Was Joe Paterno overly targeted for retrobution?

In the end, the combination of Federal charges of violating the Clery Act, violating the Mann Act, possible violations of IRS rules (because the Second Mile was probably a 501(c)(3) organization), and all those civil suits could literally wipe out Penn State financially--maybe enough to come close to wiping out the entire endowment of the university. Penn State could end up being reduced to the same status it was before Joe Paterno arrived on the scene--a small agricultural college.

LynnW said:

The Board of Trustees was never informed of the 2001 incident.


If Paterno hadn't died, it is likely he would face indictment on the coverups.

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Not true at all. There was no real evidence that contradicts what Paterno said. What Freeh used to show Paterno had other knowledge was a vague reference in an email by a person accused of perjury.

Please people, get facts and keep opinions out of it. Don't speculate on motives.
And think, would it really have hurt the football program to have a Former coach arrested? It would have been out of the headlines long before fall.

mkubel said:

Not true at all. There was no real evidence that contradicts what Paterno said. What Freeh used to show Paterno had other knowledge was a vague reference in an email by a person accused of perjury.

Please people, get facts and keep opinions out of it. Don't speculate on motives.
And think, would it really have hurt the football program to have a Former coach arrested? It would have been out of the headlines long before fall.

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Unless the non-profit organization set up as a victim farm for said former coach was also used for schemes to financially reward its officers and their affiliates. Then the spurning of said former coach might open up embarrassing financial inquiries regarding the operations of that same non-profit.

That would hurt football some, but would really hurt Paterno himself and his investment partners who served on the Second Mile board. That's why it was covered up. Sandusky's sickness jeopardized their financial apparatus.

Any wonder that the DA investigating all of this years ago mysteriously disappeared? He's either swimming with the fishes or exists as merely a void in the concrete foundation of some recently-constructed PSU campus building. You don't kill DA's to cover up a sicko, but you might if multi-million dollar deals are at stake.

The email that indicates a Paterno's prior knowledge comes from a person accused of perjury. So what? A conspirator might easily lie to authorities, but not as likely to lie to his co-conspirators in a private email sent long before any serious investigations had taken place.

Louis Freeh is not a "speculator." He is an investigator. Have you read every word of his report? Paterno knew back in 1998. Hs testified to the grand jury that he did not. That is perjury. Perhaps not enough to convict, but more than enough to charge him for the crime, which is all any of us have said. Perjury is very difficult to prove (just ask free-as-a-bird "Roid Rocket" Roger Clemens), so I'm not saying he'd lose at trial, but he's just as guilty as the others.

Let's revisit this thread in three years and see how big a can of worms this becomes. Right now we're only ankle-deep in this river of filth.

ILikeTurtles said:

Joe Paterno colluded with school officials to keep a child molester's actions a secret - in the name of protecting the school football program and their public image.

IMO - the entire Penn State football prog should have been shut down indefinitely.

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punish all the kids and people who didnt have anything to do with it? They need to shut it down and get rid of all the people who were involved with it, but to indefinitely shut down the entire program seems a little unjust.
lets just go ahead and charge everyone in the program with the same thing while we are at it.

BFizzzle said:

punish all the kids and people who didnt have anything to do with it? They need to shut it down and get rid of all the people who were involved with it, but to indefinitely shut down the entire program seems a little unjust.
lets just go ahead and charge everyone in the program with the same thing while we are at it.

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Who is being "punished?" Every Peen State football player can transfer without losing any eligibility. So NO PLAYER on the team can claim any sort of "victimhood."

The other students? They aren't being "punished," either. College is for academics, and football fandom is a privilege, not a right. If PSU as an educational institution is so completely addicted, culturally and financially, to football, it needs to be cut off cold-turkey if there is any hope of a real change of mentality.

That is the whole point of invoking the "death penalty": to change the culture. You know, the "defend the program at all costs" madness that directly fueled the serial child rape cover-up for at least 14 years? The godlike reverence afforded to Joe Paterno that still completely blinds people to the truth of his reprehensible conduct and moral cowardice, even when presented with concrete evidence of it?

No one has made a better case for indefinite suspension of football @ Penn State better than the fans themselves, who, earlier this week, held a pep rally at the LASCH BUILDING, the very place many of the boys were violently raped! Young 8-10 year old boys were AT the rally, getting their pictures taken with football players, with Paterno's wife shaking the hands of players at the door of the facility. They are wearing "We are.. Pissed Off!" T-shirts and shirts proclaiming the NCAA as "communist."

