That’s interesting…it’s almost totally the opposite on mine. I’ve seen maybe one or two people support him, but that’s out of a contingent of about 50 (growing up in central PA, even if you didn’t go to Penn State you were probably a fan). Most of the commentary has ranged from “glad he’s gone” to “it’s a shame he had to go out this way, but it needed to be done.”
Without a victim coming forward, the University couldn’t prove a crime was committed, so they were limited in what they COULD do. (I really, really doubt Paterno asked for the investigation to be shelved) Now, they allegedly DID notify the Second Mile of the allegations, why didn’t the people at the charity pursue it? Why does nobody even care about that “moral failure”? Those folks were directly responsible for the kids! Oh, that’s right, it’s no fun in ruining the reputation of a not-famous person!
Would Paterno have had reason to assume that nothing would be done? No.
Would he have expected to have been told about the progress of an active investigation? Honestly? Not unless there was something they needed him to do. We don’t know if he attempted to follow up with those he reported to, because he hasn’t been allowed to speak.
Without an indictment, the Athletic Department could do little more than take his keys and tell him not to bring kids on campus.
You missed my point.
I wrote “And yet, for some reason the law as written specifies reporting to one’s supervisor as one of the proper courses of action.”
IOW, the people who wrote these laws did not think the idea of reporting child abuse to a supervisor was insane, as you and others do. Otherwise they would not have written the law that way.
Maybe they too are from another planet. But I don’t think so. I think it’s reasonable to assume that the supervisors will deal with things correctly, including involving law enforcement as necessary. What happened in this case is that the system did not work as it should have, and outraged people with 20/20 hindsight demand blood for what most people would otherwise consider a reasonable course of action.
I’ve already addressed this earlier, several times. If it was clear to me that there had been a child rape, then it would be obvious, if I saw the perpetrator continuing to hang around, that the supervisor had been derelict, and I would have to take further initiative myself. But if I only heard an ambiguous report from someone else, then it would not be obvious that proper procedures had been followed, and I would have no reason to doubt that a proper investigation had been done etc., and I would not have to involve myself further. So the crucial issue is what JP was told, and so far all evidence indicates that he was not told anything detailed.
Other people have made this point as well, but I disagree with it. It’s seems pretty accepted that JP had enormous influence and power at PSU. But that doesn’t mean that he micromanaged areas that were outside of his area of responsibility. Suppose if he really wanted he could use his influence to shake things up in the physics department. That doesn’t mean that he’s responsible for everything that goes on in the physics department. If he passed along some info he heard to the proper channels in the physics department, I don’t think he would need to follow through on it. Obviously he was a lot closer in this case, but the same principle holds. He could certainly have influenced the course of action taken by Curley & Shultz, but that doesn’t mean he was required to oversee their actions in their area of responsibility, as long as he reasonably assumed they were doing their jobs.
As someone already pointed out Joepa knew McQueary very well. Joepa began coaching McQueary in '94 I believe so he had known him for eight years when McQueary went to him. So well, in fact, he invited McQueary to his home to discuss what he saw.
I don’t want to sound rude but how often have you mistakenly thought you saw a man butt fucking a child? Oh, that’s right… never. I’m fairly certain a 28 year old man knows anal sex when he sees it.
And I do think Joepa is a nut who didn’t give a shit. What makes you think Joepa isn’t a nut and that he actually gave a shit? Is it when he called the police immediately? Oh sorry, he didn’t do that. He decided to go about his day and talked to someone about the situation the following day. And do you seriously have to ask what’s in it for Joepa? Making sure his football program remained untarnished seems motivation enough.
That assumes I think McQueary’s actions were okay. I think he should be just as gone as the rest of them. And I’ll tell you exactly why I expect a person who heard this story third hand to act accordingly. Mr. Turchetta heard about victim 1’s abuse third hand. At that time he was the AD and football coach. HE called the authorities himself to report the information that was relayed to him via a third person. Then he told his superiors what he did. That is exactly what Joepa should have done. Had he done that victim 1 wouldn’t have even been a victim.
And again, I’m assuming nothing. Joepa said McQueary was visibly upset. You don’t get upset when you see people horsing around in the showers. You get upset when you witness a crime. Let’s assume you are correct. McQueary shows up with this fantastic tale about a child being raped in the showers by Sandusky but Joepa thinks McQueary is lying. Then he turns around and makes this liar his assistant coach? Yea, makes sense to me to… :rolleyes:
Simple. Up until then they had managed to keep things quiet. Joepa hoped it would continue that way. Really.
Do you have a cite that he didn’t ask questions to the relevant parties or others?
Depends on how you define “obligation”. I certainly think he could have done more right, but I am not sure the criticism he is getting is deserved.
It matters because information is what we based the credibility of claims on. If Paterno did not have that information, the resultant bad judgment he showed is more understandable.
