PSU AD Requests Leave of Absence
November 7th, 2011 at 12:35 AM ^
Better yet, both of them are out.
Edit: My article says the exact same thing, but with a different headline. No matter what, still a nice turn of events.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:50 AM ^
One returned to retirement. One is taking a leave like the OP said.
Edit: you fixed it while I was writing the response, my bad.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:34 AM ^
If they want to resign. Let them. But personally, id hate to get fired after being accused of something only to be found not guilty later. Until a court or internal investigation finds that they really did what they're accused of, they should keep their jobs
November 7th, 2011 at 12:38 AM ^
Best case: they ignored an accusation that an employee was raping children.
EDIT for clarity: a former employee with emeritus status and full access as if he were an employee.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:49 AM ^
According to the Grand Jury, these two men claimed that the Grad Assistant reported to them that Sandusky was wrestling the young boy and touched him inappropriately. Still F***ed up and wrong, but different than raping. The apparant best case (which is still a real shitty case) according to the Grand Jury is that they ignored an emeritus faculty member inappropriately touching a boy.
It seems like these 2 men covered it up, I agree with that, but they still have a right to defend themselves and not be fired until they are found guilty.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:52 AM ^
And the Grand Jury found enough evidence that they were full of shit to charge them with perjury which is HARD.
Also your best case, that's a firable offense.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:55 AM ^
I agree. I'm not saying that they shouldn't be fired, I'm just saying that they shouldn't be fired YET.
Additionally, the burden of proof to bring charges against a person is much less than the burden of proof to convict them. Just because they have been charged does not mean they will be found guilty. If they are, fire their asses, until then, let them defend themselves.
November 7th, 2011 at 1:03 AM ^
I actually think the state will have a hard time convicting them on the perjury charge. It's basically their word against McQueary's as to what he said at the meeting.
I think the lack of response to the McQueary accusation, regardless of whether he told them what he told Paterno (that it was sexual, but was not specific) or what he told the grand jury, is a firable offense. The full response was to ban Sandusky from bringing children on campus, which they admit was unenforceable. So they did nothing. That's according to their own grand jury testimony.
I edited this to clear up some pronoun issues.
November 7th, 2011 at 1:12 AM ^
Due to the one sided nature of grand juriy hearings they often produce findings and draw conclusions that aren't mirrored in later court findings. I know the knee-jerk reaction in order to feel good is to fire people based on grand jury summaries, but without the full testimony of these men, it is premature to draw too many conclusions about what happened.
Yes it looks very bad, but until they can adequately defend themselves, they should not be punished (i consider being fired punishment).
November 7th, 2011 at 7:16 AM ^
at the very least wrestling with a minor while naked in a shower. Their response was to report it to Sandusky's charity organization, take away his keys to the football facility, and ban him from coming on campus with minors. Clearly this is an Athletic Director and a VP of Finance trying to sweep the problem off campus to limit the impact to Penn State, rather than protect minors and fulfill their legal responsibilities to the State. From an ethics stand point alone, they should at least be placed on administrative (unpaid) leave of absense until their case is decided. However, if the state law requires them to report, I think they should be fired. They didn't report.
November 7th, 2011 at 1:17 AM ^
To further clarify: I don't think you need to break the law to be fired in this kind of situation. There are two different things to think about here: legal ramifications and ethical/moral ones. Legally, I suspect they're both guilty of failure to report. I think it is entirely possible they perjured themselves, but from what is written in the indictment, I don't think they're guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Ethically and morally though? Scumbags who should be removed from a position of authority. And I think employment decisions (ESPECIALLY at a public institution like PSU) are subject to ethical and moral questions, even if they're clear legally. They violated the public trust. The second McQueary left that meeting, they needed to launch a full criminal investigation or forward the case to the state police if they didn't want the campus police to investigate. They didn't. Even if Sandusky is innocent (which I VERY much doubt, considering the consistency of the stories of the victims), they had a responsibility to determine that at the time.
For a Michigan point in a far less serious matter, if the AD were found to have covered up the Ed Martin allegations, you'd want them fired, right? And I'd say the majority of this board thought that Gordon Gee, Gene Smith, and Jim Tressel should have been fired, right? None of them even broke a law. Tressel committed NCAA violations, and Smith/Gee happily ignored them (or was responsible for the people who did; which is why I think the PSU President should go as well).
November 7th, 2011 at 1:27 AM ^
I agree that they can get fired for not breaking the law, but I also think that a really good prosecuter can make anyone look extremely guilty in a grand jury hearing. Based on the initial summary of their testimonies, I agree that they appear to have committed firable offenses, but grand juries can often make people seem way guiltier than they really are.
