New Report Concludes That Penn State and the NCAA Rushed to Judgment Against Joe Paterno

It is unfortunate and sad--tragic, really--that the general public is quick to believe the worst about a person, particularly when the person in question lived a life characterized by integrity. Joe Paterno's distinguished coaching career at Penn State not only produced great football teams but--much more importantly--it produced great citizens. Paterno's name has been dragged through the mud by opportunists who are eager to find a scapegoat for the gross mishandling of the Jerry Sandusky case and Paterno is the perfect scapegoat because he is deceased and thus unable to defend his good name by speaking for himself. In Joe Paterno's Legacy I concluded:

Hopefully, with the passage of time cooler heads will prevail and Paterno will be remembered first and foremost for the "Grand Experiment" (the Big Ten Conference could make one move in that direction by reversing the hasty decision to remove Paterno's name from the Conference's football championship trophy). Joe Paterno was a shining light in the increasingly murky cesspool of college sports.

After the release of the Freeh Report, few members of the media were willing to publicly speak up for Paterno but I expressed doubt about Freeh's harsh attack on Paterno's character:

In retrospect it is clear that Paterno should have taken a more active role in addressing the Sandusky allegations--Paterno himself expressed regret that he had not done more--but I still find it hard to believe that Paterno knowingly and deliberately covered up child abuse merely to avoid bad publicity for his football program.

A new report commissioned by the Paterno family but independently investigated by former Attorney General Richard Thornburgh, former FBI supervisory special agent/former state prosecutor James Clemente and Dr. Fred Berlin--an expert in sexual disorders and pedophilia at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and School of Medicine--raises serious questions about Freeh's methodology and conclusions.

Thornburgh explains the defects he and his fellow researchers found in Freeh's work: "The lack of factual support for the [Freeh report's] inaccurate and unfounded findings related to Mr. Paterno and its numerous process-oriented deficiencies call into question the credibility of the entire report. In my opinion, the Freeh report is seriously flawed, both with respect to the process of [its] investigation and its findings related to Mr. Paterno...There was just a rush to injustice."

You can read the entire Thornburgh/Clemente/Berlin report here.

You can read a brief summary of the report here.

NCAA's Penn State Sanctions are Disproportionate, Unfair and Hypocritical

"The sanctions announced by the NCAA today defame the legacy and contributions of a great coach and educator without any input from our family or those who knew him best. That the President, the Athletic Director and the Board of Trustees accepted this unprecedented action by the NCAA without requiring a full due process hearing before the Committee on Infractions is an abdication of their responsibilities and a breach of their fiduciary duties to the University and the 500,000 alumni."--Paterno family statement

Jerry Sandusky's sex abuse crimes are abhorrent and he deserves the severest possible penalty under the law--but even he deserved and received due process and his day in court. Sandusky received justice but his case has now shifted into a witch hunt that appears to be designed to consume and destroy the reputation and legacy of Joe Paterno. Paterno is an easy target because he is deceased and thus not able to defend himself and his actions/alleged actions. Although a Pennsylvania grand jury declined to charge Paterno and there is no direct evidence that Paterno knowingly covered up Sandusky's crimes, Paterno's name is being smeared based on the words "reasonable to conclude": the Freeh Report interviewed hundreds of people and reviewed over three million documents but failed to find a single proverbial "smoking gun" implicating Paterno. Instead, the Freeh Report engaged in some form of literary interpretation and determined that it would be, in Freeh's repeatedly stated words, "reasonable to conclude" that Paterno actively sought to cover up Sandusky's crimes--even dating back to a time when law enforcement authorities had investigated Sandusky and been unable to prove that Sandusky had in fact committed any crimes.

The accusations against Paterno simply do not make much sense; why would Paterno report Mike McQueary's allegations about Sandusky to Tim Curley and Gary Schultz if Paterno's primary motivation was to cover things up at all costs? Paterno has a well documented history of suspending players for even minor infractions and for emphasizing academics/integrity over wins. Paterno did not cover up or whitewash small, technical NCAA violations so why would he actively cover up heinous crimes? Paterno said that in retrospect he wishes that he had done more; it is reasonable to suggest that Paterno should have taken a more active role to ensure that his superiors properly handled the Sandusky matter but it is more than a bit of a reach to assert that Paterno deliberately covered up child sex abuse just so that he could win more football games.

