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Here we go, now we're starting to get to the next level...remember, Corbett, who is now Governor, was also previously the Atty General, so his office would have known about reports of child molestation of Second Mile kids via Sandusky. But he approved a $3M grant to the organization AFTER he gets elected? and we find that Second Mile board members gave Corbett's campaign money? Oh brother.

secondmile.2_500.jpg

A drawing of the Learning Center at The Center for Excellence for The Second Mile.

Corbett approved grant for Sandusky charity
$3M OK'd despite abuse investigation

Wednesday, November 16, 2011
By Jon Schmitz, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11320/1190145-455-0.stm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11320/1190145-455-0.stm</a>

Gov. Tom Corbett this summer approved a $3 million state grant to The Second Mile, the charity founded by suspected child molester Jerry Sandusky, despite knowing about the sex abuse investigation that later resulted in charges against Mr. Sandusky.

The grant is now on hold, said Mr. Corbett's spokesman, Eric Shirk.


The grant would have helped pay for the first phase of the "Center for Excellence" at The Second Mile, which Mr. Sandusky, a former Penn State University assistant football coach, founded in 1977 to work with troubled children.

The center was a grand dream of Mr. Sandusky's that he said would offer "a sense of [permanence] and a place for our kids to call 'home.' " It would have classrooms, a gym, athletic fields and dormitory space.

According to correspondence from Mr. Corbett's budget secretary, Charles B. Zogby, the $3 million was first budgeted by the Legislature in 2010 and approved for release by former Gov. Ed Rendell a year ago.

A grant agreement was not completed before Mr. Corbett took office in January, and the administration decided to review that and other grants that were pending in the state's Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program, Mr. Zogby wrote.

"The Office of the Budget has completed its review of The Second Mile Learning Center project and I am pleased to inform you that Governor Corbett has approved the Commonwealth's commitment of $3,000,000 in RACP funding for this project," he wrote in a July 20 letter to Jack Raykovitz, Second Mile CEO until he resigned Monday.

Mr. Corbett as attorney general supervised an investigation that began in 2008 when a 15-year-old Clinton County boy came forward with complaints that Mr. Sandusky had sexually abused him. The governor spoke about the case in a live radio interview on Tuesday but was not questioned about the grant. He could not be reached to comment about it later.

Mr. Sandusky was removed from contact with children in The Second Mile's programs after notifying agency officials he was under investigation in 2008, the agency has said. He fully retired from the agency in 2010.

Mr. Shirk said no state money was disbursed. The grant was structured to provide reimbursements to the agency as construction proceeded. "It's suspended pending further review," he said Tuesday.

Mr. Sandusky touted the Center for Excellence in Second Mile annual reports in 2007 and 2008 and in his resignation letter in 2010. He said it was needed because the organization was growing and could no longer rely on borrowed space for its programs.

"This lack of dedicated space also hampers our ability to train volunteers and professionals so that they can make our programs available to even more children across Pennsylvania," he [Sandusky] wrote in 2007.

The grant was an unusual departure for the agency, which raises money from corporations and private citizens to fund its operations and boasts that it gets no government funding.

Mr. Raykovitz resigned as The Second Mile's CEO and president on Monday, in the wake of the scandal that has Mr. Sandusky facing 40 counts of sex abuse involving eight children. Two top Penn State administrators, athletic director Tim Curley and vice president Gary Schultz, face charges of failing to report abuse and perjury.

All three men have claimed they are innocent.

Dave Woodle, board vice chairman who has taken over day-to-day operation of The Second Mile, could not be reached Tuesday to comment on the status of the construction project.

One description said it was to have six phases that would take 25 to 30 years to complete. The first phase was a learning center that would have athletic fields around it.

In another development Tuesday, Mr. Corbett defended the amount of time it took for the attorney general's office to bring charges against Mr. Sandusky.

Some have questioned whether the investigation was sufficiently staffed in its earlier stages. Mr. Corbett, in a live interview on KDKA radio, said it takes time to gather evidence, interview witnesses and build a strong case.

"These investigations don't just jump up and give you the evidence right away," he told the station's Marty Griffin.

Asked if he was concerned that Mr. Sandusky might have victimized more children during the investigation, the governor said, "We have no knowledge one way or another, so of course you worry about that. But you have to have the evidence to bring the charges."

Mr. Griffin asked Mr. Corbett about Mr. Sandusky's TV interview on Monday night with NBC's Bob Costas, in which he denied being sexually attracted to young boys.

"I guess that's going to be determined in a court of law and not in the newspapers or on television," the governor said.

While noting that the investigation is continuing and raising the possibility that more witnesses and/or victims could come forward, Mr. Corbett declined comment on whether he expected more people to be charged in the case.

Jon Schmitz: jschmitz@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1868. Twitter: @pgtraffic.
First published on November 16, 2011 at 12:00 am

Read more: <a class="postlink" href="http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11320/1190145-455-0.stm#ixzz1dtoVBmg5" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11320/11 ... z1dtoVBmg5</a>

Oh, it seems that the Koch Brothers were big campaign contributors to Corbett's Governor run. Now, I haven't verified this, but thought I'd add because of the mention of the Koch Brothers earlier in this thread.
 

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And now we see commentary by the media's cartoonists...

10263190-standard.jpg


And as it gets more insane, Citizen Bank will stop distributing their PSU buttons because of misinterpretations in light of the Sandusky matter..

penn-state-football-buttons-f3f0c93faae22054.jpg


Citizens Bank is reportedly stopping distribution of Penn State football buttons for away contests at Ohio State and Wisconsin. The slogans for the buttons were to be "Much Ado About Nuttin'" for Ohio State and "Brie 'em to Their Knees" for Wisconsin.

The buttons' slogans could be misconstrued in light of the sex abuse scandal on campus. Former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was charged with 40 counts of sex crimes against minors, while legendary coach Joe Paterno and three other university officials lost their jobs for their handling of allegations against Sandusky.

Penn State takes on Ohio State on Saturday at 3:30 p.m. The game will be televised locally on ABC.

Citizens Bank distributes buttons for home and away Penn State games with phrases directed at the Nittany Lions' opponent.

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/11/penn_state_buttons_pulled_over.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index. ... _over.html</a>
 

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Tony Softli weighs-in...
Goto minute 13:30 in his interview with Bernie today. Softi thinks that there will be numerous other implicated, including politicians & police... even mentioning the rumor that Sandusky was pimping-out kids from Second Mile

[mp3]http://stage.101espn.com/podcasting/2011/11/11162011114457.mp3[/mp3]


A Horror Movie for the Ages
By Tony Softli
Published: November 16, 2011 @ 1:01am
<a class="postlink" href="http://tonysoftli.com/?nid=28&sid=15722744" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://tonysoftli.com/?nid=28&sid=15722744</a>

A casting company will start the search and hold auditions for the role of a legendary football coach who had 400-plus collegiate victories stretching over six decades , at a college that was uncontaminated and dirt free from NCAA violations, had no scandals with an immaculate reputation, and sparkling in rich tradition. While this coach's achievement will go down as one of the best in all sports, the tarnish placed on his trophy of accomplishments is nothing compared to the black eye he will wear for the rest of his life for the negligent decision to not do the right thing.

Other actors will be sought out to play the lead role as the defensive coordinator that is accused of child sexual abuse over a 15-year period while running a charitable organization. Other characters include a young graduate assistant coach who is developing as one of the key witnesses and characters in the movie, along with at least eight child actors that grew to adult actors during this film and will play the role of the victims.

There will be casting notices for other supporting actors: An athletics director, university president, senior vice president, and a handful of lawyers, prosecutors and judges to make up a grand jury. There will be many twists and turns as the plot thickens, with the district attorney disappearing midway through the movie, which points to corruption from the top down involving members of law enforcement including private detectives, and campus and local police. It has government officials revealing phone records, text messages and e-mails; a true cover-up from the top down.

There will be backdrops and staging of a community and small-town setting along with a university campus full of secondary actors to fill roles at football games, community living and protesting. It will be a dynamic story line, with murder, suicide, sexual abuse, love, hate, corruption and a scandal that may lead to the victims possibly becoming scapegoats. The brutal truth is what the director will push for from the first scene to the rolling of the credits.

While this movie is not yet rated, for sure it will yield blockbuster returns on the opening weekend. I suggest that all the proceeds from this horror flick be donated to sexually abused children throughout the country.
 

