Yea its bad,but the cover up that our government is doing is worse. Raising taxes,Letting more illegals to take our jobs,letting prisoners go because our prisons are over crowded.Letting foriegners collect welfare and health benefits while our senior citizens starve and lose their houses!Yes noone says anything about that thou!
ERock, just show me what the dissenters are saying. Where are they saying it and please post a link. Maybe it's just that my normal reads are not reporting both sides of the issue, yahoo, nbc, cbs, espn etc. So make it known and I'll ignore the derogatory remarks. But all I've been seeing are people rallying to the side of the University, the football program and JoPa himself with candlelight vigils in his front yard etc. Pretty disgusting.
By the way, it may not be about the PSU players but it IS about the staff of the football program. You can't deny that is part of the game... the coaches etc.
By the way, it may not be about the PSU players but it IS about the staff of the football program. You can't deny that is part of the game... the coaches etc.
this is the exact insane nitter mentality i'm talking about. this is totally about football. it's the deifying of a football coach that allowed this to happen. it's the record setting football booster donations in 2011 that shows it's a cultural problem at the university, not just the idiot actions of 6-8 people. Why did they do this stuff? so that the football program and joe's legacy wouldn't be tarnished...so they could recruit as normal and keep collecting donations at a record setting pace.
Think about Enron. Yeah 5-6 guys pulled the strings but thousands of others were part of the problem and never thought to ask "wtf are we doing" when shutting down power in CA just to up the prices.
anyone that doesn't think this is a football issue is insane or just a kool-aid drinking nitter. if this was the assistant tennis coach would they have covered it up? hell no! they needed the football program to keep it's squeaky clean image (which is complete bullshit) and keep that little town, and joe pa, isolated from the real world.
the students praying on joe pa's lawn and worshiping his statue last night, the comments made by kyle brady and matt millen, and the thousands of facebook posts telling us to "leave joe out of out because he's dead and can't defend himself" explains how delusional these people are and how nothing can change without a DRASTIC shift in mentality. That shift can only take place by shutting down the football program (not the entire athletic dept or university) for a few years and giving things a fresh start with hopefully a more realistic view of the importance of football.
The sins of the father
Rick Reilly [ARCHIVE]
ESPN.com
July 13, 2012
Facebook Twitter
What a fool I was.
In 1986, I spent a week in State College, Pa., researching a 10-page Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year piece on Joe Paterno.
It was supposed to be a secret, but one night the phone in my hotel room rang. It was a Penn State professor, calling out of the blue.
"Are you here to take part in hagiography?" he said.
"What's hagiography?" I asked.
"The study of saints," he said. "You're going to be just like the rest, aren't you? You're going to make Paterno out to be a saint. You don't know him. He'll do anything to win. What you media are doing is dangerous."
Jealous egghead, I figured.
What an idiot I was. Twenty-five years later, when former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky was accused of a 15-year reign of pedophilia on young boys, I thought Paterno was too old and too addled to understand, too grandfatherly and Catholic to get that Sandusky was committing grisly crimes using Paterno's own football program as bait.
But I was wrong. Paterno knew. He knew all about it. He'd known for years. He knew and he followed it vigilantly.
That's all clear now after Penn State's own investigator, former FBI director Louis Freeh, came out Thursday and hung the whole disgusting canvas on a wall for us. Showed us the emails, read us the interviews, shined a black light on all of the lies they left behind. It cost $6.5 million and took eight months and the truth it uncovered was 100 times uglier than the bills.
Paterno knew about a mother's cry that Sandusky had molested her son in 1998. Later, Paterno lied to a grand jury and said he didn't. Paterno and university president Graham Spanier and vice president Gary Schultz and athletic director Tim Curley all knew what kind of sick coach they had on the payroll in Sandusky. Schultz warned them. "Is this opening of pandora's box?" he wrote them in emails. "Other children?" "Sexual improprieties?"
It gets worse. According to Freeh, Spanier, Schultz and Curley were set to call child services on Sandusky in February 2001 until Paterno apparently talked them out of it. Curley wasn't "comfortable" going to child services after that talk with JoePa.
Yeah, that's the most important thing, your comfort.
