You might have anticipated that the intersection of functionally crazy and functionally stupid would be amusing to see. Sadly, no. While it is remarkable to behold, it’s just loathsome and revolting.
There’s an episode of MASH where Hawkeye is accused of leading a mutiny against Frank Burns while Burns is temporarily in charge of the 4077th. Burns testifies about the events of the day in a way that makes himself look like another Albert Schweitzer, but with better surgical skills. When Hawkeye takes the stand, he says “The major’s version of events was fascinating, to say the least. To say the most, it was perjury.” He then adds, “Actually, I’m sure that’s how he remembers it. More’s the pity.”
Not sure what brought that to mind.
:o Aw gosh folks, I’m overwhelmed, this, this is just more than I ever expected, I just, I don’t know what to say…
:dubious: On second thoughts, I think I do know what to say.
Nope. What the jury found was merely that the available evidence was insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that anal rape actually occurred.
Which in no way contradicts what the rest of us in this thread have been arguing all along, as I pointed out back in post #3360:
My position there is, in fact, the one that was actually vindicated by the outcome of the trial. The jury’s verdict said absolutely nothing at all, zip, zilch, nada, diddly-squat*, about McQueary’s testimony not being consistent with anal rape, as you are trying to claim.
So I was right, and I win!! What’s my prize? 
[jumping up and down]
Ouch! Oh that’s right, I’ve already been awarded it. Never mind. [/jumping up and down] [walking away very carefully]
- What is a “diddly-squat”, anyway? Sounds like what SA was claiming that Sandusky wasn’t capable of doing.
Um, make sure to wash out that award very thoroughly.
It takes a special kind of mind to conclude that an utterly deranged obsession with one specific detail of a case, that has served to make the poster in question perhaps the biggest laughingstock on the history of this board, is any sort of “win”.
Unless one actually wants to be thought of as deranged, that is. Maybe that’s it.
In another memorable thread, he declared “You’ve spent so much time proving I was wrong about ‘Sarah Palin Proven Right About Death Panels’ that you never noticed I was equally full of shit about the ‘Social Security Tricks Beautiful Mom’ half of my post! Therefore, I win!”* So, ‘special kind of mind’ sums it up nicely.
*Paraphrase, not exact quote. (Just for the nitpickers.)
Is it a Pennprick (sp??) victory?
§ 3126. Indecent assault.
(a) Offense defined.–A person is guilty of indecent assault
if the person has indecent contact with the complainant, causes
the complainant to have indecent contact with the person or
intentionally causes the complainant to come into contact with
seminal fluid, urine or feces for the purpose of arousing sexual
desire in the person or the complainant and:
(1) the person does so without the complainant’s
consent;
(2) the person does so by forcible compulsion;
(3) the person does so by threat of forcible compulsion
that would prevent resistance by a person of reasonable
resolution;
(4) the complainant is unconscious or the person knows
that the complainant is unaware that the indecent contact is
occurring;
(5) the person has substantially impaired the
complainant’s power to appraise or control his or her conduct
by administering or employing, without the knowledge of the
complainant, drugs, intoxicants or other means for the
purpose of preventing resistance;
(6) the complainant suffers from a mental disability
which renders the complainant incapable of consent;
(7) the complainant is less than 13 years of age; or
(8) the complainant is less than 16 years of age and the
person is four or more years older than the complainant and
the complainant and the person are not married to each other.
§ 6318. Unlawful contact with minor.
(a) Offense defined.--A person commits an offense if he is
intentionally in contact with a minor, or a law enforcement
officer acting in the performance of his duties who has assumed
the identity of a minor, for the purpose of engaging in an
activity prohibited under any of the following, and either the
person initiating the contact or the person being contacted is
within this Commonwealth:
(1) Any of the offenses enumerated in Chapter 31
(relating to sexual offenses).
(2) Open lewdness as defined in section 5901 (relating
to open lewdness).
(3) Prostitution as defined in section 5902 (relating to
prostitution and related offenses).
(4) Obscene and other sexual materials and performances
as defined in section 5903 (relating to obscene and other
sexual materials and performances).
(5) Sexual abuse of children as defined in section 6312
(relating to sexual abuse of children).
(6) Sexual exploitation of children as defined in
section 6320 (relating to sexual exploitation of children).
So these are what Sandusky was convicted of with regard to Victim 2, just so we know what we’re arguing about.
§ 3123. Involuntary deviate sexual intercourse.
(a) Offense defined.--A person commits a felony of the first
degree when the person engages in deviate sexual intercourse
with a complainant:
(1) by forcible compulsion;
(2) by threat of forcible compulsion that would prevent
resistance by a person of reasonable resolution;
(3) who is unconscious or where the person knows that
the complainant is unaware that the sexual intercourse is
occurring;
(4) where the person has substantially impaired the
complainant's power to appraise or control his or her conduct
by administering or employing, without the knowledge of the
complainant, drugs, intoxicants or other means for the
purpose of preventing resistance;
(5) who suffers from a mental disability which renders
him or her incapable of consent; or
(6) (Deleted by amendment).
(7) who is less than 16 years of age and the person is
four or more years older than the complainant and the
complainant and person are not married to each other.
(b) Involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child.--A
person commits involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a
child, a felony of the first degree, when the person engages in
deviate sexual intercourse with a complainant who is less than
13 years of age.
And this is what he was acquitted of.
So according to the jurors, Sandusky did this:
“Indecent contact.” Any touching of the sexual or other intimate parts of the person for the purpose of arousing or gratifying sexual desire, in either person.
So they couldn’t prove BRD that the boy’s anus was penetrated, but he was convicted of having his dick between buttcheeks, basically. This isn’t a hill I’d want to die on, if I were SA.