November 7th, 2011 at 1:34 AM ^
I guess my question is if either of the following are in dispute:
1) Curley and Schultz were informed that a potential case of sexual misconduct involving a child occurred on school property involving a former school employee who enjoyed access to PSU facilities, emeritus status at the University, and other perks.
2) No law enforcement or child services official was contacted about this potential case.
That to me, would be more than enough. And I would think if the latter weren't the case, their lawyers would be trumpeting it everywhere.
November 7th, 2011 at 1:45 AM ^
My opinion on this is that anything produced in a grand jury summary is up for dispute. If we had the transcripts of their hearings I would be quicker to make conclusions. The prosecuter can make circumstantial cases against these men and then question them without any chance for them to be cross-examined. The summary claims that they said these things, but almost as important as what they said is exactly how they said it and exactly how they got to the point where they said it.
Without this information, I am not ready to accept this as the absolute truth. Grand jury summaries are quick to make one-sided conclusions and state them as fact.
November 7th, 2011 at 2:05 AM ^
correct, good post.
Isn't there some sort of official reporting in this type of situation - signed report, taped, etc? Apparently not, but there should be. How else to prove one person's word over another? The GJ is charging them, so I'm hopeful that these is in fact a way to prove this.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:53 AM ^
Agree. You have to realize that the grand jury indictment/report is the best-case scenario for the prosecutors. Gospel, it is not.
That being said, this whole situation is hard to even think about. Disturbing if true; disturbing if partially true; disturbing, period. And charges like this, you have to think, wouldn't be brought without pretty solid evidence. But then again, the case against, say, Rod Blagojevich was much weaker than I had anticipated it would be and under similar thinking (if they're charging, it must be damn strong, etc)
November 7th, 2011 at 1:26 AM ^
November 7th, 2011 at 7:17 AM ^
First of all, if Sandusky is guilty as he appears, he should be institutionalized for the rest of his life.
That being said, put yourself in the places of the two officials. Who are you going to trust: a grad assistant you don't really know or a coach you have known your entire tenure at PSU? It was the word of a GA against the word of a trusted friend and ally.
If a GA made an accusation like that on a Michigan coach who had been there forever, who would most of us believe? If I was in a supervisory capacity, I would require a lot more evidence than one "he said, he said" to start tearing down the character and ruining the life of someone who was a trusted emloyee for 30 years.
In retrospect, they screwed up badly, but you don't get retrospect in realtime.
November 7th, 2011 at 7:28 AM ^
a degree of flexibility. But this isn't some GA claiming the guy requested reimbursement for a dinner including alcohol, or he heard the guy was having an affair. I think the seriousness of the allegations mitigate the fact that goodwill was accrued.
November 7th, 2011 at 8:01 AM ^
simple for the fact that the 2002 "incident" was not the first time that Schultz had knowledge of Sandusky's behaviour like this with little boys.....
"Schultz told the jurors he also knew of a 1998 investigation involving sexually inappropriate behavior by Sandusky with a boy in the showers the football team used.
But despite his job overseeing campus police, he never reported the 2002 allegations to any authorities, "never sought or received a police report on the 1998 incident and never attempted to learn the identity of the child in the shower in 2002," the jurors wrote. "No one from the university did so."
Happens one time "might" be able to argue there was some mis-understanding involved with handling the information. Happens twice, sounds like a cover-up....
November 7th, 2011 at 8:19 AM ^
2002 wasn't the first time this had come up with Sandusky. In fact there were some accusations before 1998. The '98 incident actually sparked and investigation and there is a police report. From the outside it looks like they let Sandusky retire with a "farewell tour" year in 1999 with knowledge of that incident/accusation.
And what about JoPa? Are we to believe that he didn't know of any of the previous accusations or the investigation about his DC?
November 7th, 2011 at 9:26 AM ^
then they do a rape kit and its no longer speculation. This is the great failing at PSU. They didn't do shit. There wasn't even a file started about the 2002 incident. Worse, the GA is now a full coach. Sounds like he got rewarded for keeping his mouth shut.
November 7th, 2011 at 11:39 AM ^
How do you square your position with the apparent fact that they never even tried to determine the boy's identity?
Put yourself in their place. You're given an extremely serious accusation by a member of the football staff. Was there any reason to think he was lying? You have a choice, pass along that information to the police (as required by law), investigate the charge, or cover it up. You seem to think they took a fourth option, to simply believe someone they knew better, even though he had been investigated for child molestation before and had every reason to lie. Sounds like understandable bad judgment to you.
As I see it they had a simple choice: worry that kids were being molested on their campus or worry about the bad publicity that story would bring. If they were concerned about the possible past and future victims they would have made sure that the charges were investigated. They also would have looked for ways to better protect children on their campus.