To the rest of the civilized world, this looks like the most glaring cognitive dissonance imaginable. The players and fans are "victims." Oh, the horrors they've suffered, losing players, scholarships, and bowl games! They're certainly the real victims, not the boys Sandusky sodomized repeatedly for 14 years under the leadership and tacit approval of St. JoePa. "Screw them--WE WANT FOOTBALL! WE ARE PENN STATE! HONOR THE TEAM!"

He helped cover up kids getting raped...the guy got what he deserved. The statue should be blown to bits, and a damnatio memoriae should be placed upon his name.

D*I*S_Frontman said:

God bless you. A moderate voice.

I hope you aren't alone, and I hope you remain anonymous on that campus, at least for now. I imagine it's a fearful time to hold such views in "Happy Valley."

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Thank you. And honestly I do. Last time I voiced my opinion on campus I nearly got my head chopped off. Now, I just keep my opinions to myself until I get home.

Lousy at football, too...

I don't think he deserved the statue in the first place, sure he had a lot of wins but in how many years? And things like he thought that NFL Hall of Fame QB Jim Kelly (from Pennsylvania) should switch to linebacker , that's why JK went to Miami, the rest as they say is history.

I am and always will be a sports fan. This is just my opinion. The football program was amazing. Simply brilliant and Joe Paterno was a genius. But for Joe Paterno and the entire football program to ignore the health and well being of ALL THE YOUNG BOYS Sandusky harmed was a CRIME! Getting a players talent to where he would sign a MASSIVE contract with a NFL team is NOT worth harming in any way shape or form the young boys that Sandusky molested. No one learnes ANYTHING. The young boys get scarred for life, the college football player Penn State is trainning for the NFL just learns that laws useless and not what it means to be a man ON the field AND off the field and ALL THE PEOPLE in the "mighty" Penn State football program get richer and richer. I think that football program should have been shut down FOREVER! The children ARE OUR FUTURE. IF society don't protect them then we do NOT have a future.

I believe in my heart that Penn State got a "slap on the wrist". For allowing Sandusky to continue to harm the young boys and Uni got off way too easy!

Scum are scum. Don't matter what their job is. Turn a blind eye to child rape, you're a scumbag. No mitigation, no excuse.

Some people will never fully understand unless their own child gets raped some day. Until then, they will put their football first.

Get the facts right. Paterno did not cover anything up. He saw that it was reported to the proper authorities. that is the opposite of a cover-up. Skip past the trash stories and get the actual facts. Too much non-sense is spreading around.

mkubel said:

Get the facts right. Paterno did not cover anything up. He saw that it was reported to the proper authorities. that is the opposite of a cover-up. Skip past the trash stories and get the actual facts. Too much non-sense is spreading around.

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Care to give evidence of these facts.

MacNut said:

Care to give evidence of these facts.

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+1. Lets see evidence of Joe Paterno ensuring the authorities dealt with the child rape when he was told about it.

niuniu said:

+1. Lets see evidence of Joe Paterno ensuring the authorities dealt with the child rape when he was told about it.

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Paterno, who didn't see the incident and was only given a vague account of what McQueary witnessed, saw that it was reported to the both the head of Campus police and the head of the athletic department. There is no dispute of this.

Joe had nothing to gain from a cover-up (again he saw that it was reported), he didn't like Sandusky, and he was around long enough to know that a former coaches actions wouldn't hurt the football program. A prime example of this was the basketball scandal at Syracuse that came out right after this.

mkubel said:

Paterno, who didn't see the incident and was only given a vague account of what McQueary witnessed, saw that it was reported to the both the head of Campus police and the head of the athletic department. There is no dispute of this.

Joe had nothing to gain from a cover-up (again he saw that it was reported), he didn't like Sandusky, and he was around long enough to know that a former coaches actions wouldn't hurt the football program. A prime example of this was the basketball scandal at Syracuse that came out right after this.

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We're not talking about littering, it's child abuse.

He notified Campus administration, one of which oversaw campus security. He did not notify the State police. What sort of man doesn't make sure that the report of child abuse isn't followed up on, or reported to the State police?

He didn't like the guy apparently, yet he still wouldn't follow up on it. Shows you how self-serving and sick these people really were.

niuniu said:

We're not talking about littering, it's child abuse.

He notified Campus administration, one of which oversaw campus security. He did not notify the State police. What sort of man doesn't make sure that the report of child abuse isn't followed up on, or reported to the State police?

