# Rick Reilly: Penn State deserves the death penalty for Sandusky **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [July 15, 2012, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271 "2012-07-15T02:20:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/261 "2012-07-19T15:53:57Z")
> [@Zeriel](#): > > Obviously we’ll never know. Nonetheless, I’m going by the fact I live two miles from campus, and even today there are a percentage of people who honestly believe Joe did everything he could, because they desperately want to believe that Joe was always as good as he appeared to be. This is your evidence that people would behave _rationally_? Look, even if you’re right, that doesn’t matter. The _school_ believed their reputation would be hurt and so took the necessary actions to cover up the crime. If Sandusky had been outed immediately, we can suppose that people would forgive the school itself and eventually carry on with life. In our reality, you’re asking that people forgive the school itself and eventually carry on with life. The difference is that in our reality, _there was a decade of coverup_. If something like this happens again at any other school, why shouldn’t the people in power decide to try another coverup? After all, because football is Too Big To Fail, they won’t get hit any harder than if they outed the criminal right away. The coverup is worth a shot. No. The penalty for the coverup needs to be severe enough that the risk of the coverup being discovered isn’t worth it. ---
**Author:** ![brickbacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@brickbacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brickbacon)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/262 "2012-07-19T15:55:44Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > It’s not about Sandusky, it’s about all the top guys covering up his crimes. It’s the president of Michigan saying “Oh no, we’re not keeping this quiet, let’s get out in front of it, take our lumps now instead of getting hit 10x as hard for covering it up.” You think the threat of losing your football team for a few years, which might happen even if you fess up, is a more significant deterrent than public scorn, loss of your job, and jail? Honestly, the current penalties are all far worse. Even if it were a deterrent, you are assuming these people are acting rationally and methodically. As if Paterno sat down with some pro-con list of a Sandusky cover up for which the addition if the football death penalty would have made him go, “well I guess this is a bad idea then”. People don’t behave rationally in many of these cases, so deterrents contingent upon a sober cost-benefit analysis are likely not going to work. Especially when there are far more deleterious and significant individual consequences already in place. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/263 "2012-07-19T15:57:59Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > It’s not about Sandusky, it’s about all the top guys covering up his crimes. It’s the president of Michigan saying “Oh no, we’re not keeping this quiet, let’s get out in front of it, take our lumps now instead of getting hit 10x as hard for covering it up.” Okay, but in that case the connection to the football program is more tenuous. When programs get a competitive advantage by paying the players, giving cars to their family or hooking them up with jobs, etc., that’s directly connected to the operations of the football team. They’re cheating to make the team better than it otherwise would be, and it involves a number of corrupt actors: coaches, boosters, administrators, players and their families (not that I think getting paid makes a player corrupt), and agents. In PSU’s case, all but 5 or 6 people had clean hands. There was Sandusky; there was Paterno, who wanted to cover it up for any number of possible reasons; there was Curley, Schultz, and Spanier, who wanted to cover it up seemingly in deference to Paterno; and you could maybe include McQueary, who witnessed a crime and didn’t call the police. The connection to the football program itself is tangential. It involved coaches, but it didn’t involve acts intended to give the program a competitive advantage. It was really more of a private conspiracy between rogue actors. But the football program is more than those guys, it’s a multitude of people who have greater and lesser stakes in the team. If you’re going to say “Paterno is Penn State football,” well…he’s beyond punishment now, though his legacy is in tatters. What do you accomplish by punishing everyone else outside of those 5? ---
**Author:** ![brickbacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@brickbacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brickbacon)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/264 "2012-07-19T16:00:47Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > If Sandusky had been outed immediately, we can suppose that people would forgive the school itself and eventually carry on with life. In our reality, you’re asking that people forgive the school itself and eventually carry on with life. The difference is that in our reality, _there was a decade of coverup_. If something like this happens again at any other school, why shouldn’t the people in power decide to try another coverup? After all, because football is Too Big To Fail, they won’t get hit any harder than if they outed the criminal right away. The coverup is worth a shot. > > No. The penalty for the coverup needs to be severe enough that the risk of the coverup being discovered isn’t worth it. The penalty is JAIL for all the living people principally involved in the cover up. They also lost their jobs, and will have an eternal scarlet letter thanks to Google. Tim Curley’s great-grandkids will know he’s a scumbag. What makes you think a man willing to risk all that wouldn’t if it meant losing the football team? ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/265 "2012-07-19T16:09:54Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > This is your evidence that people would behave _rationally_? > > Look, even if you’re right, that doesn’t matter. The _school_ believed their reputation would be hurt and so took the necessary actions to cover up the crime. I believe you can meaningfully separate the administrators concern for their own reputations from their concern for the school’s reputation, and I believe that’s what happened here. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/266 "2012-07-19T16:13:51Z")
> [@brickbacon](#): > > You think the threat of losing your football team for a few years, which might happen even if you fess up, is a more significant deterrent than public scorn, loss of your job, and jail? Honestly, the current penalties are all far worse. The current penalties all existed from 1998 through the present and they were not enough to get any of these people to go to the police, the Penn State board, or the relevant authorities. I think there’s more than enough evidence to indicate they were worried about what the scandal would mean for the football team, since something that hurt the football team would also affect their job status and how the public saw them. A severe penalty removes the impetus to cover up something like this to protect a team. ---