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Past And Present Board Members Of Sandusky’s Charity And Their Businesses Or Families Gave $641,481.21 To Gov. Tom Corbett


Past And Present Board Members Of Sandusky’s Charity And Their Businesses Or Families Gave $641,481.21 To Gov. Tom Corbett
<a class="postlink" href="http://deadspin.com/5860034/past-and-present-board-members-of-sanduskys-charity-and-their-businesses-or-families-gave-64148121-to-gov-tom-corbett" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://deadspin.com/5860034/past-and-pr ... om-corbett</a>

Earlier today, we reported that some two dozen current and former board members at The Second Mile had given money to Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett's 2010 campaign. The board members donated a combined $201,783.64, to be exact. But direct contributions are hardly the end of it. Big donors can also encourage family members or employees to send cash to a politician.

Take Bill Greenlee, who served on The Second Mile board until 2004. Greenlee died last year and never gave money directly to Corbett. But he founded Greenlee Associates (now called Greenlee Partners), one of the top lobbying firms in Pennsylvania. And Greenlee Partners donated $36,535.19 to Corbett's 2010 gubernatorial campaign, with another $1,000 coming from Vanessa Getz, one of the firm's top employees. In 2007 and 2008, Greenlee Partners gave $2,000 to Corbett, when the then-attorney general was running for reelection. The firm also gave money to Corbett when ran for attorney general in 2004—his first campaign—and in the subsequent year. From 2003-2005, the firm donated $13,295.02 to Corbett. [Note: That figure includes a $1,500 contriubtion credited to "Greenlee Associates" because the checks came from the same PO Box in Harrisburg.] The total amount transferred from Greenlee's firm to Corbett's political coffers: $51,830.21.

Another longtime and current board member of The Second Mile is Louie Sheetz, the Executive Vice President of Marketing at Sheetz, Inc., a successful chain of gas stations and convenience stores. Like Greenlee, Sheetz hasn't given money directly to Corbett. But his family-owned company and his family have. Corbett received $106,000 in Sheetz, Inc. money for his 2010 gubernatorial run. In prior election cycles, Sheetz, Inc. and Sheetz family members donated $7,350 to Corbett, bringing the Sheetz total to $113,350. [Note: Sheetz, Inc. also donated $20,000-$49,999 to The Second Mile in 2010 and currently has the company's public relations manager, Monica Jones, sitting on the charity's central board.]

A smaller but still representative money tendril is associated with Michael Gillespie, the chief accounting officer of the Hersha Hospitality Trust and a director on The Second Mile's southcentral board. Gillespie only gave Corbett $250 in 2010. But Gillespie's co-workers gave Corbett $7,142.80. Of the eight other employees listed on the hospitality trust's website, four gave to Corbett, as did the chairman of the trust's board and the chief investment officer for the Hersha Group, which oversees the trust. Two other employees of the Hersha Group gave to Corbett's gubernatorial campaign, bringing the total to $8,642.80.

The surface donations are easy enough to count up. We've already covered that ground. But it's also worthwhile to look at how much money these people have donated to Corbett since 2003, when he first ran for public office. Same goes for how much money Corbett received from companies or people with strong ties to directors on the charity's boards. At the very least, even the indirect connections show, again, how influential and well-connected The Second Mile is.

2011 state board of directors

Bob Poole, Chairperson
President and CEO, S & A Homes and Poole Anderson Construction
2009-2010 cycle: $9,133.34
Other years: $2,125
Total: $11,258.34

Dave Woodle, Vice Chairperson
Chairman & CEO, NanoHorizons, Inc.
2009-2010 cycle: $5,000
Other years: $1,000
Total: $6,000

Cliff Benson, Director
Retired, Deloitte Tax LP
2009-2010 cycle: $750
Other years: $500
Total: $1,250

Michael Fiore, Director
Executive Vice President, Leonard S. Fiore, Inc.
2009-2010 cycle: $4,590
Other years: $6,112.56
Total: $10,702.56

Bruce Heim, Director
Chairman, Keystone Real Estate Group, LP
2009-2010 cycle: $1,000
Other years: $2,500
Total: $3,500
[Note: Three other current or former Keystone employees—Al Pringle, Michael Trombley, and Ben Heim—are both Corbett donors and current or former members of the charity's boards. Their donations are listed below.]

Heidi Nicholas, Director
Real Estate Developer & Manager
2009-2010 cycle: $5,000
Other years: $1,000
Total: $6,000

Al Pringle, Director
Senior Vice President of Commercial Real Estate, Keystone
2009-2010 cycle: $250
Other years: $0
Total: $250

Nancy Ring, Director
Realtor, REMAX Centre County
2009-2010 cycle: $350
Other years: $0
Total: $350

2011 central board of directors

Michael Hawbaker, Director
Glenn O. Hawbaker Inc.
2009-2010 cycle: $500
Other years: $0
Donations by family members and/or other Glenn O. Hawbaker employees: $23,225
Total: $23,725

Ben Heim, Director
President, Keystone Real Estate Group
2009-2010 cycle:$500
Other years: $2,500
Total: $3,000

Benjamin Hulburt, Director
President & CEO, Rex Energy
2009-2010 cycle: $6,500
Other years: $0
Total: $6,500

Jack Infield, Director
Regional President, Graystone State Bank, State College
2009-2010 cycle: $500
Other years: $0
Total: $500

Alan Kirk, Director
Esquire, Babst Calland Clements & Zomnir
2009-2010 cycle: $350
Other years: $0
Donations by other Babst Calland Clements & Zomnir employees or PACs: $4,550
Total: $4,900

Harry Sickler, Director
CPA, Owner, Harry K. Sickler Associates
2009-2010 cycle: $600
Other years: $200
Donations by Harry K. Sickler Associates and an employee: $3,000
Total: $3,800

Michael Trombley, Director
Retired, President, Keystone Real Estate Group
2009-2010 cycle: $350
Other years: $275
Total: $625

2011 southcentral board of directors

Rod Savidge, 1st Vice Chairperson
VP, Director of HR, Gannett Fleming, Inc.
2009-2010 cycle: $110.30
Other years: $0
Donations from Gannett Fleming and it employees: $15,300
Total: $15,410.30

Michael R. Gillespie, Director
Chief Accounting Officer, Hersha Hospitality Trust
2009-2010 cycle: $250
Other years: $0
Donations from other Hersha employees and board members: $8642.80
Total: $8,892.80

Former Second Mile board members who donated to Corbett's campaigns:

Anne Deeter Gallaher, Director
2009-2010 cycle: $300
Other years: $0
Total: $300

Kimberly Ortenzio-Nielsen, Director
2009-2010 cycle: $1,300
Other years: $0
Total: $1,300

Rick Karcher, Director
2009-2010 cycle: $1,200
Other years: $0
Total: $1,200

James Swistock, Director
2009-2010 cycle: $6,200
Other years: $1,000
Total: $7,200

Lance Shaner, Director
2009-2010 cycle: $155,550
Other years: $1,125
Donations from a family member: $6,600
Total: $163,275

Derek Walker, Director
2009-2010 cycle: $1,500
Other years: $0
Total: $1,500

Current state board members whose companies and/or families donated to Corbett:

Jake Corman, Director
Pennsylvania State Senator
Corman's father, J. Doyle Corman, Jr., a former state senator, gave Corbett $600 in the 2009-2010 cycle. In past cycles, Corbett received a combined $6,912 from Corman's parents and the senator's "Friends of Jake Corman" PAC.
Total: $7,512

Mike Fiaschetti, Director
Senior Vice President, Highmark Blue Shield
Highmark health insurer is a major Corbett donor. The company donated $21,250 to Corbett's 2010 gubernatorial campaign. The company's chief legal counsel, Gary Truitt, gave $5,000. (Truitt retired last year.) Another employee donated $300. Contributions from Highmark and its employees from previous years: $17,300.
Total: $43,850
[Note: The Highmark Foundation, the company's charitable wing, is also a big donor to The Second Mile.]

Ray Roundtree, Director
Regional Vice President of Finance, Comcast Cable
Comcast donated $69,500 to Corbett in the 2009-2010 cycle. Comcast employees gave $36,300. Comcast and its employees did not give money to Corbett before his gubernatorial run.
Total: $105,800

DrueAnne Schreyer, Director
Community Volunteer
DrueAnne Schreyer is a longtime member of the board and the daughter of former Merril Lynch CEO William Schreyer, a Penn State alum who served two terms as the president of the school's board of trustees. Schreyer gave PSU $55 million to create an honors college at the school called the Schreyer Honors College. In 2010, he gave Corbett $10,000.
Total: $10,000

Louie Sheetz, Director
Executive Vice President, Marketing, Sheetz, Inc.
No direct contributions to Corbett from Louie Sheetz, but Sheetz, Inc. and Sheetz family members donated heavily: $106,000 to Corbett's 2010 gubernatorial run and $7,350 to previous campaigns.
Total: $113,350

Rick Struthers, Director
Retired, Bank of America (former president of global card services)
Bank of America donated $2,500 to Corbett in 2007.
Total: $2,500

Current central board members whose companies and/or families donated to Corbett:

Katherine Cestone, Director
Senior Vice President at Bank of America
See Struthers above.