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The university police had jurisdiction, and are overall better equipped for handling these types of investigative crimes then the locals. It would have been up them to call in the state police for help.

Besides, don't you think the upper administrators were more responsible at this point. They even had more information then was given to Paterno, and more experience. Its easy to blame the name you recognize. But the reality was much different.

mkubel said:

The university police had jurisdiction, and are overall better equipped for handling these types of investigative crimes then the locals. It would have been up them to call in the state police for help.

Besides, don't you think the upper administrators were more responsible at this point. They even had more information then was given to Paterno, and more experience. Its easy to blame the name you recognize. But the reality was much different.

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Everyone is responsible. It's child abuse. You don't pass the buck.

Some sickos about with their funny ideas on 'reality'.

mkubel said:

The university police had jurisdiction, and are overall better equipped for handling these types of investigative crimes then the locals. It would have been up them to call in the state police for help.

Besides, don't you think the upper administrators were more responsible at this point. They even had more information then was given to Paterno, and more experience. Its easy to blame the name you recognize. But the reality was much different.

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Campus clowns giving cars parking tickets grow up!!!!
Just like a mall cop. They are to protect property and hand over felons to the city/state police.

An example of my experience: My Alma-Mater

link : http://www.oocities.org/universityoftoledo/n.html

Excerpt After 16 Months, Killer Finally Admitted Murder
The story of the 1992 shooting death of University of Toledo nursing student Melissa Anne Herstrum by UT police officer Jeffrey Hodge captivated the city and angered students, who called for better campus security measures.

Ms. Herstrum's partially clothed body was found shortly after midnight on January 27 at a remote site on UT's Scott Park campus. The 19-year-old sophomore from Rocky River Ohio had been shot 14 times in the head, the back, and legs.

On January 31, the day of Ms. Herstrum's funereal, police revealed that she had been shot by the same 9-mm handgun used to fire six shots into a UT dormitory room a week earlier.

The next day, Hodge, 22, at the time and a rookie police officer, was arrested amid widespread complaints in the media of a smail-paced and ineffective investigation. He later was charged with aggravated murder and kidnapping. Prosecutors said they would seek the death penalty.

ShamrockSolace said:

Campus clowns giving cars parking tickets grow up!!!!
Just like a mall cop. They are to protect property and hand over felons to the city/state police.

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Actually university police are well trained officers. There are bad people that get into every profession. I've heard equally bad stories about big city cops. It s the person, not the department.

Mall cops are usually unarmed security officers. And university police do have jurisdiction on there campus.

Paterno got off easy by dying before the Freeh report was released. I was glad to see that a large number of his victories were vacated so he is no longer the winningest coast in division 1 football.

I am probably going to upset a fair number of people with my thoughts on this but so be it...

Zombie Acorn said:

Nope, he got what he deserved.

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Yes and no. I agree that he needed to have criminal charges filed against him and everyone involved. The NCAA stepping in and imposing there own punishment is what really really upsets me. Weather or not he was a football coach, swim coach, track coach, etc has NO BEARING WHAT SO EVER. This is first and foremost a criminal case and all "sports" affiliations should have been removed from context.

2020mike said:

The whole PSU football program should of got a death sentence in my opinion.

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That is complete BS. The kids playing on the football team did not deserve what the NCAA did by vacating there wins and removing the scholarships, etc. The NCAA stepping in was and is completely over the line in this case.

LaWally said:

Instead of losing 20 scholarships for 4 years and having a 4 year loss of post season eligibility, PSU should have lost 14 scholarships for 14 years, and had a 14 year loss of post season eligibility ... one scholarship/year for each year of the cover up.

If not that, then just close the whole place down.

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Yes, because punishing the players that were there and had there wins vacated is right. And because doing this to current students and football players is fair.

nishioka said:

That's to be expected. The community is circling the wagons like nobody's business right now. The NCAA ventured into new territory by punishing Penn State football for what went on, and a buddy of mine who is a fan specifically said that vacating Joe Paterno's wins (his words: pissing on Joe's grave) was a bridge too far.

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I agree with your friend. Whether or not he failed to report something of criminal activity is irrelevant to his coaching and the sport of football. It would be just as irrelevant had he been a track coach or swim coach.

nishioka said:

Frankly, for an issue that's supposed to be about child abuse, the NCAA did a pretty good job of shifting focus back to football. Now you have people who are either upset that Joe Paterno's wins were vacated, or are scouring Penn State's roster trying to figure out which kids are going to defect, you have people wondering if the Big Ten shouldn't undergo some structural change to reassign a new cross-division rival to Nebraska... it goes on. Everyone's saying "of course the kids are what's important", but nobody is acting like it. That is what happens when you apply a football punishment to a child abuse problem. The NCAA should have stopped at the $60 million fine that's supposed to go to charity. Maybe even made it more stiff.

