessed the events on the Friday before spring break 2002, he is now saying that he saw the events in February 2001. This seems incredibly shady, and the speculation is that he is "changing the date" such that it would put those crimes beyond the ten year statute of limitations in PA. Thus, making it so that his testimony is "irrelevant" and he will not have to testify before a grand jury.

Forget jutice for the children, Mike McQueary doesn't want to be uncomfortable in front of the media again. He has done nothing right since the outset of this whole situation, and his behavior continues, both in the trial and with sham lawsuiits such as this one. The whistleblower laws were set up to protect whistleblowers, not those people who kind of blow the whitle, kind of lie, and kind of coverup all to protect themselves.

vbnautilus

May 9th, 2012 at 4:29 PM ^

That's not a fair description of what has happened. 

In the original police report in 2010, McQueary was not sure of the year.  He said it was before spring break in either 2001 or 2002, but couldn't be sure. 

Over the course of the questioning, he seems to have settled on 2002. 

The defense attorneys did some digging and have evidence that the whole thing went down in 2001.  It's Shultz's and Curley's attorneys who want this to be beyond the statute of limitations.   McQueary has not been charged with any crime.  

The change didn't come from McQueary, although prosecutors now agree that the incident happened in 2001.  

Maize_in_Spartyland

May 9th, 2012 at 10:40 AM ^

The SOL is a huge problem for McQueary. If he's inside that timeframe, he at least has a colorable argument that he was fired for reporting what he knew. Outside that timeframe, it becomes tougher.

With that said, PSU will likely argue that McQueary wasn't fired for reporting, rather, he was fired for a failure to report. It would have been different if McQueary reported out to police when the incident occured, but he sat on it for 9+ years. Acting in that way indicates a failure to report, not an afforded protection of a Whistleblower law.

Wouldn't be surprised to see this one get kicked on Summary Disposition. If what is coming out now is true, McQueary has made more and more bad decisions, beginning with his failure to report.

 

Yeoman

May 9th, 2012 at 3:38 PM ^

In Michigan your obligation is to report to the authorities; in Pennsylvania your obligation is to report the incident up the chain of command to a "designated person" in the institution who then reports to the authorities. Failure to report would be on the institution and the designated reporter, not the person who observed the behavior.

Yeoman

May 13th, 2012 at 9:47 PM ^

That satisfied McQueary's legal obligation, which then fell to Paterno.

The law's not really designed for this situation--the usual situation is that abuse is suspected, not directly observed. But under PA law there doesn't seem to be grounds for a failure-to-report charge against McQueary, quite aside from the fact that the law wasn't in effect yet at the time.

I suppose it's possible that there was an institutional policy in place that McQueary failed to follow, but I very much doubt it. We'd have heard about it by now if there was.

Maybe I'm misreading the situation but it seems to me if there was a way to frame this as a firing for cause PSU would have done.

mikeelikesit

May 9th, 2012 at 12:32 PM ^

You sir are an idiot! Suing PSU because his character is damaged? He damaged his own character by seeing what he saw and then left, leaving that child behind with a monster! That is what damaged his character, that is why he lost his mancard!