OT: Paterno Fired

[Rico444]

If I came to you and told you that your long-time friend and co-worker raped somebody in the bathroom, what would be your first reaction? Would you investigate it and inform your superiors that there might be a problem or call the police based on a statement from a guy you barely know? Paterno did what any level headed person would have done: he informed people more qualified than himself to investigate the matter.

If I didn't believe what this "guy I barely know" was telling me, then I sure as hell wouldn't make him my wide receivers coach.

 

[prankster]

Fair enough. I just feel Paterno did do something (if not by many people's opinions the best thing) to resolve the issue, and therefore shouldn't be thrown on the cross. It's just my opinion that he's getting more blame for not calling the police when the direct witness of the incident could have done it himself the whole time.

As I mentioned in an earlier post.....NO ONE involved in this sordid mess is going to emerge covered in glory....

There are too many ways to count where McQueary....chose poorly.

He should have taken direct action at the time he witnessed the act. And he should then have called the police, immediately afterward.

"Informing Paterno" comes in as a distant third, at best, on the list of stuff to do when presented with a case of child rape in the showers...

 

[SkyWalker2011]

SkyWalker2011, it scares me that you and many others think that way, absolutely frightening.

Hey, it's just my opinion, sorry we see differently. I think a lot of people are running off of emotions here. What happened to those kids is sickening, and I'm just as upset about it as everyone else. I agree with prankster that the whole situation is $hitty, and that a lot of poor decisions were made. All I'm saying is it was the responsibility of the person who directly witnessed the act to call the police. Did Paterno do the best he could do? No. Did he act within reason given the initial rumor and what he was allegedly told? Yes. I don't agree with people crucifying Paterno when he did do something to see that the allegations were investigated.

Is it possible that there's more to the story than Paterno has admitted to? Yes, but until then I'm not going to say Paterno should have been dealt with like that. If evidence emerges that said Paterno actively worked to cover up the scandal, well then yeah he's a #$%*.

 

[champs99and04]

Paterno knew this guy was a child rapist for at least the last 15 years and I'm guessing much longer, this is just the tip of the iceberg. I'm guessing close to 100 people come forward and who knows how many more were harmed, this guy is an absolute monster and he is sleeping at home through all of this.

That's the thing I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around as well. It has been reported that Sandusky was spotted on campus as recently as last week, and if that is the case, there is absolutely no way Paterno can justify his lack of action. Getting his higher ups to take care of the leagal situation and denying Sandusky access to the football facilities would be one thing, but to allow a predator to basically roam the campus at his own will is incredibly infuriating.

And also, how the *k does the GA still have a job? If Paterno was canned for not fulfilling his moral responsibility, then I would love to know how the GA fulfilled his.

It is mind blowing to think that people have known about this guy for fifteen years (probably longer) but yet he still had full access to the facilities.

 

[superjohn]

It's the most shocking story I've ever seen, none of it makes any sense. It sure looks like McQueary was told to keep quiet and was rewarded for his cowardice, the guy's career took off, he became their lead recruiter and wide receiver's coach.

 

[ctchamps]

I think we're just disagreeing on this.

It is my understanding that Shultz ran the University Police. The university police have the legal authority and the expertise to investigate.

Curley is Joepa's boss.

I understand that Joepa should've done more, but he informed men who were in a much better position than himself to follow up on this crime.

Schultz and Durley have been charged here, NOT Paterno.

You have it correct. Shultz represented the legal and criminal authority at PSU. So JoePa did report it to the "cops".

And the "cops" investigated supposedly by interviewing McQueary. No other details about their investigation has been made public as far as I know. It is possible JoePa followed up on his reporting of the matter and was told the evidence of Sandusky's guilt was in doubt, but we'll never know. It is just as likely that JoePa told these people to go through the motions. Again we'll never know.

The horror of the actions and the duration of the incidences, plus the information that two incidences were reported to take place on the campus, one in 1998 and one in 2002, has everyone justifiably angry. Furthermore the retirement of Sandusky in 1999 is a very odd event.

It is absurd for anyone of us to believe we'll know the truth about all the details. Most likely we'll learn a lot of things, some of which will be right on the mark, some will be totally off the mark, and most of the things will be partially correct.

None of this will help the kids no matter how this turns out. They will carry the scars forever. Hopefully they and their loved ones can heal in spite of what happened.

 

[Deadrody]

Am I the only one here who feels bad for Paterno? The guy is the victim of a media witch hunt. He did everything a person in his position I would expect to do.