What'd they do instead? Alerted nobody. Called nobody. And let Sandusky keep leading his horrific tours around campus. "Hey, want to see the showers?" That sentence alone ought to bring down the statue.
What a stooge I was.
I talked about Paterno's "true legacy" in all of this. Here's his true legacy: Paterno let a child molester go when he could've stopped him. He let him go and then lied to cover his sinister tracks. He let a rapist go to save his own recruiting successes and fundraising pitches and big-fish-small-pond hide.
Here's a legacy for you. Paterno's cowardice and ego and fears allowed Sandusky to molest at least eight more boys in the years after that 1998 incident -- Victims 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9 and 10. Just to recap: By not acting, a grown man failed to protect eight boys from years of molestation, abuse and self-loathing, all to save his program the embarrassment. The mother of Victim 1 is "filled with hatred toward Joe Paterno," the victim's lawyer says. "She just hates him, and reviles him." Can you blame her?
What a sap I was.
I hope Penn State loses civil suits until the walls of the accounting office cave in. I hope that Spanier, Schultz and Curley go to prison for perjury. I hope the NCAA gives Penn State the death penalty it most richly deserves. The worst scandal in college football history deserves the worst penalty the NCAA can give. They gave it to SMU for winning without regard for morals. They should give it to Penn State for the same thing. The only difference is, at Penn State they didn't pay for it with Corvettes. They paid for it with lives.
What a chump I was.
I tweeted that, yes, Paterno should be fired, but that he was, overall, "a good and decent man." I was wrong. Good and decent men don't do what Paterno did. Good and decent men protect kids, not rapists. And to think Paterno comes from "father" in Italian.
This throws a can of black paint on anything anybody tells me about Paterno from here on in. "No NCAA violations in all those years." I believe it. He was great at hiding stuff. "He gave $4 million to the library." In exchange for what? "He cared about kids away from the football field." No, he didn't. Not all of them. Not when it really mattered.
What a tool I was.
As Joe Paterno lay dying, I actually felt sorry for him. Little did I know he was taking all of his dirty secrets to the grave. Nine days before he died, he had The Washington Post's Sally Jenkins in his kitchen. He could've admitted it then. Could've tried a simple "I'm sorry." But he didn't. Instead, he just lied deeper. Right to her face. Right to all of our faces.
That professor was right, all those years ago. I was engaging in hagiography. So was that school. So was that town. It was dangerous. Turns out it builds monsters.
Not all of them ended up in prison.
Rick Reilly [ARCHIVE]
ESPN.com
July 13, 2012
Facebook Twitter
What a fool I was.
In 1986, I spent a week in State College, Pa., researching a 10-page Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year piece on Joe Paterno.
It was supposed to be a secret, but one night the phone in my hotel room rang. It was a Penn State professor, calling out of the blue.
"Are you here to take part in hagiography?" he said.
"What's hagiography?" I asked.
"The study of saints," he said. "You're going to be just like the rest, aren't you? You're going to make Paterno out to be a saint. You don't know him. He'll do anything to win. What you media are doing is dangerous."
Jealous egghead, I figured.
What an idiot I was. Twenty-five years later, when former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky was accused of a 15-year reign of pedophilia on young boys, I thought Paterno was too old and too addled to understand, too grandfatherly and Catholic to get that Sandusky was committing grisly crimes using Paterno's own football program as bait.
But I was wrong. Paterno knew. He knew all about it. He'd known for years. He knew and he followed it vigilantly.
That's all clear now after Penn State's own investigator, former FBI director Louis Freeh, came out Thursday and hung the whole disgusting canvas on a wall for us. Showed us the emails, read us the interviews, shined a black light on all of the lies they left behind. It cost $6.5 million and took eight months and the truth it uncovered was 100 times uglier than the bills.
Paterno knew about a mother's cry that Sandusky had molested her son in 1998. Later, Paterno lied to a grand jury and said he didn't. Paterno and university president Graham Spanier and vice president Gary Schultz and athletic director Tim Curley all knew what kind of sick coach they had on the payroll in Sandusky. Schultz warned them. "Is this opening of pandora's box?" he wrote them in emails. "Other children?" "Sexual improprieties?"