**Author:** ![brickbacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@brickbacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brickbacon)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/267 "2012-07-19T16:24:03Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > The current penalties all existed from 1998 through the present and they were not enough to get any of these people to go to the police, the Penn State board, or the relevant authorities. Correct. Now explain to me why you think a football death penalty would have been enough to get them to fess up? > [@Marley23](#): > > I think there’s more than enough evidence to indicate they were worried about what the scandal would mean for the football team, since something that hurt the football team would also affect their job status and how the public saw them. A severe penalty removes the impetus to cover up something like this to protect a team. Do you honestly think they did this ONLY to protect the team? If so, where is the evidence for that? Why do coverups happen at institutions where there is no team to cover for? ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/268 "2012-07-19T16:39:36Z")
> [@brickbacon](#): > > Correct. Now explain to me why you think a football death penalty would have been enough to get them to fess up? I just did: it changes the balance of risk and reward in hiding this type of criminal activity. The PSU/athletic department leadership decide they were better off hiding what they knew from the board and the authorities (and thus the public). I think if they’d known that not only were they risking a lot of trouble to themselves, but to their cash cow of a football team, they would have evaluated this differently. > [@](#): > > Do you honestly think they did this ONLY to protect the team? I’ve said several times - I think in this thread - that it wasn’t _only_ to protect the team. They were also thinking about the reputation of the school and they were thinking of themselves. But if they’d known that this coverup was only going to hurt the team and the school on top of the personal risks and the added trouble a coverup could’ve brought them, I think it would have been more obvious the coverup was not worth the risk. ---
**Author:** ![Labrador\_Deceiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7c8e57/32.png) [@Labrador\_Deceiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labrador_Deceiver)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/269 "2012-07-19T16:42:21Z")
> [@Aizle](#): > > You’ve moved the goal post. My entire claim was that athletic programs do not financially support the overall school. As in, they don’t contribute to anything outside of the athletics program. Any profit that they generate is funneled right back into their program instead of the rest of the organization. > > Now if we both agree on that, great. You’re wrong, and a quick google search is all it takes to find the information. [This](http://www.forbes.com/sites/chrissmith/2012/05/07/would-banning-college-football-actually-help-academics/) was the very first link that came up for me. ---
**Author:** ![ScarletNumber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c0e974/32.png) [@ScarletNumber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ScarletNumber)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/270 "2012-07-19T17:45:07Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > If you’re saying that Penn State shouldn’t be punished more severely than Baylor because someone died at Baylor and nobody died at Penn State, I understand your point but I don’t agree. Nobody died at SMU and they did get the death penalty. Someone died at Baylor and they didn’t get that penalty. So the fact that nobody died at Penn State doesn’t matter. Baylor was not held responsible for the murder of the player and Penn State isn’t going to be punished for the actions of their former coach. The punishments are over the coverups and rule breaking by the staff. The difference to me is that the problem at Baylor didn’t go above the basketball coach and his staff. At Penn State, it involved the football coach, athletic director (who was Paterno’s guy anyway) and the president and VP of the school. Regarding SMU, once the NCAA saw how devasting the death penalty was for a program, I think that made them think twice about ever using it again. IMHO, if they didn’t use it on Baylor, they aren’t going to use it. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/271 "2012-07-19T18:53:38Z")
> [@ScarletNumber](#): > > Regarding SMU, once the NCAA saw how devasting the death penalty was for a program, I think that made them think twice about ever using it again. That’s definitely true and I can understand why. Although when you combine the NCAA’s punishment of Baylor’s and the school’s self-punishment (letting the players leave), it’s pretty close. But on the other hand, this was a longer-lasting event that went higher up the administrative chain. If the NCAA doesn’t apply that penalty here, shouldn’t they just remove that penalty from their arsenal? ---
**Author:** ![Nauplius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nauplius/32/51_2.png) [@Nauplius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nauplius)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/272 "2012-07-19T18:59:40Z")
> [@brickbacon](#): > > The penalty is JAIL for all the living people principally involved in the cover up. The potential for jail is only because they perjured themselves not for the decade long cover-up. The punishment for the cover-up has to be levied against the program to deter other schools from doing the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/273 "2012-07-19T19:03:42Z")
> [@Nauplius](#): > > The potential for jail is only because they perjured themselves not for the decade long cover-up. They are also being charged with failing to report the crimes, but that’s a lesser crime than perjury. ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/274 "2012-07-19T19:15:14Z")