If their concern was the school and program being subjected to bad publicity then they would have done everything just as they did. Make sure there was no investigation. Notice they didn't tell the GA that they didn't believe him. If they had he probably would have gone to the police directly. Instead they took minimal action against Sandusky and told the GA about it, hoping he wouldn't take it further.
If the facts are as they appear I find Culrey and Schultz' behavior as morally corrupt as Sandusky's. Sandusky appears to be a very sick, evil man. Curley and Schultz decided it was expedient to allow children to be molested. That's just evil.
November 7th, 2011 at 3:09 PM ^
Picture a young Brady Hoke at Michigan and he sees Bo doing something horrific (obviously not the case -- just a hypothetical). He reports it to Lloyd. What is the possibility that a young coach (or gradass) is gonna lie about a legend about something so serious? How easy is it for the legend to defend himself in disproving the lie (just produce the boy in question).
The fact is that very powerful figures in the PSU athletic department were too cozy and too weak to go to bat for little kids who were being raped. They believed McQueary. They just didn't have the balls to do the right thing.
November 7th, 2011 at 5:59 PM ^
I am NOT going to "picture a young Brady Hoke at Michigan," or Bo, or Loyd Carr doing anything remotely like any of this.
Next hypothetical, please.
November 7th, 2011 at 9:24 AM ^
earn their benefits, while defending themselves? They should be fired for dragging their employer's name through the mud. Penn State looks like a bunch of clowns, that's the reason for the firing. Forget "court" matters, the PR hit is terrible.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:36 AM ^
Innocent until proven guily seems to be more an exception than the rule these days
November 7th, 2011 at 1:28 AM ^
November 7th, 2011 at 7:52 AM ^
This is a distinction few people seem to make anymore.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:36 AM ^
He obviously wasn't doing his job before this.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:55 AM ^
November 7th, 2011 at 1:21 AM ^
November 7th, 2011 at 1:35 AM ^
I'm reminded of AD Mike Nifong and the Duke Lacrosse case. As soon as that story first broke into the news everyone wanted to disband the lacrosse team and kick out every student slightly related to the incident. After the initial story was questioned a little, we learned that the prosecuter was acting wrecklessly to achieve some sort of political gain.
I don't think this is the case here, but this is the reason I think we should wait to jump to conclusions based on the word of the prosecuter and grand jury. For all we know he may have coerced them into saying things that he could spin into charges against them, until we know more, we should give the defendents the benefit of the doubt.
November 7th, 2011 at 7:25 AM ^
inappropriate activity with a minor in a shower to the police or child services. Period.
In the Duke case, the allegations were reported, and the case investigated and later dropped.
In the Penn State case, this did not happen. It doesn't matter if you believe the GA or the AD. What the AD stated he knew to the Grand Jury was enough to require an ethical person to report it to authorities qualified to investigate. In my view, the two people who didn't report should be fired. Period.
November 7th, 2011 at 7:53 AM ^
That's like apples and orangutans.
November 7th, 2011 at 9:44 AM ^
I am sure your main point is to not rush to judgement before all the facts have come out. The Duke case is different because IIRC, Nifong wanted to use the case as political capital to run for a higher position then he currently had. Race was a huge part of that case and I am sure Nifong was none too happy to be seen as the person who took down a bunch of rich white kids who thought they were above the law. The whole thing was handled horribly by Nifong from the start and I think much of the blame of how that whole thing played out rests with him.
November 7th, 2011 at 11:15 AM ^
That whole thing was Nifong's fault. He proceeded alone and was smacked down by both the state AG and the bar association. He deserves every little piece of misery he gets for trying to prosecute that case; he's just a bad, bad human being.
In this case, you have a pattern of behavior, eight witnesses (including one respected coach who was a firsthand witness), and an internal investigation at the time that was enough to specifically ban him with little kids and revoke his locker room access. By sheer numbers alone, this case is nothing like the Duke lacrosse case, even if Sandusky is innocent.
November 7th, 2011 at 1:57 AM ^
To everyone saying wait and see since this is just a grand jury, I think there is enough initial witness testimony to at least give leave without pay to the AD and the other dude:
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20111106/D9QRDCB81.html
I agree with Genzilla that heed needs to be taken given how the Duke case went, but I think since this involves children as victims and has several witnesses that have nothing to gain by their testimony, there is a little more likelihood of these accusations being true.
What I mean is I believe the grad student reported potential abuse to JoPa and JoPa sent it up the chain of command, so there should have AT LEAST been an investigation by the university in some manner, which in turn required the officials to contact the authorities on the matter. There is enough evidence from the University's standpoint to fire the two for not fulfilling their duties as employees.
November 7th, 2011 at 2:13 AM ^
I am a pre-law student and I will naturally be a pain in the ass about these things. I would like to be given the benefit of the doubt if there's a 1% chance that I did nothing wrong until it's proven that I did in fact do what I'm being accused of. Do I think that these two men being fired would be a gross injustice, no. Do I think they are probably guilty of what they are being accused of, yes.