Monica Jones, Director
Public Relations Manager, Sheetz, Inc.
See Sheetz above.

Ted McDowell
Regional President, Ameriserv, State College
Ameriserv gave $750 to Corbett in the 2009-2010 cycle.
Total: $750

Current southcentral board members whose companies and/or families donated to Corbett:

Matthew Sommer, Director
Vice President of Natural Gas and Electricity for Shipley Energy
William Shipley, the CEO of the Shipley Group, gave Corbett $10,000 in 2010, and $1,000 in 2008.
Total: $11,000

Karen Creasia Yarrish, Director
Vice President, Secretary & General Counsel, Penn National Insurance
Corbett received $9,150 from Penn National insurance for his gubernatorial campaign. The company gave him $1,100 in previous cycles.
Total: $10,250

Current southeast board members whose companies and/or families donated to Corbett:

Stephen J. O'Connor
Operations Manager, Gilbane Building Company
Two Gilbane employees, Gregory Stewart and Julius Tarsi, gave $3,200 to Gorbett in the 2009-2010 cycle.
Total: $3,200

Former board members whose companies and/or families donated to Corbett:

Bill Greenlee, Director
Founder, Greenlee Partners
Greenlee Partners donated $36,535.19 to Corbett's 2010 gubernatorial campaign, with another $1,000 coming from one of the firm's emplpyees. From 2003-2008, the firm gave $15,295.02 to Corbett.
Total: $51,830.21

GRAND TOTAL: $641,481.21
 

JdashSTL

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Interference, how long do you think it will be before this actually goes to court? I know our court systems can be pretty slow.
 

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JdashSTL said:
Interference, how long do you think it will be before this actually goes to court? I know our court systems can be pretty slow.
I'd think they would want to get this to trial as quickly as possible, but on the other hand the prosecution has to build a rock solid case as they'd look pretty foolish if they do NOT get a conviction after all tihs publicity. So, my guess would be within 12 months, but then that's only a guess.

Pennsylvania seems to have its own unique type of corruption system, and I don't have any experience with how that state works internally. All I know is that I've always been told that Penn is most certainly part of the "Thug Belt", and therefore, anything goes.

Let me know if people here are still interested and want me to post stuff I find. I'll probably not post as much, but let me know if I'm beating a dead horse or not.

By the way, I'll be surprised if the new Governor isn't forced to resign to keep others "safe". No way this is isolated to just Pennsylania... and I'm sure no one wants a Federal investigation unless that investigation is tightly controlled as to limit exposure.

It seems pretty clear to me now that they acted pretty fast, almost too fast, to give us (the public) a few prominent heads on a platter. My guess is that this was done to diffuse and redirect public outrage. Too much political capital was being invested by too many powerful people for this too be limited to just a few football coaches, school administrators and public officials. People were being protected by real power here, and that lies behind these front people.
 

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ESPN: One Big Thing: 11/16
Scott Van Pelt comments on the latest details to emerge from the Penn State scandal


[mp3]http://cdn16.castfire.com/audio/303/2117/7827/790035/vanpeltaudio_2011-11-16-155735-6701-0-0-0.48.mp3?cdn_id=33&uuid=023b125f1b4743e393b6302911f4fce8[/mp3]

<a class="postlink" href="http://espn.go.com/espnradio/play?id=7243173" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://espn.go.com/espnradio/play?id=7243173</a>
 

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Sandusky's Volunteered at Local High School after Leaving PSU, Abused More There

[flv]http://wnep.vid.trb.com/wnep/video/2011/11/8/WNEP-VID5458-IN123937-OUT128500-0456C45E-4EB88978/outformats/flash/3f651b2a-8ed2-4e00-8569-1b875b7726c3.flv[/flv]

http://www.wnep.com/news/countybycounty/wnep-clint-community-reacts-to-sandusky-abuse-allegations-20111107,0,239388.story

By Jon Meyer
4:28 p.m. EST, November 7, 2011

The sex abuse allegations against Jerry Sandusky came to light in 2009 when he was volunteering as an assistant football coach at Central Mountain High School in Clinton County.

It was there a 15-year-old student told authorities that Sandusky abused him.

The attorney general said the quick action taken by officials at Central Mountain High School is in marked contrast to the action of those at Penn State seven years earlier.

Investigators said a victim at the school near Lock Haven was the first to report years of abuse to a parent, then school officials and police.

Several years after Sandusky retired from 32 years of coaching at Penn State, he volunteered as an assistant high school football coach at Central Mountain High School.

Investigators said his pattern of abuse continued there, and first got the attention of police.


Many in the area are shocked hearing this case hit here.

"That's really upsetting," said Pam Snook of Sugar Valley. "I didn't realize it was here."

The attorney general says Sandusky took a job at Central Mountain High School as an assistant football coach as a way to stay close to one of his victims. He would, alledgedly, call the boy out of study halls in the afternoons for so called "Meetings. "


All that came to an end in 2009 when a parent reported abuse.

"The fact that it happened down here. I'm very happy that whoever brought [the abuse] to attention did what they did," said Randy McIntosh of Lamar.

The attorney general said Central Mountain officials called police and barred Sandusky from the campus when that parent came forward.

The reports from there helped launch the attorney general's investigation.


"The local people at least cared enough to say something and take care of it but he got away with it for a long time," said Penny Williams of Mill Hall

Investigators said Sandusky had at least one victim at Central Mountain, however the coach met with numerous other boys from The Second Mile program at the school, all unsupervised.

"I just thought it was so sad that someone who had so much to do with kids and then do that, you just, it makes you wonder," said Joyce Vincent of Linden. "It's so sad. "

Administrators at Central Mountain had no comment today about the school's involvement in this investigation.

The attorney general said officials at that Clinton County school district did what Penn State officials should have done seven years earlier.
 

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Well, if anyone wants me to shut it down just let me know in this thread or PM me.
 

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Jerry Sandusky's 'Victim Four' tells his story of alleged abuse for years by Sandusky as a surrogate father
Published: Thursday, November 17, 2011, 9:47 PM Updated: Thursday, November 17, 2011, 10:23 PM
SARA GANIM, The Patriot-News By SARA GANIM, The Patriot-News
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/11/jerry_sanduskys_victim_four_te.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index. ... ur_te.html</a>


For Victim Four, it isn’t about a single shower. His story begins with a surrogate father and turns into a nightmare.

It is about several years of alleged abuse. It starts almost immediately after he meets legendary Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky.
And after watching Sandusky proclaim his innocence on national television, Victim Four, as he is known in court papers, is more determined than ever.

"My client now has become even more adamant that he intends to testify and not waver from his grand jury presentment testimony," said his attorney, Ben Andreozzi.

The day they met, authorities said, Sandusky began to touch him. It happened in a swimming pool, and he remembers Sandusky testing his boundaries, authorities said. Victim Four met Jerry Sandusky when he was 12 or 13 during the boy’s second year with The Second Mile. But Sandusky was kind to the boy, and initially Victim Four thrived on the affection.

Then there were the showers — where authorities allege soap battles that would lead to indecent contact.

The two started working out together, playing sports together. The boy accompanied Sandusky to charity events, parties and on football trips. They had sleepovers in hotels. He even was part of the Sandusky family trip to two bowl games.

Now 27, Victim Four was a fixture in the Sandusky household as a child. And Sandusky, the youth’s attorney says, played two roles — that of a father and that of a molester.

"He had a very close relationship with Mr. Sandusky, and I think his relationship was similar to a familial relationship and I think that’s part of the reason it was initially so hard for my client to come forward," said Andreozzi, of Harrisburg, who also represents another man who says he was molested by Sandusky.

"He viewed him almost as a family member and he looked up to him because there were some things that Jerry was doing positive at the time," Andreozzi said.

Victim Four eventually came to know other assistant Penn State football coaches and their families. He was Sandusky’s guest at the coaches’ table at banquets. During hotel sleepovers, he told the grand jury, Sandusky would begin by wrestling him and end with a sexual assault.

Signs — like trips with boys and hotel room stays — might have been noticed sooner if Sandusky wasn’t viewed as being such a selfless, almost saintly community leader.

"Now we know it’s a little weird," Andreozzi said. "I think there are a number of instances, a number of people who were under the impression that Sandusky was an upstanding person in community."

Sandusky won the boy over through his generosity, according to the grand jury. He showered the boys with gifts, including clothing, a snowboard, Nike shoes, sports lessons, golf clubs, jerseys. He once gave him $50 to buy pot, and let him smoke it in his car, authorities say.

He included him in a Sports Illustrated photo and a video about Penn State’s linebackers. Sandusky guaranteed the boy a walk-on position on the Division I football team.

