Dr. Dranov, Notable Witness Pointing to Sandusky’s Innocence, Has Died at Age 80

One of the significant figures in the Sandusky Travesty, Dr. Jonathan Dranov, MD, died on July 3 at 80.

Dr. Dranov had a 47-year medical career in the State College area. He was one of the indicators of Jerry Sandusky’s innocence.

In 2011, the Pennsylvania Attorney General alleged that nine years earlier (2002), a graduate assistant and former football player, Mike McQueary, saw Sandusky rape an unknown 10-year-old boy in the Penn State shower room and did nothing to stop it.

What is undisputed is that McQueary went to his father and Dr. Dranov that evening.

Allegedly, McQueary went to Paterno the next day to report the rape, though evidence showed he waited six weeks before seeing the head coach.

The prosecutors alleged McQuary claimed he saw rape and Paterno did nothing other than talk about it with his superiors.

In a Facebook post, the eminent Reverend Joseph Stains wrote:

ANOTHER GIANT PASSES.

By Rev. Joseph Stains

Dr. Jonathan Dranov was the only mandated reporter to interview the only accusatory eyewitness in the infamous Sandusky “rape of a 10-year-old boy” case, on the same night as the incident.

Under Dr. Dranov’s questioning, it was determined that assistant coach McQueary heard sounds that made him think of sex but saw only a calm-looking boy in a mirror for 1 1/2 seconds.

Three times, Dr. Dranov pointedly asked McQueary, “Did you see anything sexual?” Three times, McQueary answered, “No.” (McQueary responded the same way when Franco Harris confronted him with the same questions 11 years later.)

Dr. Dranov concluded that night that there was nothing to report. This is all in the public court record.

Few people seem aware that Sandusky was acquitted of this charge, the one for which he seems most infamous.

As one can tell from the obituary, Dr. Dranov was lauded for his accomplishments and legacy.

Yet Paterno, Spanier, Schultz, and Curley were smeared for “failure to report” the same incident.

Rest in peace, Dr. Dranov; you’ve earned it.

But something remains rotten in the state of Pennsylvania, and innocent people (and their families and associates) continue to bleed for it.”

Much Wrong with the Sandusky Prosecution

Some points to consider:

1. After the grand jury’s record was illegally leaked to the press, McQueary protested that the Attorney General misquoted him in the leak. He said he never said he saw Sandusky rape a boy.Deputy Attorney General Jonelle Eshbach replied by email: “I know a lot of this stuff is incorrect, and it is hard not to respond. But you can’t.”

   A rapist seeking privacy wouldn’t have lured his prey into a giant sports facility on a university campus of 45,000 students.

2.  At the trial, Sandusky’s attorney Karl Rominger asked Dr. Dranov: “Did he (McQueary) describe any particular sex act?” Karl Rominger asked Dranov. “No he did not,” Dranov answered.
3. McQueary changed his story so many times the Sandusky jury did not know what to believe. They acquitted Sandusky on the shower boy charge – the only one that involved Joe Paterno.
4. Though aware of Allan Myers’s claim that he was the boy McQueary had seen, prosecutor Joe McGettigan told the jury that the boy in the shower was “known to God but not to us.”
5.  The “shower boy” Allan Myers provided the best evidence of Sandusky’s blamelessness.  Myers, in 2011, was a twenty-four-year-old ex-Marine. The state police interviewed Myers on September 20, 2011, and in the words of the police report, he said, “at no time did Sandusky do anything that made him uncomfortable.”Myers also gave a sworn statement to Sandusky’s legal representatives: “….The grand jury report says that Coach McQueary said he observed Jerry and I engaged in sexual activity. That is not the truth and McQueary is not telling the truth. Nothing occurred that night in the shower.”
6. The prosecutors changed the date McQueary saw the shower incident from 2002 to 2001 to comport with the date McQueary saw Paterno.

Penn State fired Joe Paterno days after Sandusky’s indictment in November 2011 for his alleged mishandling of a child sex abuse allegation in 2002.

After Paterno’s death in January 2012, three university officials, including former Penn State President Graham Spanier, served short jail sentences on child endangerment charges. All three convictions were based on the prosecution’s version of McQueary story.

Yet, their stories and Dr. Jonathan Dranov, MD, said the same thing: McQueary said that nothing sexual happened.

Dr. Dranov of Boalsburg, PA, graduated from Chester High School in 1961, Penn State University in 1965, and the University of Pennsylvania Medical School in 1969. He completed his residency and fellowship at Duke University Medical School. In 1974, he moved to State College and started his practice in internal medicine and nephrology. He developed the region’s first dialysis unit and established Internal Medicine Associates of State College, which later became Centre Medical and Surgical Associates.

During his career, Dr. Dranov served as assistant chief of medical staff, board member of Mount Nittany Medical Center, and chair of its foundation. He also established a dialysis program and a lecture series for pre-med students and served on the Alumni Council.

He will be remembered in history as the man who gave truthful testimony that should have exonerated Jerry Sandusky, Joe Paterno, Graham Spanier, Gary Shultz and Tim Curley, who was ignored.

Frank Parlato

Frank Parlato is an investigative journalist, media strategist, publisher, and legal consultant.

Frank Parlato

Frank Parlato is an investigative journalist, media strategist, publisher, and legal consultant.

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