> [@Zeriel](#): > > I believe you can meaningfully separate the administrators concern for their own reputations from their concern for the school’s reputation, and I believe that’s what happened here. I’m not even sure what this is supposed to mean, and I’m increasingly skeptical your responses have anything to do with the core of the argument. If concern for individual reputation can and was meaningfully separated from concern for the school’s/football program’s reputations, _why was there a coverup in the first place_? If the administrators believed everything would land only on Sandusky’s head, they should have had no problem hanging him out to dry in order to protect the school and their own heads. It’s only when they believe outing Sandusky would hurt everything that they determined it was better to try to hide things. The idea of a harsh penalty they didn’t expect (because as **Marley** points out, potential jail time for conspiracy charges were already in place and weren’t enough of a deterrence) is necessary to show to other schools that no matter how much they think outing someone immediately will hurt, not outing them will hurt more. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/275 "2012-07-19T19:39:23Z")
> [@brickbacon](#): > > You think the threat of losing your football team for a few years, which might happen even if you fess up, is a more significant deterrent than public scorn, loss of your job, and jail? The coverup, in practice, wasn’t just those four top guys. It was the whole culture surrounding the football program, in which everybody _understood_ that the program was more important than anything else. In which people like the janitors feared _not_ that they would lose their jobs and be scorned for concealing crimes, but actually the opposite–that they would get in trouble for _making_ the report, for making the program or some important person look bad. ---
**Author:** ![Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barkis_is_Willin)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/276 "2012-07-19T20:09:54Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > That’s definitely true and I can understand why. Although when you combine the NCAA’s punishment of Baylor’s and the school’s self-punishment (letting the players leave), it’s pretty close. But on the other hand, this was a longer-lasting event that went higher up the administrative chain. If the NCAA doesn’t apply that penalty here, shouldn’t they just remove that penalty from their arsenal? The NCAA has to go all or nothing on PSU. A bowl ban and limited scholarships would actually be worse than no punishment. At least they could explain that the issues were too far outside the scope of the NCAA’s regulation. They’d be heavily criticized, but it’s at least a coherant argument. If they do go the weak-sauce punishment route, then yes, they should eliminate the death penalty as a possibility for any future punishment. Because what the hell could you ever apply it to if not this? ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/277 "2012-07-19T20:15:20Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > That’s definitely true and I can understand why. Although when you combine the NCAA’s punishment of Baylor’s and the school’s self-punishment (letting the players leave), it’s pretty close. But on the other hand, this was a longer-lasting event that went higher up the administrative chain. If the NCAA doesn’t apply that penalty here, shouldn’t they just remove that penalty from their arsenal? I’d argue that the “death penalty” should remain in the arsenal for instances where conduct goes both up AND down the chain–direct benefits to the players AND malfeasance by coaches AND administrative apathy. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/278 "2012-07-19T20:18:50Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > I’m not even sure what this is supposed to mean, and I’m increasingly skeptical your responses have anything to do with the core of the argument. > > If concern for individual reputation can and was meaningfully separated from concern for the school’s/football program’s reputations, _why was there a coverup in the first place_? If the administrators believed everything would land only on Sandusky’s head, they should have had no problem hanging him out to dry in order to protect the school and their own heads. It’s only when they believe outing Sandusky would hurt everything that they determined it was better to try to hide things. You’re excluding a possibility here that I find most likely. Paterno believed his personal reputation would suffer for having trusted Sandusky, and he also believed Sandusky deserved an in-house quiet punishment as befits the dignity of an old friend and long-time colleague in the old boy’s club. The administration believed their personal reputation would suffer for having trusted Paterno to make good decisions, and also believed that Sandusky deserved an in-house quiet punishment as befits the dignity of an old friend and long-time colleague in the old boy’s club. Hell, why else would their internal discussions use the word “humane” to describe how they wanted to treat Sandusky? ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/279 "2012-07-19T20:31:49Z")
> [@Zeriel](#): > > You’re excluding a possibility here that I find most likely. > > Paterno believed his personal reputation would suffer for having trusted Sandusky, and he also believed Sandusky deserved an in-house quiet punishment as befits the dignity of an old friend and long-time colleague in the old boy’s club. The administration believed their personal reputation would suffer for having trusted Paterno to make good decisions, and also believed that Sandusky deserved an in-house quiet punishment as befits the dignity of an old friend and long-time colleague in the old boy’s club. Hell, why else would their internal discussions use the word “humane” to describe how they wanted to treat Sandusky? Fine. Maybe the loss of their football program will scare other universities into making sure their own old boy’s club isn’t going to cover up a scandal. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271/280 "2012-07-19T20:37:02Z")
> [@Zeriel](#): > > Hell, why else would their internal discussions use the word “humane” to describe how they wanted to treat Sandusky? They didn’t want to embarrass him or themselves. Interesting note: I think the “humane” discussion came around the time they stopped using his name (and the name of Second Mile and the Department of Public Welfare) in their emails. That sounds an awful lot like the behavior of someone concerned about a potential prosecution. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rick-reilly-penn-state-deserves-the-death-penalty-for-sandusky/628271.md?page=15)