There was even more to the relationship. In 1999, Victim Four remembers Sandusky being distraught after meeting with Joe Paterno and being told he wouldn’t be the next head football coach.

Victim Four had become his confidant.

But as he got older, Victim Four began to distance himself. He would hide in closets when Sandusky came for him. He got a girlfriend.


After he came forward to police, Sandusky’s attorney began trying to discredit his story with examples of continued communication with Sandusky.


"Anyone that handles sexual assault cases on a regular basis understands that there is a complex relationship between the perpetrator and the victim, and that the perpetrator utilizes his control and power over the victim — and it’s extremely difficult for the victim to break free from the control," Andreozzi said.

Today, Victim Four is receiving a great deal of advice from his attorney. People have asked Andreozzi if Victim Four is angry with Dottie Sandusky, Jerry’s wife, or other members of the Sandusky household. They ask if he is angry with the football program. Or with former Penn State coach Joe Paterno?

"At this point, his anger is directed at Mr. Sandusky," Andreozzi said. "That does not mean that he excuses the actions of the others. It’s fair to say that he knew the Sandusky family quite well."

On Monday, Sandusky and his attorney made their prime-time debut. Sandusky, on NBC, denied all the abuse allegations. Sandusky admitted he might have made mistakes in being too touchy-feely during shared showers.

Many people were surprised that Sandusky did the interview and stunned by what he said. But those who are working with the victims said it actually might have been a good thing.

Since the interview, attorneys who represent crime victims have been fielding phone calls from people who say they were victims of Sandusky. Hearing him proclaim his innocence, "I bet we’ve gotten close to half-dozen to a dozen," Andreozzi said.

One of them is a man in his 30s who talked to police earlier this week. He will probably end up testifying before the grand jury, Andreozzi said. At least one has alleged abuse dating back to the 1970s.

"I think that Mr. Sandusky’s decision to speak to the media may have backfired," Andreozzi said.

© 2011 PennLive.com. All rights reserved.
 

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Special Report: Scandal. Shame. A search for answers at Penn State.
By L. Jon Wertheim and David Epstein
This story appears in the Nov. 21, 2011 issue of Sports Illustrated.
<a class="postlink" href="http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/magazine/11/16/penn.st/?xid=cnnbin" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/m ... xid=cnnbin</a>

joe-paterno-si-cover-p1.jpg


Too small to be considered a full-fledged town, the borough of Mill Hall, Pa., abuts a winding creek in the shadow of the Allegheny Mountains. Most of the 1,500 or so residents work nearby and cheer for Penn State. That includes Steven Turchetta, the athletic director and until recently the football coach at Central Mountain High. Turchetta, known around Mill Hall as Chet, carries himself with the easy grace of a former jock, and he was excited to coach his Wildcats team alongside Jerry Sandusky.

A defensive coach at Penn State for 32 years, including 23 as coordinator, Sandusky was a revered figure, responsible for the program's Linebacker U reputation and at one point the man in line to succeed Joe Paterno -- if and when JoePa ever retired. But in 1999, Paterno told Sandusky he would not, in fact, be the next head coach, and Sandusky abruptly announced that he would retire after the '99 season at 55. Though at an age when many coaches are still in their prime, Sandusky never returned to the college sideline, instead working full time at The Second Mile, a charity for at-risk children that he founded in '77. In 2002, Sandusky began volunteering at Central Mountain High, working with players and sitting in the booth during games. By '08 he was a full-time volunteer.

Turchetta had noticed, though, that something was amiss. Sandusky would get into shouting matches with Central Mountain students, and Turchetta would have to defuse the conflicts. He also found Sandusky to be "clingy" and "suspicious" with one freshman boy in particular. Sandusky sometimes came to the school and pulled the student out of class to meet with him privately.

In 2009, the boy's mother made a troubling report to the school. When he was 11 or 12, her son had met Sandusky through The Second Mile, which had grown into a nationally renowned nonprofit with assets of close to $9 million. Now, several years later, the mother became suspicious when her son asked her about "sex weirdos." She notified the school, and the principal brought the student into the office to discuss the situation, whereupon the boy told the principal that Sandusky had been sexually assaulting him. After the school informed the mother, she notified the local child protective services agency, which launched an investigation into Sandusky. Central Mountain officials promptly barred him from the school. When asked under oath about Sandusky's behavior in the years leading up to the victim's 2009 revelation, Turchetta provided unsparing and unambiguous answers.

Joe Miller is a Penn State fan too -- if not to the extent of his father, who on fall Saturdays was a 50-yard-line usher at Nittany Lions home games. A worker at the local paper factory, Miller, 44, has served as a wrestling coach in Mill Hall. Like Turchetta, he was aware of Sandusky's glowing career at Penn State and thought even more highly of his charitable work. Every year Miller and his wife, a school guidance counselor, contributed to The Second Mile. Miller, though, had once seen Sandusky lying on a weight room floor, face-to-face with the boy in question, with his eyes closed. Miller, too, when asked by investigators about what he'd seen, gave a precise and independent account.

Both Turchetta and Miller knew Jerry Sandusky. At some level they knew what their testimony could mean for his reputation. What they could not possibly have known was that their accounts would help set in motion the most explosive scandal in the history of college sports, one that would make a mockery of the recent drumbeat of NCAA outrages. Rogue boosters? Players selling jerseys for tattoos? Heisman-caliber quarterbacks available for purchase? By the end of last week those transgressions seemed quaint.

Once notified of the events in Mill Hall, a combination of Pennsylvania legal and child welfare agencies began a multiyear investigation into Sandusky and his conduct with boys as young as 10 years old. On Nov. 4, Pennsylvania attorney general Linda Kelly and State Police Commissioner Frank Noonan filed a grand jury report that depicted the 67-year-old Sandusky -- in 23 pages of stomach-twisting detail -- as the embodiment of unadulterated evil, a coldly manipulative serial sexual predator. Often through the access he gained by way of The Second Mile, the report alleges, Sandusky first built trust and relationships with young boys -- vulnerable, socially at-risk kids from his own foundation -- then sexually assaulted them. The report alleges that between 1994 and 2009, Sandusky abused eight boys, though a source tells SI that multiple others have consulted lawyers.

The report asserts that Sandusky traded on his status as a Penn State football demigod. Many of the alleged assaults occurred either in the university's football facilities or at football functions. The Nittany Lions program became Sandusky's bait. He brought victims to games at State College, allowed them to attend coaches' meetings, facilitated their meeting players, cast them in instructional videos, and in one case took a boy to the Alamo Bowl, in San Antonio. Sandusky was charged with 40 counts of various sex crimes, seven of them involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, a felony. In an interview with NBC on Monday, his first public statement, Sandusky admitted that he "horsed around" and showered with boys but denied the criminal allegations.

In addition to the charges against Sandusky, Penn State's athletic director, Tim Curley, 57, was charged with perjury and failure to report Sandusky's alleged child abuse in a 2002 incident. So was Gary Schultz, 62, who as Penn State's senior vice president for finance and business oversaw the campus police. While Paterno wasn't charged, his testimony is recounted in the grand jury report. After its release Paterno was widely condemned by the public -- and, implicitly, by law enforcement -- for what appeared to be, at best, galling obliviousness. "I don't think I've ever been associated with a case where that type of eyewitness identification of sex acts [took] place where the police weren't called," Noonan told reporters, echoing the speculation already expressed by so many others that Penn State administrators had covered up Sandusky's crimes to protect the image of the university. "I don't think I've ever seen something like this before."
Posted: Wednesday November 16, 2011 4:31PM ; Updated: Wednesday November 16, 2011 6:22PM
A search for answers at Penn State (cont.)

By L. Jon Wertheim and David Epstein

*****

Within hours of the report's release, the scandal began metastasizing. By the following Monday, Curley had taken administrative leave and Schultz had resigned. As a media swarm descended on State College, every tin-eared statement by a Penn State official accelerated the crisis. On Wednesday, Graham Spanier, the school's president since 1995, was fired for his actions and inactions in the Sandusky matter. Asked whether Spanier might face indictment as well, Kelly responded, "It's an ongoing investigation."

Momentous as those abrupt moves may have been, they were rendered mere footnotes on Wednesday night when the Penn State Board of Trustees announced that it had fired not only Spanier but also Joe Paterno. The notion was, in some ways, unfathomable. Here was the most successful coach in the history of college football -- arguably the most unfireable person in all of sports -- gone, and not of his own volition. What's more, the man known as much for his moral authority as for his record 409 wins was being shown the door over an ethical failure that even he conceded was a horrible lapse in judgment. "It is one of the great sorrows of my life," Paterno said in a written statement earlier in the day. "I wish I had done more."