It gets worse. According to Freeh, Spanier, Schultz and Curley were set to call child services on Sandusky in February 2001 until Paterno apparently talked them out of it. Curley wasn't "comfortable" going to child services after that talk with JoePa.
Yeah, that's the most important thing, your comfort.
What'd they do instead? Alerted nobody. Called nobody. And let Sandusky keep leading his horrific tours around campus. "Hey, want to see the showers?" That sentence alone ought to bring down the statue.
What a stooge I was.
I talked about Paterno's "true legacy" in all of this. Here's his true legacy: Paterno let a child molester go when he could've stopped him. He let him go and then lied to cover his sinister tracks. He let a rapist go to save his own recruiting successes and fundraising pitches and big-fish-small-pond hide.
Here's a legacy for you. Paterno's cowardice and ego and fears allowed Sandusky to molest at least eight more boys in the years after that 1998 incident -- Victims 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9 and 10. Just to recap: By not acting, a grown man failed to protect eight boys from years of molestation, abuse and self-loathing, all to save his program the embarrassment. The mother of Victim 1 is "filled with hatred toward Joe Paterno," the victim's lawyer says. "She just hates him, and reviles him." Can you blame her?
What a sap I was.
I hope Penn State loses civil suits until the walls of the accounting office cave in. I hope that Spanier, Schultz and Curley go to prison for perjury. I hope the NCAA gives Penn State the death penalty it most richly deserves. The worst scandal in college football history deserves the worst penalty the NCAA can give. They gave it to SMU for winning without regard for morals. They should give it to Penn State for the same thing. The only difference is, at Penn State they didn't pay for it with Corvettes. They paid for it with lives.
What a chump I was.
I tweeted that, yes, Paterno should be fired, but that he was, overall, "a good and decent man." I was wrong. Good and decent men don't do what Paterno did. Good and decent men protect kids, not rapists. And to think Paterno comes from "father" in Italian.
This throws a can of black paint on anything anybody tells me about Paterno from here on in. "No NCAA violations in all those years." I believe it. He was great at hiding stuff. "He gave $4 million to the library." In exchange for what? "He cared about kids away from the football field." No, he didn't. Not all of them. Not when it really mattered.
What a tool I was.
As Joe Paterno lay dying, I actually felt sorry for him. Little did I know he was taking all of his dirty secrets to the grave. Nine days before he died, he had The Washington Post's Sally Jenkins in his kitchen. He could've admitted it then. Could've tried a simple "I'm sorry." But he didn't. Instead, he just lied deeper. Right to her face. Right to all of our faces.
That professor was right, all those years ago. I was engaging in hagiography. So was that school. So was that town. It was dangerous. Turns out it builds monsters.
Not all of them ended up in prison.
OK ERock, if you are going to accuse me or anyone of saying one of the dumbest things you've ever read, be ready to stand up for yourself or at least straighten the record as I did in the following post which didn't seem to register with you.
What I said was a misstatement but not entirely off the mark because it does include the PSU community, probably in its entirety, not the entire state of Pennsylvania which isn't how it was intended to read. But still it's not far off the mark save for any non-PSU-specific elements.
Personally I take the comments you mentioned lightly but not where the football program is concerned.
Now there is your ridiculous comment of the day. NO one has said anything about shutting down the university as half of your commentary seemed to assert but it is about its football program. Of course it's about football, everything about the legendary football guru JoPa and his so-called storied football program is on the line here and I am afraid that all those who would close rank could very easily turn out to be all that's left of Joe Paterno and the Nittany Lions when this is all said and done.
What I said was a misstatement but not entirely off the mark because it does include the PSU community, probably in its entirety, not the entire state of Pennsylvania which isn't how it was intended to read. But still it's not far off the mark save for any non-PSU-specific elements.
It's not about what anyone knew before the facts were let out, it's what they did AFTER the facts were made known. Did each PSU supporter join in circling the wagons or did each person stop and say how can anyone defend a child rapist or for that matter, someone who protects said rapist, even Jo Paterno himself?
I stand by what I said which was that any PSU supporter that runs to the defense of anyone on the side of a child molester deserves all the chastisement he gets and then some.