Regardless, the problem I have with all this ex post facto judgment is chilling effect it has on anyone who desirous to be in the public eye. Clearly, this is an extreme example with much valid criticism being heaped on to Paterno, but the reality is that we all have likely trusted someone who is not a decent person. Everytime you assume the malice rather than ignorance, society loses a little bit of trust. Everytime you punish ignorance as though they were tantamount to the crimes of the accused, you marginalize the processes by which we build communities and social structures. We rely on our reputations, and the trust we have in others. Punishing everyone who makes a honest mistake in whom they trust does not encourage better judgment, or in this case, fewer crimes; it just means we degrade the validity of the idea itself.
Everytime I see people browbeat some politician to repudiate a colleague’s comments (eg. Rev. Wright), or assume family members should know when others in their family commit crimes (eg. Mark Madoff), I wonder if people apprecaite the cost we are all paying because we have decided that misplaced trust and the inability to predict the future is a grand moral failing. Unfortunately, there are really shitty people out there, and they largely stay under the radar because they convince others that they are decent folks. There is generally not some conspiracy, complicity or willful ignorance; it’s just a number of people failing to see something because they are human. It doesn’t mean we should all go looking for blame in every corner and crevice to punish anyone tangentially related to the person who actually did the damage.
I get that, and don’t disagree with you. However, both McQueary and Paterno have had NINE YEARS in which to say “you know, I think I made a mistake with that situation, and I really need to follow up with some people.” Perhaps an after-the-fact call to the police would have accomplished something, perhaps not. But a nine-year span was not long enough for either of those people to feel the necessity to push for more action.
What that action might be, I don’t know. I do know that after that incident, Sandusky continued to be involved with Penn State, continued to use Penn State facilities for his charity, and ran into these guys on a regular basis. How either of them could just put the incident out of their minds is beyond me, and is the moral failing that outrages most people.
Absolutely. And they deserve to pay the price for that failing.
My remark was directed more toward the posters in this thread, who find it easy to say “I know what I would have done.” That number is awfully close to 100% of the self-reporting sample. But, statistically, some number of those people are deluding themselves. Some number of them would act less heroically than they think. Maybe it’s not as many as the population-at-large, since we know that Dopers are clearly a cut above normal people. But that number isn’t zero, either.
ESPN’s Joe Schad is reporting (via the live news crawl at the moment) that Paterno expects to issue a statement sometime today clarifying what McQueary told him about the 2002 incident. According to Schad’s source, Paterno recalls McQueary saying something about “fondling,” “touching”, or “horseplay.”
So even if you accept that as Paterno’s version of events, when you’re talking about Sandusky in the PSU showers at night with a young child, those words, to me, are enough to place a very large moral responsibility on Paterno to find out what actually happened.
Believe me, I’m down with Paterno being from what’s been alleged so far.
But deep down I wonder this: let’s say I’ve worked with a guy for 30 years. I don’t know a lot about his life outside of work other than he’s married and he’s got kids and he does some charity work. Then one day out of the blue, someone else I work with comes up to me and says he saw said guy raping a kid in the showers. Do I believe him? If I tell him to tell the authorities, does the fact that I don’t see the accused on local TV in handcuffs make me think my co-worker was lying about the incident?
I’d like to think to myself that, sure, I’m going to follow this up and protect the kids. But maybe there’s going to also be a part of me that thinks, “If my co-worker is lying, then I could ruin someone’s life for no reason.” (And, since my name is not Joe Paterno, I’m also going to be thinking that the authorities are just going to say “OK, but we’re not going to do anything until the eyewitness comes forward, so you’ve got to convince him to do that.”)
Again, this is not to exonerate Paterno and I haven’t defended him in this thread. But I am saying, hold on a minute before you convince yourself you would have handled this perfectly. The very reason most child predators get away with so much is because people around them don’t handle things perfectly.
Riiiight. A 28-year-old in 2002 is going to use the term “horseplay”.
Even more silly is the idea that anybody anywhere would actually use the term “horseplay” in reference to anal rape of a young boy.
I don’t know why you’re so certain. I’ve never mistakenly thought I saw this happen but I’ve never actually seen it either.
I mean, it’s not hard to imagine being sure of it, if you’re close enough and pay attention to detail. But I can easily envision a scenario in which the observer did not actually see genital contact, but saw them in close proximity and in the proper position and deduced - whether at the time or later - from their positions and motions etc. that it was anal sex. I would guess that’s what happened in this case.
But JP had no reason to change his course of action. If he assumed it had been properly dealt with at the time, he would naturally continue to assume that. He didn’t get any new information after 2002 (AFAIK).
We don’t know what was going on in Paterno’s head at that time, but look at what we do know. Shortly after McQueary reported the incident to Paterno, Sandusky is told that he is no longer Paterno’s heir apparent. By 1999, Sandusky is “retired” from football (he interviewed for a head coaching position with Virginia, but didn’t get it, so his retirement was not voluntary). Meanwhile, McQueary remains on the PSU coaching staff.
What does that set of facts tell you about whether Paterno thought McQueary may have been lying?