He heard a statement (without apparent evidence) that a friend of his was molesting kids. So he goes and tells what he heard to his superior and the head of campus police so they can further investigate it. There is nothing wrong with that chain of events. It wasn't, and isn't, Paterno's responsibility to play detective in this case, so he reported what he heard to the right people.

Some people are saying it's Paterno's "moral responsibility as a human" to call the police directly. Sorry, but that's Stop. If I came to you and told you that your long-time friend and co-worker raped somebody in the bathroom, what would be your first reaction? Would you investigate it and inform your superiors that there might be a problem or call the police based on a statement from a guy you barely know? Paterno did what any level headed person would have done: he informed people more qualified than himself to investigate the matter.

Firing Paterno doesn't help those kids who were raped, all it does is satisfy the thirst for blood of the public.

If we were talking about what happened yesterday or last week, you might have a point. I don't hold Paterno responsible for not calling the police that day. But 9 years ago ? Yeah, at some point you HAVE to come forward and say WTF is going on with that Sandusky investigation ? And all of that assumes Paterno was not an active participant in a cover up, which I don't think is any better than a 50-50 proposition at this point.

And it doesn't go without noting that the perv in question wasn't just "some guy", but formerly the heir apparent to be PSU head coach and a former right-hand man under Paterno.

You're giving him FAR too much benefit of the doubt.

 

[DogMania]

This is my last post on the subject as it no longer serves any purpose other than me railing against the illogical need for immediate resolution by the masses.

When Joe is referring to his superiors, included in that meeting was the man in charge of the police force, who is now under indictment for perjury and will likely also be indicted for failing to act.

Joe's problem comes much later when nothing happens to Sandusky. Absent other facts, IMO it was unfair to treat the man in the manner they did, because he his the face of the university.

I'm ready for some football.

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IMO, some of you are stuck deep within the weeds and are missing the big picture here. Based on the outcome of GJ testimony, JP was not indicted for any prosecutable wrongs. Now that's not to say that things could change as more evidence comes out, nor is JP out of the woods as far as the myriad of civil suits that will inevitably come out of all this.

Now let's step a little further from the weeds and consider that maybe JP should have been indicted but due to his beloved status, the GJ simply cast a blind eye to his culpability. I've heard some say that according to PA law, every party was responsible to report what they saw or learned about this sort of crime. I don't know if that was the case back then. But even if it was the case and the GJ dropped the ball, this is not IMO JP's most significant transgression in all this.

Taking yet another step back from the woods, regardless of the law, his lack of making sure someone reported the incident to the police should be considered a major lapse in judgement. But even that is not the big issue at hand.

IMO JP's greatest transgression is that he, along with others, allowed and even worse enabled this monster to continue to be around young boys while knowing he brazenly sexually assaulted one in their own facility. I just can't get my mind around what in the fricken world were they thinking to keep Sandusky around and even help him grow his pool of possible victims.

Someone posted that there's some report that others might e involved with Sandusky in some sort of distribution channel of these children to other child molesters. I would not be shocked at all if that turns out to be the case considering how long he was at it and how long he was allowed to stick around and use university facilities even though he was no longer on the staff.

---- I'm going off topic a bit here, but what do you think about the following? ----

Maybe I'm a bit paranoid, but if I was a college president, AD or any type of high level administrator of a large organization that has any type of charitable work with children, I'd immediately conduct a cursory investigation to find out if there are any, what I would call, hanger-on-ers who are deeply involved with these sorts of charitable programs. What I mean by hanger-on-ers are those who are involved with these types of programs that seem to be sticking around a long time that are either not employed by that organization or entrenched at a level one would think they should have advanced beyond a long time ago. If you find out they have some that fit that category, then it might be worth doing a little digging to see if something ugly turns up. Now this might seem like a witch hunt and could turn out to be such if it's conducted the wrong way, but when it comes to children being at risk, I'm all for being proactive and catching these bastards. It's probably not all that hard to do. If you find out you have someone or more than one that fits that description, you investigate if they have a pattern of doing a lot of one-on-one type of activities out of the site of others, particularly with those who are also involved with that program. I think one-on-one mentoring is a very powerful and effective method to develop young people, but it can be easily conducted in public places where there are others around. Look for those who take just one boy or girl on trips. See if there are some who often selectively give gifts to certain boys or girls. That seems to be a common practice for child predictors that should be easy to spot, though for some reason many simply ignore. If there seems to be some pattern where there is a pattern of some participants in the program dropping out abruptly who were all involved with the same person, that should throw up some red flags. I just think that those who are around these types of predators simply are blind to the obvious signs because they simply can't believe that this seemly nice person could ever do such a thing. FWIW, doesn't it seem that most of the ones who were at it for a while before getting caught aren't the creepy ones, but instead are the ones that seemed not only normal but real nice people?