Here's a golden opportunity for your company to weed out the weak minded by asking them if a rapist's acts should be kept secret if he works for an organization like PSU football for the sake of protecting the reputation of the program. OF course you'd need to understand the question first before you could appreciate why I would make a suggestion like that.
Personally I take the comments you mentioned lightly but not where the football program is concerned.
Now there is your ridiculous comment of the day. NO one has said anything about shutting down the university as half of your commentary seemed to assert but it is about its football program. Of course it's about football, everything about the legendary football guru JoPa and his so-called storied football program is on the line here and I am afraid that all those who would close rank could very easily turn out to be all that's left of Joe Paterno and the Nittany Lions when this is all said and done.
Conan,
Thank you for your follow up responses, I'm just seeing these now after a very long day. They certainly registered and paint a clearer a picture. Much more precise and to the point, which is what I'm used to from you. Your first statement seemed to lay a wide net and emphasis on "EVERYONE in the state that should be ashamed because they supported what happened....", I stand by this being one of the dumbest things statements I have ever seen.
My rant, if you will call it that, did start to sway from your post. I have never seen you say "shut the program down", however, I'm hearing it non stop from naive idiots in this part of the country and I'm fairly certain this talk is happening elsewhere. IMO, people couldn't be more short sighted with that line of thinking. That was where my comment about this not being about football was directed. RT, seemed to think I was referring to cover up, which I was not - he is right the cover was about football. I firmly believe all those involved should be punished and held as accomplices.
My moral compass is less sturdy than most, I can see another man wanting to kill another man under certain situations, I think its ok to resolve a dispute between men with fists and I fully understand criminal activity when its a necessity to survival. However, in no way shape or form can I wrap my head violent acts towards women and children, never.
These men involved in the cover up, which are few, should be prosecuted to the fullest extent and be held accountable as accomplices. Their failure to react led directly to years of incredible torment to countless children - children, not adults.
I support your follow up posts, but they are very different then your initial statement. I couldn't agree more with you and RT regarding the dopes holding candle night sessions and other non sense, ridiculous. Fortunately, most of those people are teenagers. I can say will full certainty that the majority of alumni, which I am not, associated with this institution are disgusted, embarrassed and appalled by what took place.
Love or hate the football program, Penn State is an excellent university that consistently produces professional ready talent, something most schools in this area can not proclaim. I like your line of thinking on weeding out the talent we see coming in, because I would not want to hire some young kid, even if talented, that failed to understand the ramifications and the level of misconduct that took place here. I would have to think of a creative way to get there, because I'm sure there would be HR type issues with that line of questioning.
Lastly, RT's Enron comparison is apples to oranges, Lay, Jeffrey, Skilling and Fastow hid billions of debt, mismanaged assets, gutted the pension and drove the stock price from $100 a share to less than $1 - there was nothing left to come back to. There is something to come back to here, if the Enron leadership committed crimes of equal discern, but left the company standing in strong financial health - Enron would exist today and they would not bring down a corporation for the actions of a few.
Please don't take this as my support for anyone involved in this madness - furthest from the truth, however, I don't think the university should pay as dear a price as many want for the action of a few. Those few should pay the ultimate price.
Thought you guys might find this interesting. Paterno estate planning. Like I said, he knew this was coming. Further circumstantial evidence that he might have facilitated his own demise....
http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2012/07/joe_paterno_fought_for_salary.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/14/s...ract-amid-jerry-sandusky-inquiry.html?_r=2&hp
http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2012/07/joe_paterno_fought_for_salary.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/14/s...ract-amid-jerry-sandusky-inquiry.html?_r=2&hp
I thought if I searched hard enough I would be able to bump a " pure play" thread on the , " cover up "
So, Here's to you . cheersgif
Cheers !
MAJOR RELEASE: 'Framing Paterno" Tells The Full Story of the PSU "Scandal"
Today I am releasing a free, online, "mini book" on the entire case. I am doing this from a unique stand point. I have spent months writing this story from the perspective of what you have to believe happened for you to accept the "conventional wisdom" of the case.
Hopefully, you will find this device to be both extremely informative as well as entertaining. It is the product of an enormous amount of work and I am very proud of it. It is obviously free (as everything I have done here has been) and so I ask is that you read it and share it with others who might be interested in the real truth of this matter.