More specifically, his derangement is in his obsession with how to buttfuck a little boy. Guin’s right, *that’s *the scary and dangerous part, not this silly “winning” shit.
And how many times have I said that very same thing in this thread?
I said there no rape; the jury said there was no rape. I win; you lose. Equivocate all you want, the fact is inescapable.
I am so loving watching you dillweeds flail about in desperation, frantically trying to wring some semblance of victory…or at least some way of denying me mine…out of utter and unquestionable defeat. It is to laugh…and believe me, I am!
You should have listened kids. We don’t convict people of crimes in this country just because they are reprehensible people who’ve committed similar crimes at other times or because we otherwise want to believe them guilty. It takes proof, and in this case the proof you were so eager to glom on to fell short, just like I said it would.
The forces of due process, truth, justice and the American way have prevailed once again. If they don’t stand for the bad guys, they don’t stand for anyone. You aren’t allowed to pick and choose which people you’re going to ignore the protections of the law for, and I’m even happier about that than I am to gloat in the vindication afforded my by the Sandusky jury’s verdict.
I don’t know. Would you care to provide a quote or two? The jury verdict was that there was insufficient proof that anal rape did occur; you’ve said that it definitely didn’t. There is a difference.
And what about the cites that the crime he was convicted of with respect to this victim is a serious felony? Do you still believe that Paterno and the Penn State administration were right to not report what they were told to the appropriate law enforcement agency?
So, SA, can you point to all the times in this thread where you said that Sandusky engaged in behavior that reached the level of “indecent contact” as defined above?
And would “indecent contact” have been enough, in your mind, to make it certain that Paterno should have done more than what he did?
“Indecent contact” is a separate issue and I’ve acknowledged several times in this thread that it was entirely possible some sort of skeevy sexually oriented behavior was going on. My point is simply that rape is a crime separate and unique unto itself, both in its commission and as experienced by its victim. Thus as a crime it stands alone.
Early in this thread people were eagerly jumping to the conclusion that the boy in the shower was being brutally raped anally, and using the horror of that experience from the boy’s point of view to villainize Joe Paterno to as great a great a degree as possible for his alleged knowledge that Sandusky was subjecting boys to such horrific treatment and either didn’t care or was more concerned with protecting his football program.
As time went by all of this turned out to be false. All Paterno knew at that time was that a mother had complained two years earlier about Sandusky hugging her kid in the shower and that after an investigation by local authorities nothing came of it, thus for all he knew this was simply another incident like that. Further, he was was not protecting his football program because Sandusky had been out of it for several years by that time. And McQueary’s description of what he saw did not support the eager allegations of rape which the board’s posters were seeking to use against against Paterno.
So, facts being facts, I began to argue these various points and here we are. The fact of the matter is that as an official matter of jurisprudence we are only allowed to convict people of crimes which we can prove they committed, rather than ones we just like to assume they committed because we don’t like them or because the crime that has us all het up is especially heinous. As an attorney you should know that as well as anyone.
To be extremely blunt, without a testifying victim or medical evidence it can be very difficult to prove that penetration occurred, as Sandusky may have been rubbing his penis against the boy’s anus or masturbating himself between the boy’s legs. It is likely that the jury simply wasn’t comfortable finding that penetration occurred without the testimony of the victim and very, very unlikely that they found that penetration was “impossible due to angles” or what have you. Had the victim testified that penetration occurred it’s extremely unlikely that a court of appeals would have found the evidence legally or factually insufficient to support a verdict due to the “difficulty of the angles.” At any rate, if the original argument was that Paterno and McQueary were justified in not reporting the incident to police, the jury’s finding that a felony sex offense was committed against a child should put that to rest, penetration or not.
One thing you never admitted to earlier is whether you ever showed this thread to any family members (or friends, or mental health professionals).
Or maybe you did. If so, what did they say?
It was up to a jury to decide what if any offenses were appropriate to convict Sandusky of. From Paterno’s perspective, very early on and knowing only of one previous incident two years before where Sandusky hugged a kid in the shower, it was investigated and nothing came of it, it was very likely simply another incident like that.
I admit to having never shown my family a Straight Dope thread.
Whether there was anal penetration or not, the jury confirmed that a serious, sexually-related crime did take place. Paterno was informed of it, but did not ensure that state law enforcement was notified. Do you believe that acquittal on a particular charge, but conviction on others, excuses Paterno’s inaction?
The NCAA has imposed very strict sanctions on the Penn State football program because of this incident and its aftermath. To say that Paterno had no motive to cover it up in order to protect the football program is clearly contradicted.
SA, now that the victim of this incident has come forward and filed suit against Penn State, will you accept any additional facts that might change your view of what happened? What if he testifies under oath that he was anally raped, the school is found liable, or they settle out-of-court?
Just promise that when you’re at the podium hugging your Blind Squirrel award, you’ll refrain from sobbing “you like me!”
There’s wrong, and then there’s “knock the Earth off its axis” wrong.
RA, I believe, and will always believe unless convincing evidence proves otherwise, that Joe Paterno had no idea what Jerry Sandusky was really doing with those kids, and that he felt at the time that he was following proper protocol in reporting the shower incident to the school’s administration.
Oh, so he molested the kid, but he didn’t actually rape him. Well, then everything’s all right!
You’re a real piece of work, you know that? You’ve destroyed all credibility and any shred of respect that people had for you here. And all to defend some pedophile. I hope it’s worth it.
And once again, have you read the Freeh report? Wait, never mind. You’ll just hand wave it away.
Go to hell and take your paper towel tubes with you.