Doing more at the time would have brought a raft of bad publicity; having done less will leave an ineradicable stain. "Penn State will never fully get its reputation back as the guys in the white hats," says Charles Yesalis, a retired Penn State health policy and sports science professor. "Part of that was smoke and mirrors." Adds Mary Gage, former director of the undergraduate fellowships office at Penn State, "It's amazing to think what one man can do to a whole heroic institution if the reaction is faulty."

*****

For most of his more than six decades at Penn State, Joe Paterno would walk to work from his four-bedroom house on the fringe of campus, the kind of gesture -- an authentic, unpretentious throwback -- that endeared him to so many in Happy Valley and beyond. But the walk also afforded Paterno the opportunity to survey his empire. His home may have been astonishingly modest (current estimate: $415,000) for a man of his stature, but his regal trappings festooned the campus. There is the library that bears his name; the campus creamery that famously scoops Peachy Paterno ice cream; the health center he helped endow; assorted statues and murals; and the Lasch football facility, a fortress underwritten by friends of Paterno. He is even on the syllabus, COMM 497G -- Joe Paterno: Communication & the Media. JoePa Class, the students called it.

That nickname, JoePa, while a play on words, also connoted a fatherly presence. His role in elevating Penn State's profile and its endowment -- which barely existed when he began and now nears $2-billion -- cannot be exaggerated. One story among many: Several years ago Paterno scoffed when he was asked to do a national Burger King commercial, only to reverse course when he realized how much money he could donate to the library from the royalties. Even those ambivalent toward Paterno appreciate his unmistakable contribution to the school. "There's an emphasis on athletics that necessarily results in a de-emphasis on everything else," says Penn State journalism professor Russell Frank. "But a lot of us owe our jobs to him, in a sense. He grew the university so much, and that's attributable to how high-profile the football program has been."

Outgoing, accessible (his home phone number is in the campus directory) and philanthropic, Paterno was the benevolent despot. But he was a despot nonetheless. Org chart be damned -- unlike Schultz and Curley, Paterno is not classified as a senior staff member -- he ran the place. "He built this university, he built this town, and everybody knows it," says longtime State College resident Mark Brennan, a journalist who chronicles Penn State athletics. In 2004, Curley and Spanier visited Paterno at his home to suggest that, at age 77 and after a 3-9 season in '03, he should retire. Paterno, in effect, told them to get off his lawn. They acceded. He went on to coach eight more years. There were less dramatic if more literal examples too. Cindy Way, a Penn State alum who lives in town, once took a shortcut across the grass near the on-campus skating rink. Paterno jumped out of his car and told her to take the sidewalk. "It was," she says, "like being scolded by God."

As his program ascended, so much about the school seemed to cast itself in Paterno's image. The team's nameless jerseys and unadorned white helmets reflected the hidebound coach. Like JoePa, an English major at Brown who became a successful football coach, Penn State, a regional agricultural school, became a premier research institution with a football program courted by the Big Ten. The school thinks of itself as a striver that reached the grand stage, fiercely independent and unapologetic, celebrating old-fashioned mores. (To wit: an on-campus creamery.) Paterno's self-styled morality -- Success with Honor was his trusted motto -- was absorbed by osmosis on the campus, creating a certain high-mindedness that sometimes bled into righteousness. The school's rallying cry -- "We are Penn State!" -- implies that no further explanation is needed. We get it. You don't.

Their domain is Happy Valley, and while it's the Happy that's stressed, the Valley is significant too. For a prominent university, Penn State is remarkably isolated, nestled in the hinterlands of Pennsylvania, six hours from the nearest conference rival and three hours from a major city. (As many learned last week, the impenetrability is heightened by a status that exempts PSU from meaningful state open-records laws. Many documents related to the Sandusky case, such as e-mails between university officials, are not subject to public disclosure.) Like Russian nesting dolls, there are levels of isolation within Penn State, the innermost of which is the football team, which has separate facilities from the rest of the athletic programs and a lavish training facility all its own.

Such insularity has worked to the benefit of the team's image. While the Nittany Lions eagerly trumpeted to recruits that they had never faced serious NCAA scrutiny or sanction, it has hardly been a spotless program. Three years ago ESPN reported that between 2002 and '08, 46 players had been charged with a total of 163 crimes ranging from public urination to murder. In March, SI published arrest tallies for all the programs in its Top 25. Penn State tied for fourth, with 16 players on the '10 opening-game roster who had been charged with a crime. Last week Harrisburg's Patriot-News, which broke the story of the Sandusky investigation in March, made passing reference to "a player-related knife fight in a campus dining hall" that was broken up by assistant coach Mike McQueary in '08.

In 2005, defensive end LaVon Chisley was quietly kicked off the team for academic reasons and, according to prosecutors, began racking up debts. He was never drafted, and that summer he murdered his former roommate, a campus marijuana dealer. Chisley is serving a life sentence. Yet when asked about the incident at a press conference after the conviction, Paterno brushed it aside: "I have no comment on that. ... Why should I?" And when ESPN questioned Paterno about the spate of player arrests, he responded, "I don't know anything about it." In 2003, after Tony Johnson, a wide receiver and the son of a Penn State assistant coach, was arrested for DUI, Paterno complained that "it will get all blown out of proportion because he's a football player. But he didn't do anything to anybody." While the coach apologized for that last remark, the image of Penn State as a haven of virtue -- at least by the limbo-bar standards of big-time college football -- persisted.

Karen G. Muir, a State College attorney who has represented Penn State football players in legal trouble, says she has seen firsthand how the team will sacrifice an individual for the sake of the program. After Penn State defensive tackle Chris Baker, later an NFL player, was involved in two off-field fights, Muir says she planned to go to trial to defend him from criminal charges, yet coaches prevailed on her client to take a plea bargain, thus sparing the program protracted embarrassment. "My experience is that Penn State football closes ranks and their focus is on the program as opposed to the individual," Muir says. "The program didn't care as much what was best for my kid."

The Sandusky grand jury report strongly suggests a similar desire to keep things quick and quiet. The first allegation against Sandusky stems from a 1998 incident in which he allegedly bear-hugged an 11 year old boy in the shower at the football facility. When the boy came home with his hair wet, his mother contacted university police, and an investigation was launched. Police listened in to discussions between the mother and Sandusky in which Sandusky apologized and admitted, "I was wrong. ... I wish I were dead." Yet shortly thereafter the case was closed. No charges were filed.

In an eerie twist, the local prosecutor at the time, Ray Gricar, disappeared in 2005. His laptop and hard drive were recovered from the Susquehanna River, irretrievably damaged, and his body was never found. It made for hot conspiracy theories last week. Contacted by SI, Tony Gricar, Ray's nephew and the family's spokesman, would not dismiss anything out of hand. He said that while his uncle was indifferent to the football program, he knew he would need an airtight case. "There [were] far-reaching consequences for Ray bringing a case against Sandusky," Tony Gricar said. Borrowing a line from The Wire, he added, "You come at the king, you best not miss."

Sandusky retired following the 1999 season, asserting that he wanted to devote his full energy to The Second Mile. But as part of his retirement package, he was conferred emeritus status, with full access to the Penn State football facilities, including an office and a phone. According to the grand jury report, in the fall of 2000, a Penn State janitor saw Sandusky in the football showers performing oral sex on a boy. The janitor was so upset he was moved to tears, and co-workers feared he might have a heart attack. They also feared for their jobs. (The report notes that after the alleged incident, Sandusky was seen driving slowly through the parking lot on two different occasions that night.) No report was ever filed; the witness now suffers from dementia and was incompetent to testify before the grand jury.
Posted: Wednesday November 16, 2011 4:31PM ; Updated: Wednesday November 16, 2011 6:22PM
A search for answers at Penn State (cont.)

By L. Jon Wertheim and David Epstein

The charge that has generated the most discussion, and that led directly to the firing of Spanier and Paterno, stems from a 2002 incident. McQueary testified that on March 1 of that year he came across Sandusky having anal intercourse in the football showers with a young boy whose hands were pinned against the wall. The 6-foot-4 former Penn State quarterback -- a onetime teammate of Sandusky's son Jon -- made eye contact with Sandusky, then 58, and the victim, whom McQueary estimated to be 10. But he did not intervene. Instead, after phoning his father (a health-care administrator affiliated with a local clinic to which Paterno has donated at least $1 million), McQueary conferred with Paterno the next day and told him what he saw. The coach then waited another day to speak to Curley. The athletic director then talked to Schultz, who relayed the incident to president Spanier. Except that as the account moved along the chain of command, the allegation apparently shed severity with each retelling. By the time it reached Spanier, it was merely behavior that, as Spanier testified, "made a member of Curley's staff 'uncomfortable.'" Unaccountably, though Curley saw fit to inform The Second Mile's director of the episode, neither he nor anyone else reported it to university police or any other police agency. Nor was there any attempt to identify or contact the boy.