The "book" is in three parts (there are links to the next section in each of the others).
Part one can be found here:
http://framingpaterno.com/perfect-sense-full-conventional-wisdom-narrati...
Part two is here:
http://framingpaterno.com/perfect-sense-full-conventional-wisdom-narrati...
Part three is here and includes a never before seen "interview" with Aaron Fisher ("Victim 1"):
http://framingpaterno.com/perfect-sense-full-conventional-wisdom-narrati...
Again, all I ask is that you read it with an open mind (understanding that it is a bit of a parody) and share it with others if you think it is worthy.
Thanks for your support.
John Ziegler
www.FramingPaterno.com
So, Here's to you . cheersgif
Cheers !
MAJOR RELEASE: 'Framing Paterno" Tells The Full Story of the PSU "Scandal"
Today I am releasing a free, online, "mini book" on the entire case. I am doing this from a unique stand point. I have spent months writing this story from the perspective of what you have to believe happened for you to accept the "conventional wisdom" of the case.
Hopefully, you will find this device to be both extremely informative as well as entertaining. It is the product of an enormous amount of work and I am very proud of it. It is obviously free (as everything I have done here has been) and so I ask is that you read it and share it with others who might be interested in the real truth of this matter.
The "book" is in three parts (there are links to the next section in each of the others).
Part one can be found here:
http://framingpaterno.com/perfect-sense-full-conventional-wisdom-narrati...
Part two is here:
http://framingpaterno.com/perfect-sense-full-conventional-wisdom-narrati...
Part three is here and includes a never before seen "interview" with Aaron Fisher ("Victim 1"):
http://framingpaterno.com/perfect-sense-full-conventional-wisdom-narrati...
Again, all I ask is that you read it with an open mind (understanding that it is a bit of a parody) and share it with others if you think it is worthy.
Thanks for your support.
John Ziegler
www.FramingPaterno.com
...and the Fairy Tail of what happened at PSU, that destroyed many good men continues to erode down to , well nothing
Lewis's latest order comes after a two-year pause in which the defendants, ultimately successfully, got perjury and obstruction of justice charges dismissed over attorney / client privilege errors.
Last week, Castor also agreed to drop a single, remaining perjury count against Curley the Superior Court had let stand.
http://www.pennlive.com/news/2016/05/jerry_sandusky_cover-up_charge.html
Lewis's latest order comes after a two-year pause in which the defendants, ultimately successfully, got perjury and obstruction of justice charges dismissed over attorney / client privilege errors.
Last week, Castor also agreed to drop a single, remaining perjury count against Curley the Superior Court had let stand.
http://www.pennlive.com/news/2016/05/jerry_sandusky_cover-up_charge.html
How Former PSU President Graham Spanier Got Convicted For Something He Didn’t Do
by John Ziegler | 4:43 pm, March 24th, 2017
Over five years after the story exploded and became the most controversial scandal in the history of college sports, former Penn State University President Graham Spanier was finally acquitted today of the “conspiracy” charge against him, but convicted on only one of two charges of “endangering the welfare of a child.” He was found guilty of something for which there is no evidence nor logic indicating that he committed a crime and, most amazingly, it happened without his lawyers even putting on a case.
Despite having no connection to Penn State, I have investigated the entire “Jerry Sandusky Scandal” on almost a full-time basis, for no money, for most of the past five years. I have spoken to Spanier for many hours and dealt with him extensively. I also attended his trial and I am 100% positive that he never had any idea that Sandusky might have been a pedophile, and that he acted almost exactly as he should have throughout the entire situation.
So, how could something like this have happened in our judicial system? The real story is far too involved to tell in just one short story, but here is essence of it.
From the very beginning, Spanier and Penn State got caught up in a media firestorm they didn’t see coming because they all honestly thought that Jerry Sandusky was innocent and that, even if he wasn’t (at least in a remotely rational world), they knew they had no culpability for the crimes of a former employee. So when in November of 2011 it was leaked that Penn State assistant coach Mike McQueary had supposedly testified to a grand jury that about a decade before (he got the date, month, and year of the episode wrong) he had witnessed Sandusky “raping” a boy, they were completely stunned and unprepared for the media-created terror which would ensue.