I'm simply arguing for the fact that what we know is only a small part of what actually happened and we might be missing key facts that discredit the prosecuter's version of things.
Although I am 99% sure they deserve to be fired, my idealistic nature forces me to focus on the 1% instead.
November 7th, 2011 at 5:08 AM ^
I think suspension with pay is the pragmatic approach. If these guys are guilty that will be fired in good time. Paying their salary for the next six months is insurance against a wrongful termination suit.
From what I've read, Pennsylvania law required that certain university officials to report abuse to law enforcement. Head football coach is presumably not on that list which is why I think Paterno did what he was supposed (legally) to do or at least what he thought he was supposed to do. I'm guessing the chain of command should have involved HR type people but going to your supervisor seems reasonable.
The thing I can't reconcile is why Sandusky was allowed to maintain a relationship with the university. It's for that reason that I think all involved, including Paterno, should resign.
UPDATE: As I'm writing this, ABC 6 in Philadelphia is reporting there was an emergency board meeting that the two men charged were asked to resign and both agreed. The report said Paterno was not discussed at the meeting.
November 7th, 2011 at 7:35 AM ^
Lawyers ............Something the world needs less of....Nothing against you Genzilla..
November 7th, 2011 at 12:32 PM ^
I'd feel comfortable putting the AD on leave based on some things which don't seem to be in dispute. Which is: that he heard something might have happened and he didn't immediately speak to the grad assistant.
I don't want someone working at my institution who hears about something like this and then sits on it for over a week before speaking to the person who made the complaint. I don't care how sketchy the second-hand report is; I don't care how it might have been soft-pedaled to him (wrestling, touching, seemed inappropriate, pussyfoot blah blah blah). You follow up on that stuff immediately, don't you? Or you're more than eligible for censure by your institution. IMO.
November 7th, 2011 at 2:21 AM ^
Joe Pa should be held accountable, and resign immediately if McQuery did in fact tell him that he saw Sandusky having anal sex with the 10 year old boy. Why? Becuase this:
"The next day, a Saturday, the grad assistant went to the home of head coach Joe Paterno and told him what he had seen. The day after that, Paterno called Penn State athletic director Tim Curley to his home to report that the grad assistant had told him he had witnessed “Jerry Sandusky in the Lasch Building showers fondling or doing something of a sexual nature to a young boy.”"
If this part of the GJ report is true, Joe Pa did not accurately report what McQuery told him.
B/c of the significance of the charges, this is enough for me and should be for others, I believe. Resign already Joe. It'll only get worse.
November 7th, 2011 at 5:07 AM ^
It's entirely possible that McQuery didn't tell Paterno exactly what he saw, but did tell the Grand Jury. Which then makes a lot of things make more sense. He's got to be something like a grandparent type figure to the guy, and would you talk to anyone from that generation about anal sex? Especially if you're at the same time accusing one of his friends of raping 10 year olds if you say it? Hard to do.
November 7th, 2011 at 12:45 PM ^
grand jury have charged McQuery as well then? He was on staff at PSU and would have been under the same legal requirement to report abuse, not a watered down version of it.
November 7th, 2011 at 2:31 AM ^
The PSU board of directors should have called an emergency meeting this weekend and suspended all involved pending the outcome of the investigation.
If what is in the GJ report is true. I hope they all go to jail for the rest of their lives.
edit: Spanier should be suspended too, I mean what the hell was that statement he released? Are you kidding me?
November 7th, 2011 at 8:18 AM ^
On the news ticker on Morning Joe, it just said the PSU board had called an emergency meeting this morning. We'll see what happens.
Edit: The emergency meeting was last night.
November 7th, 2011 at 2:59 AM ^
Been thinking about this disgusting issue all day. Bottom line:
Whether he knew about it or not (which we know he did according to his testimony), Joe Paterno facilitated the sexual abuse of multiple minors + still allowed the pedophile to run his football camp on the campus with kids up until 2009, 7 years after reported actions to him.
The great Joe Pa facilitated child abuse, through his decisions which ultimately lead to it. This is massive failure to monitor what is going on in his program. He should either step down (which is doubtful because his massive ego will not allow it)... or be fired.
The GA who used to be their QB when we kicked their ass in 97, Mike McCreary also needs to be fired ASAP for witnessing his coaching going down on a minor in the shower, and not reporting it to the law.
November 7th, 2011 at 6:41 AM ^
to be fair to mcqueary...he didnt witness tht. the janitor did. mcqueart witnessed sandusky butt raping an innocent 10 yr old and ruining his innocence and his life.
November 7th, 2011 at 10:06 AM ^
Thank you for clarifying.