Sandusky kept his office at Penn State and continued to have full access to the football facilities. The lone result of the 2002 incident -- a decision approved by Spanier -- is that Sandusky was prohibited from bringing children on campus. Don't do it here. Among all the graphic and horrifying detail in the grand jury testimony, this point is perhaps most damning.

Sandusky's alleged activity continued. It just moved elsewhere. The only two victims in the grand jury report whose identities remain unknown -- whom authorities couldn't contact -- were the ones assaulted on the Penn State campus. Had Sandusky not been so brazen in Mill Hall, had he simply restricted himself to the football facilities in State College, there is little to suggest he would have been caught. For Sandusky -- if not for the boys -- Penn State football was a safe haven.

While it may be imperfect, comparisons to the Catholic Church sex scandal are inevitable: A serial offender in a position of trust and power, with special access to youth, abused that position to commit heinous crimes. In the case of the church, says Jeff Anderson, a lawyer who has successfully represented sexual abuse victims against clergy, the predator benefited from a culture of insularity. "From low-level administrators to the top level, they looked the other way, and when they did see something, they chose to remain silent," Anderson says. Referring to both Penn State and the church, he adds, "When [the allegations] are revealed and reported and made known multiple times, there's a deliberate decision to protect the institution and reputation at the peril of the children."

Adds David Clohessy, director of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, "Usually child molesters are charismatic, lovable folks on the outside. And many victims feel, I won't be believed; he'll be believed."

Unlike other sports scandals, this one will not fade once the season or the school year ends. There are pending criminal trials. Inevitably, there will be a raft of civil litigation. There will be multiple investigations, one of them headed by Penn State trustee and Merck president and CEO Kenneth C. Frazier, who has already vowed, "The chips will fall where they may."

Among the questions that demand answers:

• Particularly given his penchant for micromanagement and his power within the community, did Paterno know in 1998 that his top lieutenant was being investigated for sex crimes by the campus police and that a report was sitting on the desk of the local D.A.?

• Though only in his mid-50s and the most prominent assistant coach in college football, Sandusky retired after the 1999 season. Was there a connection with the '98 incident?

• Why didn't anyone, from McQueary to Paterno to president Spanier, at least inquire whether police -- or, for that matter, anyone -- had followed up on the 2002 incident?

• Why did it take a week and a half for Curley and Schultz to speak with McQueary after Paterno had passed them the information?

• The grand jury report and the attorney general assert that State College lawyer Wendell Courtney was counsel for both Penn State and The Second Mile in 1998, at which time he was told by Schultz about the '98 allegation involving Sandusky. Courtney did not return SI's phone calls but publicly denied he was the counsel to The Second Mile at that time. Which account is true?

• Why, after barring Sandusky from taking children onto the campus (a prohibition that Curley himself testified was unenforceable), did Penn State allow him to hold his summer camps on branch campuses?

• Having heard the allegations against Sandusky -- and, in McQueary's case, witnessing him allegedly raping a child -- how could Penn State officials abide his continued presence on campus?

More generally, what went through the minds of Paterno, McQueary and Curley when Sandusky would turn up at practice or lift weights in the workout room of the Lasch Building, as he reportedly did as recently as Oct. 31?

As to the familiar line of inquiry, "Who knew what and when did they know it?" accounts vary wildly. While former players and Sandusky acquaintances profess disbelief over the allegations, others in State College say the rumors had been marinating for years. "When [Sandusky] left, there was speculation about his behavior with young boys," says Rebecca Durst, who owns a barbershop near campus and says her long-term clients include prominent Penn State administrators. "This is a small town. It's been in the rumor mill for a while."

After the 2008 report from Mill Hall, The Second Mile quietly barred Sandusky from activities involving children. In September 2010, with the grand jury investigation well under way, Sandusky resigned from the charity he founded "to devote more time to my family and personal matters."

Outsiders now look back, parsing statements and rereading passages. Sandusky often asserted that one of The Second Mile's fundamental tenets was, "It's easier to develop a child than rehabilitate an adult." His autobiography, titled Touched: The Jerry Sandusky Story, recounts wrestling matches with kids and includes a photograph of Sandusky after a "pudding wrestling" bout. In the same book he offers Jer's Law: I allowed myself to be mischievous, but I didn't let it get to the point that someone would be intentionally hurt ... and I swore I would tell the truth if I was ever caught doing something wrong.

*****

In Mill Hall, Turchetta, already a stalwart of the community, is being cast as one of the few good guys in a sordid story. Folks in town were never shy about voicing their displeasure when Coach Chet didn't play their kid or ran on a passing down, but uniformly they appreciate what they perceive to be his courage. "I applaud what he did," says Miller, the wrestling coach who also testified. "This could still be going on if not for [him]."

In truth, that may be overstating the matter. Inasmuch as Turchetta is being lauded simply for doing what he was legally and morally obligated to do, it's because his behavior contrasted so sharply with the response at Penn State. The men in Mill Hall, outside the reach of the university and unencumbered by pressures of a big-time football program, did the expected thing.

Turchetta is resisting the hero role. He's referring the hundreds of calls he's receiving to the attorney general's office. Last Thursday afternoon he walked out of his district administration building wearing a solemn expression, his square jaw set off by a thick black mustache. "I'm just moving on," he said somberly. He paused, looked down and seemed to consider the surreality of his newfound fame. "Just moving on."

Healing will be far less swift an hour down the Nittany Valley in State College. While the crisis was unprecedented in its severity, the Penn State management was -- again, evidence of the school's insularity -- staggeringly clumsy. Press conferences were scheduled and then abruptly canceled. Remarks were tone-deaf. Spanier all but ordered his own firing when he declared his "unconditional" support for Curley and Schultz. When various administrators expressed shock at last week's revelations, even though Sandusky had been suspected multiple times and ThePatriot-News had reported in March on the grand jury investigation, it came across as more than a little disingenuous. Last week Penn State lecturer Steve Manuel veered from the syllabus for his communications class and spent the next several sessions dissecting the university's public relations disaster.

Clearly fed up with the school's spin, Paterno hired his own Washington, D.C.-based publicist and went off-message last Wednesday, candidly admitting moral culpability. He also announced that he would step down after the season. But his time for decrees was over. Hours later the board of trustees -- five of whom are former Penn State football players -- notified him by phone that, after 61 years, he was no longer an employee of the university.

Thousands of students left their dorms and apartments and swarmed Beaver Canyon, expressing their unhappiness with the decision. "You're digging JoePa's grave!" one female PSU swimmer despaired. As some students took part in a low-grade riot -- a few of them overturned or smashed cars, while the vast majority memorialized the night with their cellphone cameras -- a half-dozen football players stood at a remove, watching the scene and discussing whether any teammates needed to be extracted from the ruckus. One player, senior cornerback Chaz Powell, appeared ready to join the throng, vuvuzela in hand, but thought better of it. He tossed the horn in the trash and walked away.

On the other end of campus, a hundred or so students gathered outside Paterno's house, standing near an autumn cornucopia and a leftover Halloween ghost. Even after JoePa offered a short valediction, they stayed, most of them with moist eyes. At roughly 11:45, Sue Paterno opened the blinds, offered a wave of thanks, then turned out the lights.

*****

On Saturday, for the first time since the Truman Administration, Penn State took the field without JoePa in a coaching role. McQueary was absent as well, placed on leave. Tom Bradley -- another longtime Paterno assistant, who took over for Sandusky as defensive coordinator in 2000 -- served as interim head coach. (Sources tell SI some members of the board of trustees have insisted that Paterno's permanent successor must come from outside the Penn State family.) Dozens of former players stood on the sideline and sat in the stands, there to pay respects to JoePa and try to begin restitching at least a few strands of a badly frayed tapestry.

For all the ambient chaos over the last week, the tableau at Beaver Stadium was strikingly normal. Predictions of protests and mass tributes went unrealized, as though Nittany Nation was emotionally depleted, too spent to do much besides enjoy the diversion of football. Fields were full of tailgaters; the student section was loud but well-behaved; 107,903 people had filled the stands. The few earmarks of the Week That Had Been included a pregame "moment of silence for the alleged victims" -- at once poignant and sadly ironic, given the role silence played in aiding the unfathomable -- as well as donation boxes for child abuse prevention charities and a "blue out" in awareness of child abuse.

Understandably "out of whack," as Bradley put it, the team sputtered on offense and fell to Nebraska 17-14. Like the fans, the players projected exhaustion. "The hardest thing was how fast everything hit us; you can't even explain how everything changes," said senior defensive end Jack Crawford, who wore an eye-black patch under his eyes bearing the letters JVP. "It's sad to see how everything unfolded like it did, sad to see how it unraveled."