Spanier’s first instincts, which were correct, were to strongly back the two highly-respected long-time Penn State administrators, Tim Curley and Gary Schultz, who were being charged with a series of serious crimes related to covering up for Sandusky (I and many others close to the case are now completely convinced that the state’s primary objective in charging them was actually to destroy two of Sandusky’s strongest witnesses). He released a statement doing so before the news media suddenly decided, thanks to the tangential involvement of legendary head football coach Joe Paterno, that this story was now the most outrageous thing that has ever happened in the history of Pennsylvania.
The statement, which was perfect given the information he had at the time, backfired on him because it was somehow seen as not being accepting enough, before anyone in the case had even spoken publicly, that all of those being implicated, including Sandusky, were clearly guilty. In short, Spanier, an esteemed and very liberal university president, had committed a violation of “political correctness.”
You see, when a witch hunt in underway, you aren’t allowed to defend yourself or anyone else who might be even remotely involved. You must accept the popular narrative as true and then beg for forgiveness, even if what is being alleged is totally false and without evidence or logic.
In a pure panic, the Penn State board, guided by then-Governor Tom Corbett (who had a major feud with Spanier over education funding the previous spring), fired Joe Paterno and forced Spanier to resign. That was then seen, effectively, as a guilty plea on behalf of the entire school and it provoked a firestorm of injustice which seemingly will never stop.
Paterno almost immediately died and Sandusky, without a single continuance or a shred of hard evidence, was convicted just seven months after his arrest. The firings created a huge backlash in the Penn State community and forced the board to justify what they did. That led to them paying Louis Freeh many millions of dollars for the “Freeh Report” to conclude that there was a cover-up. This then incited the NCAA to act with record speed to institute sanctions (which will later be revoked), thus further setting in stone the completely false narrative of a cover up. This then gave the Attorney General’s office the leverage to charge Spanier himself, thus also shutting up a strong voice for what really happened here.
Meanwhile, Penn State, eager to show the world and news media how much they “get it,” spent about $100 million dollars in tax-payer money in totally un-vetted settlements for Sandusky’s accusers. This even further established the false narrative, especially when overtly absurd stories were selectively leaked to an easily duped news media all too eager to substantiate their original rush to judgement in this case.
At each point in this battle, those on the other side who were morally certain that they and those they support had done nothing wrong kept thinking that they could cede each piece of land because it wasn’t the proper hill to “die” on. They kept having faith that as time passed and the extreme emotion this case had triggered finally died down, that the system would work. Surely, they believed, if a fair jury ever heard this case that the truth would come out and justice would finally be done.
What they miscalculated was that which each retreat their position got weaker and the public became both convinced of total guilt and stopped being open-minded, or even caring about it. There was no greater proof of this than the completely nonsensical verdict in Mike McQueary’s civil suit, which showed just how incredibly polluted the jury pool in Pennsylvania is on this case.
Knowing this is what they faced, last week Curley and Schultz took a plea bargain which gave them a misdemeanor conviction for endangering the welfare of a child. In a remotely normal case, they would get zero prison time and this would be seen as a near total repudiation of the state’s original and laughably overcharged case against them. Instead, the media dutifully did the state’s bidding by ludicrously portraying this development as an admission of a cover up (anyone who objectively saw their testimony this week would realize this interpretation is beyond preposterous).
At that point, Spanier, who rejected the same plea deal, was basically boxed in. Only a very aggressive defense which sought to blow up the many misperceptions about this case could have saved him from at least a minor conviction. Instead, the defense (directly against my many urgings/warnings) decided to curl up into the fetal position and rely solely on the reality that, according to the law, the state didn’t come close to proving their case.
Not only did they not even attempt to confront several prosecution witnesses (out fear of being politically incorrect again) who could have been very easily discredited, they literally didn’t even put on a defense. Former NCIS and FIS special agent John Snedden (whose report for the federal government led to Spanier’s top secret security clearance being renewed after the scandal broke, which I released exclusively here last week) traveled many hours to be the defense’s star witness, as was promised to jury, but at the very last moment the defense, in an act of extreme naiveté, decided to rest without calling any witnesses.
