When Politics Took the Field: Pressure, Power, and the Collapse of Due Process

This is the sixth of a series.

By John Atwell Moody

Governors, Grandstanding, and Grief: When Politics Replaced Protection

Not to blame anyone, but during the disspiriting, literally endless wild goose chase for abuse, the child turned forever to actual drugs, to actual real physical drugs, and died of an overdose. Paterno too, not knowingly ill beforehand, died very soon after his public condemnation and termination by his board of trustees whom, Ganim observed, included the State Governor as an active member. Public pressure on McQueary also came directly from the State Governor who released news that McQueary failed to “meet a moral obligation.”

I needn’t even mention the Linda Kelly press conference which used the word ‘allegedly’ once at the beginning, followed by a litany of supposed crimes and criminals and asked the public to augment the list by phoning the investigators on 814-863-1053 or state police on 814 470 2238 where they “have made it abundantly clear to everyone at both of our agencies we are determined to quickly respond to any new witnesses or any additional information that may appear.”

While saying this, Linda Kelly might possibly be slightly shaking as though experiencing either rage or stage fright. A person making really important life-or-death decisions doesn’t always need to be flustered or upset. It’s hard to see how a retrospective of the 40 or 50 year history of an old man’s involvement with a university can create a sudden emergency, where it is on the news, where people from outside have to contact the emergency hotline with new information. Particularly, it said, about one witness they are desperately searching for.

If the, really, absurdly inexplicable pressure is what diverted drugs officers from what they should have been doing, providing understanding and support about their kids’ drug use, into wasting all their time canvassing for — what was so crazy — one particular elusive abuse witness, then Ganim’s question about the culpability of the governor might have had an extensive answer.

On the other hand, it is known that the governor actively supported Second Mile, maybe the charity should have had an improved drugs outreach, it may have been dificult to govern from a distance, no one is perfect, and our own analysis from even greater distance could be misleading or just wrong.

Memories Scheduled for Delivery: How Matt Sandusky Was Told He’d Remember Later

What I’m converging on is, although that same always-intentionally-inaccurate lawyer said that Jerry had abused Matt, actually in the tape recorded police interview that was leaked, what changed is, not that Matt started saying that he started remembering abuse, but rather, whereas all along Matt had said Jerry never touched him inappropriately in any way, now one little thing has changed. His recollections haven’t changed.

But what he says on the new tape recorded police interview is that he still has no recollection of any oral or anal sex at this time. 

What has changed in the last three words, and this makes a lot of sense, is that the lawyer is assuring Matt that the reason Jerry is guilty is that although Matt still, as always, has absolutely no recollections of abuse, the lawyer’s misguided therapist already knows things Matt has not yet started to remember, and she knows that Matt will remember them later on, in a subsequent meeting, which the lawyer has scheduled for him. Like for Sinisi, this is the crucial second meeting where “Do you remember X?” “No,” is scheduled to transform into “Guess what. I remember X.”

We can imagine what would have happened if McGettigan and Amendola had allowed Matt to prevail. Matt descending on the trial with his Mark Twain style of wisdom, explaining to McGettigan and the jury about how the lawyer explained that the way he knows Sandusky is definitely guilty is because memories which Matt does not have are going to start arriving the next time the lawyer will bring him to see the therapist.

If you remember about Simcisko, the incidental touching, and the things Simcisko was about to say when McGettigan interrupted his digression about porn videos, they also came from that same misguided lawyer.

That same lawyer was Simcisko’s lawyer and that same misguided therapist was Simcisko’s therapist. McGettigan understood that a witness becoming confused or vulnerable after instructing an unreliable civil lawyer still deserves to be heard.

As I mentioned, years after the trial, Ziegler finally organized for Dillen to act as the sort-of double agent to infiltrate into this law firm, but Matt had done that already on day one. Yet because McGettigan was rightfully wary about letting that strange lawyer influence justice, the only thing that anyone ever learned of Matt’s brilliance is the press reports from the lawyer saying Matt has accused his dad of abuse.

I sometimes wonder, why did Matt persist once the trial was lost? When he never got to be the star of the big show about his Dad getting proven innocent, why did he persist with something so much worse? Perhaps if he’d just joined the thousands of young kids who said Sandusky is innocent, that would have no effect.

The police, when they interviewed 600 second mile kids, mainly got kids saying he’s a great role model and a nice person, and their report says that. For Matt to join those ranks, to increase the number of supporters by one, would be ineffective.

To Be Continued…

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