The crowd filed out quietly. A few headed to Paterno's house, tracing the route through campus that the most iconic coach in college football history had walked for all those decades. Outside the Creamery a line formed for scoops of Peachy Paterno, suddenly a nostalgic relic of a bygone era. A knot of students and alumni broke into an impromptu postgame cheer: "We are ... Penn State!"

So they are. Even if that no longer means what it once did
 

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Key records missing at Second Mile.

......Meanwhile, investigators served numerous subpoenas on the Second Mile, according to people with knowledge of the inquiry. Not only did they want the names of children who had been through the program, they also demanded all of Sandusky’s travel and expense records.

Much of the older paperwork was stored at an off-site records facility. The travel and expense records, for instance, had been sent over several years earlier. But select members of the charity’s board of directors were alarmed to learn recently that when the records facility went to retrieve them, some of those records — from about 2000 to 2003 — were missing.

The attorney general’s office was notified of the missing files, people with knowledge of the case said. Subsequently, the foundation located apparently misfiled records from one of the years, but the rest seem to have disappeared.

Lynne M. Abraham, a lawyer for Second Mile, did not return a call requesting comment. A spokesman for the attorney general declined to comment, citing the continuing grand jury investigation.

“It could be that they are just lost, but under the circumstances it is suspicious,” one law enforcement official involved in the case said of the missing files.


Some investigators said they were convinced that the idea that Sandusky had an inappropriate interest in, and relationships with, young boys was a fairly widely held suspicion around and even outside Penn State’s football program over the years.

“This was not the secret that they are trying to make out now,” one person involved in the inquiry said. “I know there were a number of college coaches that had heard the rumors. If all these people knew about it, how could Sandusky’s superiors not know?”

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/17/sports/ncaafootball/internet-posting-helped-sandusky-investigators.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/17/sport ... ators.html</a>

That's a very good summary article from the NYT by the way, I suggest reading the entire piece if you have time.
 

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The chairman of Jerry Sandusky's charity Second Mile -- Robert Poole -- also had the construction contract to do the charity's $11.5 million learning center project. Penn State sold Second Mile the property for the project for less than market value, and Gov. Tom Corbett's adminstration approved pouring $3 million in state money into the project, which has since been put on hold.

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11321/1190582-455-0.stm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11321/1190582-455-0.stm</a>
 

brokeu91

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interference said:
The chairman of Jerry Sandusky's charity Second Mile -- Robert Poole -- also had the construction contract to do the charity's $11.5 million learning center project. Penn State sold Second Mile the property for the project for less than market value, and Gov. Tom Corbett's adminstration approved pouring $3 million in state money into the project, which has since been put on hold.

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11321/1190582-455-0.stm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11321/1190582-455-0.stm</a>
I know this is uncovering a lot of suspicious behaviors beyond the raping of young boys. I wonder, though, how many people on the board were actually involved in illegal/unethical behavior. Before all of this stuff came out, if someone from Second Mile approached me about giving money to this charity and told me what the charity was about, I would probably donate something, or at the very least consider it strongly.

I have two children that I "adopted" through the world vision charity. This has allowed them to have clothes and a better education. I also bought goats and chickens for their respective villages. If it turns out that the person who ran that charity was getting money unethically and even worse having sex with young boys, it doesn't make the work that was done for those children any different. There were still a lot of kids who needed help and got it.

In now way, shape, or form am I condoning what Sandusky did. But from what I understand the Second Mile helped hundreds of kids, despite hurting several. Does it make the charity evil? No, just the guy who ran it. Some kids probably did receive help and may have straightened out their lives because of it. I feel bad for the guys who worked for the Second Mile who really tried to improve these kids lives, but will now be labeled as a monster, because of guilt by association.
 

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brokeu91 said:
I know this is uncovering a lot of suspicious behaviors beyond the raping of young boys. I wonder, though, how many people on the board were actually involved in illegal/unethical behavior. Before all of this stuff came out, if someone from Second Mile approached me about giving money to this charity and told me what the charity was about, I would probably donate something, or at the very least consider it strongly.
Yup, I think you have a very good point. FYI, philly.com has a story out today that says Second Mile donors say they were misled regarding Sandusky inquiry. Also, as I think I mentioned earlier, key financial records (subpoenaed by investigators) from the charity have gone "missing". Here's the Philly.com story:

Posted: Fri, Nov. 18, 2011, 3:01 AM
Second Mile donors say they were misled in Sandusky inquiry
By Jeremy Roebuck and John P. Martin

Even as prosecutors closed in around its founder, the charity at the center of the Penn State child-abuse scandal told benefactors there was no truth to rumors that former Pennsylvania State University football coach Jerry Sandusky was under investigation, a group of four donors said Thursday.

The four said they became concerned after reading local newspaper reports in the spring that a grand jury was pursuing allegations that Sandusky had sexually abused children.

When the donors then approached top administrators of the Second Mile, the charity Sandusky founded to help disadvantaged children, they were assured the reports were unfounded, they said, and the charity continued to solicit money from them.

The charity's purported statements to its donors contradict the timeline it laid out last week to explain what it knew and when regarding the Sandusky investigation. Sandusky himself informed the charity in 2008 that he was under investigation. By early 2010, the Second Mile's records reportedly had already been subpoenaed by the grand jury.

"When the news finally came out, it hit us hard," said Tracy Bell, a store coordinator at Family Clothesline, a Penn State souvenir shop just off campus that donated more than $50,000 to the charity last year. "We thought we were a part of the Second Mile family, and they lied to us."

Donor outrage is only the latest setback for the Second Mile, one of central Pennsylvania's largest charities for at-risk youth, as it struggles to survive since Sandusky's arrest.

This week, the organization's longtime chief executive officer, Jack Raykovitz, resigned, as did several board members who said they were concerned about the charity's handling of the case.

Sandusky is accused of molesting at least eight boys he met through the Second Mile between 1994 and 2009. He has denied the charges, but the case has already led to the arrest of two former Penn State administrators and the ouster of the university's president, Graham B. Spanier, and its famed football coach, Joe Paterno.

In a statement issued last week, the Second Mile said it became aware of the allegations against its founder in 2008, when Sandusky informed board members that he had been accused of abuse by a boy in Clinton County. He voluntarily agreed to stop working with children.

"Since then, we have done everything in our power to cooperate with law enforcement officials and will continue to do so," the charity's statement said.

But by early this year, news of a wider investigation was well-known. Rumors had begun to percolate around State College. The Harrisburg Patriot-News had started reporting in March on a grand jury convened to hear evidence in the case. And, according to a Thursday report in the New York Times, the Second Mile had already received subpoenas from the Attorney General's Office for Sandusky's travel and expense records.

Bell said her business was concerned enough by the reports to approach Raykovitz and others at the charity's annual golf fund-raiser in June in State College.

"We specifically asked the Second Mile whether there was a grand jury investigation," she said. "They said it was just gossip and rumors. They asked us to make another pledge."


Peter Varischetti, co-owner of the Brockaway commercial real estate firm Varischetti & Sons, said his concerns were also rebuffed. His company donated $5,000 last year.

Even those who never specifically asked Second Mile officials about an investigation said they felt the charity ought to have been more forthcoming.

Major benefactors such as Bank of America and health insurer Highmark Blue Shield have all announced in recent days that they were pulling their support from the program.

"Because of the very disturbing allegations and pending investigations at Second Mile, we are at this time suspending our philanthropic relationship with the organization," said Jeff McCollum, spokesman for State Farm Insurance. The company has consistently ranked among the charity's largest donors, according to annual reports. Last year, it donated between $20,000 and $50,000.

As a nonprofit, the Second Mile faced no legal obligation to inform its donors of any investigations that might affect its future. But several nonprofit sector analysts agreed Thursday that its leaders had a moral duty to inform donors of what they knew when asked.

"What they should have done was be open and up front about it," said Laura Otten, director of the Nonprofit Center at La Salle University. "It would have made them look like they were in control of the situation, as opposed to now, where they look like they were lying."

Elsewhere Thursday, lawmakers and Penn State trustees continued to grapple with questions of accountability for other institutions tied to the Sandusky case.

State lawmakers continued planning a joint House and Senate commission to consider changing state law because of the scandal.

In Washington, Rep. George Miller (D., Calif.) cited the case as evidence of the need to reexamine federal laws protecting students.

Penn State trustees retained the Pittsburgh law firm Reed Smith and seasoned New York crisis-management agency Ketchum to advise them. Both businesses declined to discuss the nature of their roles with the university.

Pledging openness and transparency last week, the board of trustees announced a special committee to conduct an in-depth investigation into the university's response, but since then it has been largely unresponsive.

Questions remain about the panel's makeup and what form that inquiry will take.

"The committee is still being formed, as individuals are being asked to serve and we are waiting on their responses," university spokeswoman Lisa Powers said. "Right now, we need to wait until the committee is in place and fully charged before we can release any more information."

