Sandusky’s Innocence Is Irrelevant: We Must Protect Penn State’s Honor

FR believes in giving differing viewpoints a chance to air. The guest view below makes some interesting points about the challenges that an imprisoned, innocent man, Jerry Sandusky, has faced for 12 years in the justice system.

Guest View

By Bernard ‘Scully’ Wilson

Jerry Sandusky is a convicted pedophile. Whether he is factually innocent or not is irrelevant.

It was settled 12 years ago with Sandusky’s indictment, the media’s verdict, and Penn State ousting its President Graham Spanier, Vice President Gary Shultz, Athletic Director Tim Curley, and head coach Joe Paterno, the latter by telephone (not in person).

The die was cast in November 2011.

Fast Judge

Just seven months later – by June 2012 – Sandusky was tried and convicted.

It was a feat by Judge John Cleland, who would deny a continuance request by the defense to study a mountain of evidence dropped at the last minute by calculating prosecutors.

Judge Cleland used the argument of a speedy trial (constitutionally a defendant’s right) against the defendant Sandusky to rush the trial.

Judge Cleland, by his actions, denied the defendant the right to timely disclosure of discovery evidence, and, by his inaction, the right to disclosure of exculpatory evidence.

Prosecutor Judge John Cleland had one goal: convict Sandusky in time to salvage the 2012 Penn State football season. Only a speedy conviction would placate the NCAA—that and payment of large fines.

This plus significant payments to lawyers and perforce the pretend victims.

Accusers would be compensated without vetting, so long as they had prominent attorneys.

And don’t forget Louis Freeh.

Eight Stories Fall Apart Under Scrutiny

The amount Penn State paid them follows their names.

Higher Learning

Penn State, as an institution of “higher learning,” does not have the luxury of being perceived to have been caught displaying lower learning.

When that perception occurred in 2011, the trustees at Penn State did not seek the truth, justice or due process.

Chairman of the Board John Surma, the US Steel executive who led the public firing of Paterno, held a deep grudge against the coach.

The institution suffered indignity and financial penalties with the “Sandusky scandal.” The institution was exonerated by the payment of more than $200 million, Sandusky’s life imprisonment, Spanier, Shultz, and Curley’s short-term imprisonment, and Paterno’s disgrace and obligingly prompt death.

Revisiting Sandusky on the grounds that Penn State paved the road for an innocent man to be convicted would be inviting a scandal worse than the first.

Under Penn State’s current leadership of President Neeli Bendapudi, looking back and examining errors is unthinkable.

Perjury Preordained

It was a perjury-laden trial, but the Attorney General’s office granted the eight accusers de facto immunity. But was it perjury when everyone, from the judge to the prosecutors, knew it would be a show trial?

Remember the Shower Boy

It was Governor Tom Corbett who paved the way with his hue and cry, “Remember the little boy in the shower!”

There was no boy in the shower.

His apprentices at the Attorney General’s office recognized this, which is why they:

1. Converted Mike McQueary’s grand jury testimony into grand jury minutes, which falsely claimed he testified he witnessed Sandusky raping a boy of 10. However, he actually did not testify he saw rape.

2. Illegally leaking the altered characterization of grand jury testimony to a friendly reporter.

1. Correcting a problem with the law of physics by adding a stool on a sketch used as an exhibit to show the jury the layout of the Penn State showers.

Sandusky allegedly raped an unknown boy – whose existence, according to prosecutor Joe McGettigan, was only known to God.

Sandusky, at 6’1”, could hardly be standing in the shower raping a 10-year-old boy, who, if he was anywhere near average height, would have been four and a half feet tall.

Solution: invent a stool.

No Need to Revisit Sandusky Matter

All this is true, but it is irrelevant.

It would be devastating to the PA Attorney General’s office if it had to backtrack and admit it was wrong.  This would lead to reputational damage and, as some privately argue, give defense lawyers the ability to use the PA Attorney General’s false conviction of Sandusky to fool jurors by comparing their clients to Sandusky.

Innocence Is Not Paramount

The price we pay for a safe society is to occasionally put innocent men in prison. It is better that 10 innocent men are found guilty than one guilty man goes free.

Why?

A guilty man going free will commit additional crimes that harm more victims. In addition, the effect of a guilty man being found innocent will inspire others to commit similar crimes.

Konstas Dreamt Up Motives, Others Dreamt Up Crimes

Based on the evidence at trial, Sandusky is innocent of abusing the eight men the Commonwealth brought forward as boy victims.

Except for Zachary Konstas, who imagined a motive that likely did not exist for a hug, the other seven accusers clearly lied about the abuse or extent of it.

Konstas, who only created a Sandusky motive, but did not invent Sandusky conduct, received the lowest compensation at $1.5 million. The seven fiction tellers, however, received from $3.25 million to $20 million from Penn State.

Lubert Shines Dimly

This low payment to Konstas cannot be entirely blamed on his choice of an attorney, Kenneth Suggs, who had no standing with the man who insinuated himself into the payment plan, Penn State trustee Ira Lubert.

Lubert, as a representative of the institution of higher learning, gave millions to perjurers and their suborning attorneys. Lubert signaled to attorneys that the truth was irrelevant.

A feeding trough of unrivaled proportions was waiting for those who knew enough to remember the man who filled the trough and made it comfortable to dine there.

Ancient History

The Commonwealth of PA won’t admit wrongdoing.

Mr. Parlato, you’re wise enough to know this. You will not succeed.
Sandusky must die in prison, an innocent man whom the public must believe is guilty.

Many are surprised he lasted this long in prison. He is 80.

The major players in this legal drama have long waited for his demise to close this uncomfortable conviction.

I wager the entire Pennsylvania judiciary knows Sandusky is factually innocent, or at least he got nowhere near due process.

It’s too late now

Consider the plight of the Commonwealth, Mr. Parlato.

Have you calculated the damage to Pennsylvania’s judicial system’s reputation if it erred on the highest-profile case of this century?

It will also cost Penn State more than the first time—in lost enrollment and other collateral damage – if the public became aware of Sandusky’s innocence.

Appeals Smeals

Mr. Parlato, I know you are not that naive to think that the appellate system will do anything more than bolster the presumption of justice.

The presumption of justice gives confidence to the subjects of the Commonwealth. The occasional reversal of a trial verdict on appeal for an inconsequential case is good for public perception, much like the occasional small winner at a casino is good for the gaming business all around.

The reversal of Sandusky’s conviction would, to use the casino analogy, bankrupt the house.

One 80-year-old man’s life is not worth the damage you are trying to inflict on the Commonwealth.

Sandusky is supposedly a believer in God and in divine rewards and punishments. He must await his reward – if God does exist – until judgment day, just as those who participated in his conviction must face their final punishment.

For now, their roles are reversed.

The plight of Sandusky is like the sacrifice of humans in the golden past as offerings to appease men and gods, to preserve the foundations of power and reinforce our social hierarchies.

Though Sandusky is innocent, how many molesters chose not to commit the offenses he was falsely convicted of? A high-profile conviction is good for maintaining order. This cannot be accomplished by convicting a low-level molester, but by convicting a saint and getting the public to condone the conviction and condemn the saint as a monster.

Our entire system depends on it.

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