At that moment I knew that the jury that I had seen, which surely had been brainwashed by almost six years of unfair media coverage, was never going to be able to navigate through the fog of emotion on which the prosecution completely relied and thus be able to see that there was no case here on the facts or the law (or that a conviction of any kind here sets an incredibly dangerous precedent for educators everywhere).
I doubt there has never been a case which more clearly echoed Ben Franklin’s famous quote “We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately” than this one. We now have four previously esteemed men who have been unfairly hanged (without even putting up a decent fight in court) all of whom know they are innocent and believe that all the others are as well.
The real story here is the most amazing thing I have ever seen. Sadly, I doubt it will ever be properly told.
[image screen grab via ABC News]
John Ziegler hosts a weekly podcast focusing on news media issues and is documentary filmmaker. You can follow him on Twitter at @ZigManFreud or email him at johnz@mediaite.com
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author. http://lawnewz.com/high-profile/how...nier-got-convicted-for-something-he-didnt-do/
by John Ziegler | 4:43 pm, March 24th, 2017
Over five years after the story exploded and became the most controversial scandal in the history of college sports, former Penn State University President Graham Spanier was finally acquitted today of the “conspiracy” charge against him, but convicted on only one of two charges of “endangering the welfare of a child.” He was found guilty of something for which there is no evidence nor logic indicating that he committed a crime and, most amazingly, it happened without his lawyers even putting on a case.
Despite having no connection to Penn State, I have investigated the entire “Jerry Sandusky Scandal” on almost a full-time basis, for no money, for most of the past five years. I have spoken to Spanier for many hours and dealt with him extensively. I also attended his trial and I am 100% positive that he never had any idea that Sandusky might have been a pedophile, and that he acted almost exactly as he should have throughout the entire situation.
So, how could something like this have happened in our judicial system? The real story is far too involved to tell in just one short story, but here is essence of it.
From the very beginning, Spanier and Penn State got caught up in a media firestorm they didn’t see coming because they all honestly thought that Jerry Sandusky was innocent and that, even if he wasn’t (at least in a remotely rational world), they knew they had no culpability for the crimes of a former employee. So when in November of 2011 it was leaked that Penn State assistant coach Mike McQueary had supposedly testified to a grand jury that about a decade before (he got the date, month, and year of the episode wrong) he had witnessed Sandusky “raping” a boy, they were completely stunned and unprepared for the media-created terror which would ensue.
Spanier’s first instincts, which were correct, were to strongly back the two highly-respected long-time Penn State administrators, Tim Curley and Gary Schultz, who were being charged with a series of serious crimes related to covering up for Sandusky (I and many others close to the case are now completely convinced that the state’s primary objective in charging them was actually to destroy two of Sandusky’s strongest witnesses). He released a statement doing so before the news media suddenly decided, thanks to the tangential involvement of legendary head football coach Joe Paterno, that this story was now the most outrageous thing that has ever happened in the history of Pennsylvania.
The statement, which was perfect given the information he had at the time, backfired on him because it was somehow seen as not being accepting enough, before anyone in the case had even spoken publicly, that all of those being implicated, including Sandusky, were clearly guilty. In short, Spanier, an esteemed and very liberal university president, had committed a violation of “political correctness.”
You see, when a witch hunt in underway, you aren’t allowed to defend yourself or anyone else who might be even remotely involved. You must accept the popular narrative as true and then beg for forgiveness, even if what is being alleged is totally false and without evidence or logic.
In a pure panic, the Penn State board, guided by then-Governor Tom Corbett (who had a major feud with Spanier over education funding the previous spring), fired Joe Paterno and forced Spanier to resign. That was then seen, effectively, as a guilty plea on behalf of the entire school and it provoked a firestorm of injustice which seemingly will never stop.
Paterno almost immediately died and Sandusky, without a single continuance or a shred of hard evidence, was convicted just seven months after his arrest. The firings created a huge backlash in the Penn State community and forced the board to justify what they did. That led to them paying Louis Freeh many millions of dollars for the “Freeh Report” to conclude that there was a cover-up. This then incited the NCAA to act with record speed to institute sanctions (which will later be revoked), thus further setting in stone the completely false narrative of a cover up. This then gave the Attorney General’s office the leverage to charge Spanier himself, thus also shutting up a strong voice for what really happened here.