Yeah, the fact that Paterno vaguely recalls “fondling” as one of the words used by McCreary really tells us all we need to know about the subject and tone of their conversation.
It’s not clear that they did. Keep in mind that we are debating whether people KNEW he was a monster, yet decided to cover it up for some inexplicable reason. Again, people respond to incentives. What incentive did Paterno have to cover up this abuse in 2002?
Very well said. It’s a point I have mentioned numerous times.
Acknowledged earlier, but thats a fair point. I still think the difference in relationships in relevant.
And yet there seems to be some disagreement as to whether he actually told Paterno that. I am not saying he necessarily misidentified the act, he may have misidentified the participants. Either way, it seems evident to me that Paterno didn’t fully believe the accusation. My point was that such incredulity could stems from a number of things besides a knowing lie on the part of the accuser.
Decades of being a public figure with a good reputation. If anything, that reputation should lead us to believe he would not do something so reckless and callous.
No, he thinks the claim is not accurate. Not believing someone doesn’t mean you think they are lying. And let’s be honest here, this is a fantastic tale with little to no physical proof. I can understand why someone would doubt it given the history with the accuser. I ask you this. Say your co-worker came over and said they saw your SO or sibling raping a kid in an open, public place. They tell you they did not call the police themselves, but figured it was better to come to you for guidance on how to proceed. Do you immediately call the police? Why or why not? Do believe the co-worker?
What about this situation, given the facts we know now, would give someone confidence that that could be acheived? More importantly, WHY would Paterno agree to do this? What does he care if his former employee is convicted of a crime?
Your time frame is off. The 1998 incident wasn’t the one McQueary witnessed. It was the one where campus police got Sandusky’s near-confession by listening in on the victim’s mother’s phone call to Sandusky. The 2002 incident is the one McQueary witnessed, more than 10 years after the incident that got Sandusky “retired”. Again, the idea that Paterno did not know about the 1998 incident (or at least that there WAS a complaint and the nature of it) is ridiculous, which makes his indifference about the 2002 incident the moral failure it is.
Your time line is slightly wrong: Sandusky retired in 1999 rather suddenly - again, after being widely viewed for years as the next coach after Paterno - for reasons that are unclear…but it comes after an investigation in 1998:
The McQueary incident was in 2002. We don’t know if Paterno knew about the 1998 incident - quite frankly, it’s hard to imagine he didn’t since Paterno was friggen’ God in those parts. And the resignation so soon after is very very strange. But, like I said - we don’t know if Paterno knew or not.
Also, for you conspiracy nuts out there, Ray Gricar disappears - just vanishes off the face of the earth - a few years later, and hasn’t been heard from since. So we’ll never know why he decided on to press charges back in 1998.
Oh, and you can add two more people to add to the list of guys that should rot in prison for a long, long time:
You’ve got it. Part of the reason I don’t like Penn State is the cult of personality that has evolved around Paterno. He may have run a clean program from the perspective of academic achievement and recruiting, but who knows what else was going on. When the coach is God, you want to avoid His Wrath at all costs.
Sorry, you’re right about the timing. My apologies.
Considering that virtually everyone outside of a bunch of drunk students are outraged at Paterno’s actions, it’s rather disingenuous to claim that “most people would consider [it] a reasonable course of action”.
You are making an argument you know damn well is spurious- that one is required to do only what the law says. We’re obviously not talking about whether Paterno complied with the law. We are talking about whether he did the right thing (or approached it).
The perpetrator did continue to hang around. He was using the university’s football facilities as recently as last week. I suppose the ambiguity of the report might be a factor, but McQueary testified that he told Paterno what he saw in fairly graphic detail. I’m having a hard time imagining what could be ambiguous about “I saw a little boy getting fucked in the showers.”
After no action was taken, it was no longer reasonable to assume that Curley and/or Shultz were doing their jobs. It’s not as though Paterno waited a few months because he thought there was an investigation; it’s been at least 7 years.
McQueary’s testimony is that he told Paterno in fairly graphic detail (which is why I’ve stopped giving Paterno the benefit of the doubt as I did on page 2 of this thread).
I’m certainly going to accept McQueary’s recollection over that of an 85-year-old, especially considering that McQueary’s other testimony did nothing to paint McQueary as a good guy.
You let the police determine whether a crime was committed. So you tell the police. The real police, not the friggin’ campus cops. (The campus cops are technically real police, but what jayjay said way upthread about how “[t]he Campus Police office is where crimes embarrassing to the admin go to die” is true on far too many campuses.)
There was nothing preventing anyone involved from doing this. If they’d done it promptly after they heard from McQueary, the police would have had a much better chance of ID’ing the victim, wouldn’t they have?
The other thing they could have done was to ban Sandusky from the PSU campus(es) and take away his keys to any athletic department facilities that he had keys to.
And all they did was tell him not to bring kids on campus. They didn’t even take away his keys, AFAICT, let alone ban him from using any Penn State athletic facilities.