Joe Paterno is once again the winningest head coach in NCAA Division I history. On Friday, late in the news cycle, it was announced that the NCAA had reached a settlement with Penn State on the legality of the decree that stripped Paterno of his wins. The agreement returns 112 wins to the school’s record and 111 to Paterno. Paterno’s record now stands at 409-136-3.
It also returns 19 victories to convicted child rapist Jerry Sandusky, along with his assistant coach of the year award received in 1999, the same year he guided the Penn State defense to a 24-0 shutout win over Texas A&M in the Alamo Bowl, getting the celebratory douse with a water bucket and carried to the center of the field on the shoulders of his players. That all happened over a year after Paterno supposedly first learned Sandusky was a child molester.
Beginning in 1977, maybe earlier, only the rapist and his literal scores of victims know for sure, Jerry Sandusky used his position, as a coach and founder of The Second Mile children’s charity to target, groom and sexually assault young boys. He is currently in prison, convicted of 45 counts of sexual abuse and will spend the next 30-60 years there.
Here is what we know for sure. From 1994-2009 Jerry Sandusky molested at least 45 children. The number could be 52, as mentioned in the original indictment and was probably more than that.
As early as 1998, Joe Paterno knew that Sandusky was a pedophile, as did school president Graham Spanier, vice president of finance Gary Schultz and athletic director Tim Curley. They allowed Sandusky to coach at Penn State for another two seasons and remain actively involved in the program through his charity until he was finally caught and brought to some semblance of justice.
According to the report put together by former FBI Director Louis Freah, Paterno, Curley, Schultz and Spanier showed a “total and consistent disregard…. for the safety and welfare of Sandusky’s child victims… there was no attempt to investigate, to identify Victim 2, or protect that child or any others from similar conduct…”.
The report continues, saying that Paterno, Curley, Schultz and Spanier, “failed to protect against a child sexual predator harming children for over a decade. These men concealed Sandusky’s activities from the Board of Trustees, the University community and authorities. They exhibited a striking lack of empathy for Sandusky’s victims by failing to inquire as to their safety and well-being, especially by not attempting to determine the identity of the child who Sandusky assaulted in the Lasch Building in 2001. Further, they exposed this child to additional harm by alerting Sandusky, who was the only one who knew the child’s identity, of what (Mike) McQueary saw in the shower on the night of Feb. 9, 2001.”
That incident in question on Feb. 9, 2001 was the moment McQueary, a graduate assistant, walked in on Sandusky sexually assaulting a small child in the shower. Why McQueary, a grown man with two arms and hands that can make fists didn’t beat Sandusky to death on the spot, we’ll never know and might indeed be something he’ll have to answer for himself some day. Instead, he told Paterno, who already knew Sandusky was a pedophile for at least three years at that point. Paterno told Curley and Schultz, Shultz told Spanier. According to the Freah report, Spanier, Curley and Schultz were going to turn Sandusky in to the Department of Welfare and the Board of Trustees, but Paterno talked them out of it. Sandusky would still be at large and part of the Penn State program in some fashion for the next 10 years.
There’s more. Lots more. And it’s all there for anyone to read. It’s all part of the public record and when it all came to light, Paterno, Curley and Spanier were fired. Schultz had already retired in 2009. Paterno was stripped of 111 of his wins dating back to when he first discovered he had a pedophile, a child rapist, working for him and did nothing but help cover it up. His statue was removed from the front of Beaver Stadium and stored.
For some reason this upset people. Not the cover up, not the raping of children, but the removal from the 111 wins from Joe Paterno’s career record. In celebrating the ruling, Pennsylvania State Senate majority leader Jake Corman said, “The NCAA has surrendered.”
“Surrendered” is an interesting word to choose there. A word I would think Sandusky’s innocent victims might understand all too well as they were dragged unwilling into closets, and showers and God knows where else and violated completely. Their lives are irrevocably damaged forever by a man, Sandusky, and the coach and institution that protected him at any cost.
That same university released a statement from its current president, Eric Barron today, “I… want to thank the hard-working students, staff and faculty at Penn State who have ensured the highest level of compliance and ethics. Finally, I want to make it clear that we have a tremendous alumni community that cares a great deal for Penn State. It is my hope that this agreement will continue the healing process for all.”
I don’t know about “for all,” there, Eric. Do you? Do you think the 45-52 (probably more) children Sandusky raped, some within the very buildings you stride today, are feeling “healed?”
Certainly the victims were not on Corman’s mind when he crowed, “Hopefully today we’ll begin to make right the damage that has been done. Today is a victory for due processes, which was unafforded in this case. Today is a victory for the people of Pennsylvania. Today is a victory for Penn State nation.”
Over 50 children, some of them now grown, others still in their teens, still mean absolutely nothing to the institution and supporters of Penn State even today. Corman, Barron and all of Penn State did today the same thing that Paterno did for more than a decade (at least). They have all displayed “a striking lack of empathy for Sandusky’s victims.”
The ultimate irony is that Penn State, as part of the agreement, must give $60 million to Pennsylvania-based children’s charities. Charities a lot like the Pennsylvania-based one that Sandusky used to stalk, coerce and rape children.
Joe Paterno never had to publicly answer for covering up Sandusky’s sex crimes against children. He got lucky. He died.
Penn State is a cancerous institution, top to bottom, that should be shuttered. The Nittany Lions should have gotten the death penalty and never played NCAA football again. Jake Corman should be sharing a cell with Jerry Sandusky.
And Joe Paterno? He can rot where he lays.