Meanwhile, Penn State, eager to show the world and news media how much they “get it,” spent about $100 million dollars in tax-payer money in totally un-vetted settlements for Sandusky’s accusers. This even further established the false narrative, especially when overtly absurd stories were selectively leaked to an easily duped news media all too eager to substantiate their original rush to judgement in this case.
At each point in this battle, those on the other side who were morally certain that they and those they support had done nothing wrong kept thinking that they could cede each piece of land because it wasn’t the proper hill to “die” on. They kept having faith that as time passed and the extreme emotion this case had triggered finally died down, that the system would work. Surely, they believed, if a fair jury ever heard this case that the truth would come out and justice would finally be done.
What they miscalculated was that which each retreat their position got weaker and the public became both convinced of total guilt and stopped being open-minded, or even caring about it. There was no greater proof of this than the completely nonsensical verdict in Mike McQueary’s civil suit, which showed just how incredibly polluted the jury pool in Pennsylvania is on this case.
Knowing this is what they faced, last week Curley and Schultz took a plea bargain which gave them a misdemeanor conviction for endangering the welfare of a child. In a remotely normal case, they would get zero prison time and this would be seen as a near total repudiation of the state’s original and laughably overcharged case against them. Instead, the media dutifully did the state’s bidding by ludicrously portraying this development as an admission of a cover up (anyone who objectively saw their testimony this week would realize this interpretation is beyond preposterous).
At that point, Spanier, who rejected the same plea deal, was basically boxed in. Only a very aggressive defense which sought to blow up the many misperceptions about this case could have saved him from at least a minor conviction. Instead, the defense (directly against my many urgings/warnings) decided to curl up into the fetal position and rely solely on the reality that, according to the law, the state didn’t come close to proving their case.
Not only did they not even attempt to confront several prosecution witnesses (out fear of being politically incorrect again) who could have been very easily discredited, they literally didn’t even put on a defense. Former NCIS and FIS special agent John Snedden (whose report for the federal government led to Spanier’s top secret security clearance being renewed after the scandal broke, which I released exclusively here last week) traveled many hours to be the defense’s star witness, as was promised to jury, but at the very last moment the defense, in an act of extreme naiveté, decided to rest without calling any witnesses.
At that moment I knew that the jury that I had seen, which surely had been brainwashed by almost six years of unfair media coverage, was never going to be able to navigate through the fog of emotion on which the prosecution completely relied and thus be able to see that there was no case here on the facts or the law (or that a conviction of any kind here sets an incredibly dangerous precedent for educators everywhere).
I doubt there has never been a case which more clearly echoed Ben Franklin’s famous quote “We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately” than this one. We now have four previously esteemed men who have been unfairly hanged (without even putting up a decent fight in court) all of whom know they are innocent and believe that all the others are as well.
The real story here is the most amazing thing I have ever seen. Sadly, I doubt it will ever be properly told.
[image screen grab via ABC News]
John Ziegler hosts a weekly podcast focusing on news media issues and is documentary filmmaker. You can follow him on Twitter at @ZigManFreud or email him at johnz@mediaite.com
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author. http://lawnewz.com/high-profile/how...nier-got-convicted-for-something-he-didnt-do/
So just to be crystal clear , the two people who conducted the most extensive investigation into what happened at Penn State concluded , their was no cover-up, and no conspiracy, because there was nothing to cover up . I ask again, is there a reason that Joe's statue is not put back up in front of Paterno field ? ......Like tomorrow
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John Ziegler ·
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Here's 1st-ever interview with FIS agent @JRSnedden whose report on Graham Spanier should've ended "PSU C-up" myth!!
https://soundcloud.com/freespeechbroadcasting/2017-03-26-2l
John Ziegler ·
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Here's 1st-ever interview with FIS agent @JRSnedden whose report on Graham Spanier should've ended "PSU C-up" myth!!
https://soundcloud.com/freespeechbroadcasting/2017-03-26-2l