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Could not agree more!! The crap the NCAA pulled and the "bridges" the crossed was a big overstep on there part as far as I am concerned. The extent to which they went should NEVER have been allowed to happen. I remember hearing on the radio on my drive into work the list of penalties and stuff that was handed down to Penn State. The first thing that went through my mind was "WTF did they just do, and how where they allowed to do it"

darkplanets said:

Close the place down? Because punishing the students and players who weren't involved at all does what, again? Sounds like it all it would do is complicate innocent people's lives.

IMO this is mostly a criminal case, and not a sports one anymore. A fine by the NCAA? That's fair. Going ******* over it to mete out your own form of civil justice? Not so fair. The courts should be the ones to handle this, no one else.

The ones who needed punishment were the ones who were in power at the time, which should have appropriate charges brought against them where applicable. Not the new administration, and especially not the students/players.

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Agreed!! The NCAA stepping in to the extent they did made this a "Look how f'ed up the Penn State football program is" instead of the criminal child abuse case it should have been from the beginning.

iJohnHenry said:

Yes, an over-reaction, but there you have it.

Strip them of NCAA affiliation for, say 5 years, and let them concentrate on producing productive scholars.

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This sounds more fair then what ended up happening. By taking away scholarships and the like they are only hurting students that may not have been able to get into college any other way.

leekohler said:

Agreed. This needs to happen in order to send a message- this kind of thing will NOT be tolerated at all.

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Fine, don't tolerate it, but the NCAA oversteps its powers and jurisdiction on this one.

ILikeTurtles said:

Joe Paterno colluded with school officials to keep a child molester's actions a secret - in the name of protecting the school football program and their public image.

IMO - the entire Penn State football prog should have been shut down indefinitely.

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You sounds like your a little bitter and shutting down the program would accomplish almost nothing and only hurt more students.

Fairfax said:

Paterno got off easy by dying before the Freeh report was released. I was glad to see that a large number of his victories were vacated so he is no longer the winningest coast in division 1 football.

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His wins are irrelevant to the child abuse that happened. Yes something should have been done to stop it right away, but that is a moral decision and has nothing to do with this coaching and the players on the team(s) that won those games. Short of games/matches/etc won because of doping and performance enhancing drugs those wins should NEVER have been vacated. It like in baseball if a player if found to be on performance enhancers then hits/home runs/etc are expunged from the record and that is fair. The wins that were vacated by the NCAA was not on any level fair.

niuniu said:

Everyone is responsible. It's child abuse. You don't pass the buck.

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This. Bottom line, if he witnessed abuse, he should have followed it through with a call to the police and/or the local children's aid society.

Anyone who has any training in working with children should know this. It's one of the first things we teach our workers in the organization I volunteer with.

You don't bring it up quietly with your supervisor. You don't assume someone else will take care of it. You don't quietly address the perpetrator and ask him to please stop. YOU are expected to bring it straight to the legal authorities. Failing to do so is in fact illegal and a punishable offense in itself!

This is what he needed to do, regardless of what may or may not have happened to the reputation of the school.

In 90% of schools the students would be marching and rioting against the football program. Today, PS students are wearing Pro Joe T-shirts and excusing everything.

What that tells you is that they became a cult there in Happy Valley. It is like North Koreans weeping over the death of their Dear Leader, a man who screwed them big time.

The football program should have been completely torn down to a Div III level and a lot of people need to be in jail. I disagree with the fines that simply hurt actual school programs.

carlgo said:

In 90% of schools the students would be marching and rioting against the football program. Today, PS students are wearing Pro Joe T-shirts and excusing everything.

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Why? The football program had nothing to do with this. Yes the offenders happened to work for the football program but so what? They could have worked for the swim program, track program, etc. This is a criminal case and the actions taken by the NCAA overstepped there bounds. Fine the football program for misconduct but the other steps taken were not fair.

There was no unsportsman like conduct or cheating involved in the victories the team had while this happened. Wiping the record of those wins is just not fair to anyone, player or coach, that was part of the football team and probably did not have any knowledge of what was happening.

The football program should have been completely torn down to a Div III level and a lot of people need to be in jail. I disagree with the fines that simply hurt actual school programs.

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People being in jail I agree with! Punish those involved and move on.