This sort of things seems to happen way too often and maybe I'm naive, but I don't think it would be all that hard or costly to implement some investigative measures for organizations that work with children, especially at risk ones who tend to be the biggest targets for this sort of crime. It might even be a good idea that the government, implement some sort people auditing practices in place. Yeah, I know this could blow up into a cost cow when it comes to government mandates. It might be hard to coordinate this type of role and effort, but I wonder if there are enough people even volunteers who would be willing to get trained on how to conduct these types of covert investigations and if they find out there's something worth looking more deeply into, an organization could then turn to some government or private organization that has trained professionals to take it to the next level. Just have this type of practice might scare off some of these predators, though my wild imagination tells me that some of these predators could work in concert with each other where some of the investigators could be fellow predators. I wouldn't put it past people. In fact, I wouldn't be shocked if something like this surfaces in the Penn State situation in the form of coverups and enabling. There was a doctor at a hospital in CT that had been at this sort of thing for years before he was discovered. And I'm sure there are many cases that don't hit the news, plus those who are at it and are not being caught as we speak.

 

[stamfordhusky]

It's real easy to cast stones from the outside with the benefit of hindsight. It is also easy to take in the sloppy media coverage and riff on that.

Joe failed in his moral responsibility to follow up when it became clear after weeks and months went by without news of the proper authorities taking action in the case. For that, it was time for him to step down.

Prior to that, he did everything correctly. I've read the entire grand jury report. It is unclear exactly what Joe was told. It is clear that it needed to be report to the authorities. He did that. It is important to remember that there is a work place component to this matter. He reported it to his supervisor and the head of campus police. The university is its own legal principality. They are the legal police force. Unless find out Joe was actively covering this up, he for at least a reasonable period of time should have been able rely on the authorities doing their job. Only when it became clear that nothing was being done, did he fail in his moral obligation. This is why the DA made the statement she did.

With no other information, the board mistreated the man who was neither a witness nor in charge of the investigation. The BOT could have let him finish up, but they got squeamish and panicked. That is the same attitude that failed the victims in this case.

Firing Joe immediately does nothing for the victims. It only feeds the mob's need for more carnage. The president, the head of campus police, and the AD should be fired for their criminal negligence. The later two have been rightfully charged bases on the information available.

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Just Paterno's own statements to the Grand Jury were enought to fire him. The BOT clearly did the right thing. By his own admission he knew that some sort of sexual molestation had taken place - even if he didn't know the specific act (and McQueary says Paterno was told the specifics). Paterno's inaction/cover-up was partly responsible for dozens of innocent children being sexually abused for years after. He had to go.

BTW, Paterno may not be a "mandatory reporter" under PA state law - but there the university is definitely NOT the appropriate "legal principality" to handle this at any stage. Any person who is a mandatory reporter is required to go outside of any workplace reporting requirement and outside of the "legal principality" and go to the PA child welfare department (not sure of its exact name). If a head coach of a team is considered an administrator, then Paterno broke the law. Either way, he acted in a morally bankrupt fashion.

 

[stamfordhusky]

people here are failing to understand that Joe Paterno is the FACE of penn state. Reporting it to his superiors? Really? So he was just suppose to bring it to their attention and it was off his hands? You dont think that if u were in his position and u reported something you wouldnt follow up to why this guy is still running boys camps and using ur facilities ? Come on

Joe is even more than the FACE of Penn State. When it came to football, Curley essentially reported to Paterno. Curley did nothing involving football - ever - without consulting with JoePa and getting his permission.

 

[Dogdeacon]

[quote="D

I guess they got rid of the character limit huh?!
I know that to volunteer at most schools these days you have to consent to background checks and even fingerprinting. You'd think charitable organizations are similar. There are always loopholes though. For example in MA over the past couple years various people with records (DUI type things, not sex offenders) have held jobs driving special needs kids or day care vans because they are outside contractors. It'd be interesting to see what Big Brothers/Sisters does for their screenings or similar organizations as I'd expect the biggest ones have the most fine-tuned and best practices.

 

[stamfordhusky]

maybe paterno felt his superiors took care of it, again we need to wait until everything comes out

He knew his "superiors" had done nothing. It's virtually certain that he consulted with Curley every step of the way.

 

[arnie3]

He knew his "superiors" had done nothing. It's virtually certain that he consulted with Curley every step of the way.

Maybe he also consulted with Sandusky. I just can't believe that Sandusky would ever have been allowed back on campus without Paterno's okay.

 

[SkyWalker2011]

First guy was actually pretty rational.