Contact staff writer Jeremy Roebuck at 267-564-5218, jroebuck@phillynews.com, or @inqmontco on Twitter. Read his blog, "MontCo Memo," at <a class="postlink" href="http://www.philly.com/montcomemo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.philly.com/montcomemo</a>

Inquirer staff writers Jeff Gammage and Al Lubrano contributed to this article.

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20111118_Second_Mile_donors_say_they_were_misled_in_Sandusky_inquiry.html?viewAll=y&c=y" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20111 ... wAll=y&c=y</a>
 

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Further, I believe it was the New York Times story posted earlier which mentions that in 1998 campus police investigated Sandusky and report "reached nearly 100 pages". We also now know that PSU VP of Finance & Business, Gary Schultz, who is being accused of perjury, was in charge of PSU campus police. What I have not confirmed is if Schultz was in fact in charge of campus police in 1998, when this report was generated.
 

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NCAA launching investigation

The NCAA has told Penn State it will investigate the school in the wake of a child sex abuse scandal that has shocked the campus, and cost its former president and coach Joe Paterno their jobs.

NCAA president Mark Emmert sent a letter to Penn State president Rod Erickson saying that the governing body for college sports will examine "Penn State's exercise of institutional control over its intercollegiate athletics programs" in the case of Jerry Sandusky, the former defensive coordinator accused of serial child sex abuse.

Penn State released the letter Friday. Download letter:
<a class="postlink" href="http://media.pennlive.com/midstate_impact/other/NCAA.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://media.pennlive.com/midstate_impa ... r/NCAA.pdf</a>
 

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WTF, Paterno was hospitalized on Saturday with lung cancer, and PSU did NOT know this when they fired him only a few days ago?

"Former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno was diagnosed with a treatable form of lung cancer, his son, Scott, said in a statement today. Paterno was hospitalized during the Nittany Lions' loss to Nebraska, and doctors are optimistic he will make a full recovery."

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/11/penn_state_president_rodney_er.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index. ... ey_er.html</a>


<a class="postlink" href="http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/11/paterno_diagnosed_with_treatab.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index. ... eatab.html</a>
 

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A Town Gone Bad
*** Must Read ***

True stories from the case files of A Town Gone Bad
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.yardbird.com/DA_seeks_FBI_probe_of_Corbett_security_contractor.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.yardbird.com/DA_seeks_FBI_pr ... ractor.htm</a>


  • Pennsylvania DA Tom Kearney asks FBI to investigate Corbett administration security contractor with ties to pedophile sex ring

    An aspect of the growing courthouse child sex and prostitution scandal was covered-up and protected by then-Attorney General Tom Corbett

    Corbett contractor Russ Wantz has close ties to courthouse pedophile ring

    Three York County PA judges - Renn, Linebaugh, and Musti Cook - concealed complaints of courthouse pedophile ring involving Wantz and Attorney Larry Heim



November 16, 2011 -- District Attorney Tom Kearney, of York County, PA, has asked the Federal Bureau of Investigation to investigate longstanding allegations that Corbett Administration security provider Russell Wantz, Jr. has ongoing close ties to a prostitution and pedophile ring centered in and around the York County courthouse.

Sex offender Wantz, of York County, was arrested in a Craigslist sting in December 2007, by Swatara Township police
. In 2009, Wantz was granted an ARD by Dauphin County District Attorney Ed Marsico. At the time Marsico refused to investigate Wantz further.

Wantz is the owner of the Schaad Detective Agency of York. Schaad holds multi-million dollar security contracts with the administration of Gov. Tom Corbett. Schaad guards sensitive state complexes such as the PennDot headquarters in Harrisburg.

Among the allegations reviewed by DA Kearney and his county detectives are complaints that Wantz's campaign manager and lawyer, Larry "L.C." Heim, also of York, openly displayed to several clients photos of a young girl whom Heim openly boasts he'd bought for sex.

One former client of Heim's has even voiced his concerns on a Youtube video that Attorney Heim, while leaving a Liquor Control Board hearing, openly displayed photos of a young girl who Heim said he bought for sexual purposes. Three of Heim's cleints so far have come forward to say lawyer Heim showed them the photo of his sex victim. "Larry must've shown that photo to half the town," one client says.

In his formal request for the FBI to investigate state security contractor Wantz, DA Kearney notes that his office has a conflict of interest prosecuting members the well-protected York County courthouse prostitution and pedophile ring.
"I would have a clear conflict of interest in any prosecution," Kearney writes.

An aspect of the growing courthouse sex scandal was covered-up and protected by then-Attorney General Tom Corbett.

Attorney General Corbett refused to investigate related complaints filed in 2005 by Chief County Detective Becky Downing in a federal lawsuit. In court papers Downing complained that York courthouse personnel used a state police forensic evidence computer to view child pornography.

In a sworn deposition for the lawsuit, York County Detective Jeffrey Martz was asked, "Was there an incident where (a law enforcement official working for the district attorney's office) improperly accessed a child porn website from the PSP (Pennsylvania State Police) in your office? Do you remember that?"

"Yes," Det. Martz replies. "I conduct forensic examinations on computers through my investigations, as well as other county departments. I am assigned a laptop computer issued to me by the Pennsylvania State Police Computer Crime Unit. That particular laptop is used strictly for forensic analysis.

"I recall Detective Millsaps asking me to go into my office to 'use the computer,' is how he expressed it, to later find out that he, as well as the information service representative, loaded the internet onto my forensic laptop and there was pornography observed."

AG Corbett's office repeatedly refused to prosecute, or even to investigate, those involved -- some have close political ties to his office. Corbett, now the governor of Pennsylvania, is also currently enmeshed in another institutional pedophile scandal involving former Penn State football coach Jerry Sandusky.

In February 2005, AG Tom Corbett's office ridiculed anyone suspecting Corbett was unwilling to investigate Chief Downing's complaints.

"The attorney general's office and Tom Corbett are fully capable of conducting an independent investigation into the allegations that are detailed in the civil suit and to suggest otherwise is ridiculous and disingenuous," Corbett's PR flack, Kevin Harley, told the York Daily Record on February 26, 2005.

York Attorney Larry Heim openly brags that he engages in sexual activity with under aged minors. He says he's protected by York County judges, as well AG Corbett's refusal to investigate.

AG Tom Corbett's office waited a year, until February 2006, to publicly announce that Chief Downing's allegations were "unfounded."

Wantz's attorney, York Attorney Larry Heim, for his part openly brags to clients and others that he engages in sexual activity with under aged minors. Heim says that he and the others in the not-too-secret courthouse pedophile ring are effectively protected by the involvement of York County judges, as well AG Corbett's refusal to investigate. One of Heim's clients says that Heim boasted that his law firm had funneled legal work to one of the county judges before she got on the bench, and that gifts of Havana cigars have been purchased for judges to "look the other way."

Attorney Heim claims York County District Court President Judge Stephen Linebaugh, former President Judge Richard K. Renn, and Judge Maria Musti Cook protect the courthouse pedophile and prostitution ring.
Heim's law partner, Robert Katherman, chaired Judge Cook's campaign for county judge.

When informed of Heim's statements, judges Linebaugh, Renn and Cook threatened court retaliation against any who would report the growing courthouse pedophile ring scandal. None of the three York judges reported to law enforcement the allegations they'd repeatedly heard of the courthouse child sex ring.

DA Kearney told the FBI that concerned citizens and even high-ranking law enforcement officials in York County are helpless to stop the well-placed courthouse pedophile and prostitution ring. DA Kearney in his letter asked the FBI to "review and follow-up."

"I note that both (former York City controller) James Sneddon and former York City Police Chief Herb Grofcsik both confirmed in recorded interviews that information ... was forwarded to ... Federal authorities although it is unclear what became of that investigation," Kearney wrote in a letter sent to the FBI.

Former York Police Commissioner Grofcsik, now with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, said in a sworn statement that he feared the local FBI office in Harrisburg would not investigate the courthouse sex ring due to its close ties with the York DA's office, where Wantz is also a contractor with the county drug task force, with close ties to state and federal law enforcement figures.
Grofcsik asked another federal law enforcement agency to investigate Wantz, and others, with close tie to the York courthouse. That investigation, Grofcsik said he feared, got "File 13."

Wantz unsuccessfully ran for public office this spring. He lost a primary election bid for Springettsbury Township, York County, supervisor. Attorney Heim, who admits to clients that he enjoys sex with minors, is listed in campaign records as Wantz's campaign chairman.



In this video Pennsylvanian Greg Turchetta details how his attorney, Larry Heim of York, Pennsylvania, boasts of traveling to Costa Rica to participate in a courthouse prostitution ring that is protected by Pennsylvania courts.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nrYY6FZQbY[/youtube]