Would you want the sum total worth of your life to be defined by what other people think is "reasonable to conclude" based on reading emails that you did not write and that were composed by people who currently are facing charges of perjury (former Penn State administrators Gary Schultz and Tim Curley)? There certainly appears to be plenty of direct evidence to implicate those two individuals; at the very least, decisions permanently affecting Paterno's legacy and status should wait until the Curley and Schultz trials hopefully shed more light on what exactly Paterno did and did not do.

The NCAA sanctions against Penn State are unprecedented. The NCAA fined Penn State $60 million, with those funds to be dedicated to an endowment to help child abuse victims. That is certainly a worthy endeavor, although it is not clear how it was decided what amount the fine should be or who specifically will bear that cost; if money is being taken away from the education of innocent Penn State students (as opposed to be taken away from people who actually committed crimes) then that is not right no matter how noble the cause is.

The NCAA also banned the Penn State football program from postseason play for four years, enforced scholarship reductions lasting for four years and placed the athletic department on probation for five years. Perhaps the most stunning decision is that the NCAA vacated 112 Penn State wins from 1998-2011, 111 of which had been credited to Paterno's personal record. The cumulative effect of these NCAA punishments hurts Paterno, his former players and current/future Penn State players but it does nothing to punish the men responsible for the actual crimes: Sandusky (whose fate correctly lies in the hands of the justice system), Curley and Schultz. Also left unscathed is former Penn State President Graham Spanier, who was heavily criticized in the Freeh Report but has not been charged with a crime and has vehemently denied that he knew about and covered up Sandusky's crimes.

The NCAA claims that it is acting so harshly against Penn State to make a statement proving that collegiate sports should never be elevated over academics and should not become "too big to fail" in the words of NCAA President Mark Emmert. Are we really supposed to believe that Penn State and Penn State alone stood for the worst of what college sports represents? Jerry Sandusky was a serial child sexual predator who manipulated and deceived his family, the people at the Second Mile charity and others around him but his crimes do not represent the totality of what Penn State stood for during Paterno's era; Paterno guided many players who became productive members of society and his teams were consistently successful on the field without committing violations off of the field. Instead of self-righteously singling out Penn State the NCAA should take down the entire bloated system that has essentially transformed college sports into minor leagues for football and basketball in which all of the profits go to the NCAA, the athletic departments and the coaches while the players are not paid anything other than scholarships. Why should college football and basketball coaches be the highest paid state employees in any state? Paterno ran his program with more integrity than just about anyone else--based on the documented record, not based on what someone decides it is "reasonable to conclude"--but if the NCAA feels that big time college sports are somehow inherently corrupt (which is certainly "reasonable to conclude" at this point) then Emmert and his cohorts should refund all of the television and sponsorship money that they receive and let some other organization take over minor league football and minor league basketball in this country while the NCAA sets up a new structure in which college sports consists entirely of intramural games that are not sources of billions of dollars in revenue.

The NCAA is a self-appointed judge, jury and executioner--but who judges the NCAA? The NCAA has a huge book filled with Byzantine rules that it enforces or fails to enforce solely at its own discretion, with no outside oversight. Big name programs like Miami (the infamous "U"), Oklahoma, Nebraska and others had endemic problems/crimes/violations yet their wins and championships have not been vacated; to cite just one example, Nebraska's sainted Coach Tom Osborne kept Lawrence Phillips on the team despite the fact that Phillips assaulted his girlfriend. Phillips ultimately played a major role when Nebraska won the 1995 national championship. Phillips has since faced numerous criminal charges and is currently serving a term of at least 26 years in prison for committing various assaults. Did Osborne, Nebraska and the NCAA ultimately do right by Phillips--coddling him instead of insisting that he be punished for his crimes and possibly get help for his anger issues--and his victims? Perhaps you say that Phillips' numerous assault cases are not as bad as Sandusky's child abuse crimes; well, what about murder? Is murder worse? In 2003, Baylor basketball player Carlton Dotson murdered his teammate Patrick Dennehy; the ensuing criminal and NCAA investigations turned up a host of crimes and NCAA violations committed by Coach Dave Bliss and other members of the coaching staff/athletic department. NCAA history is full of murder, mayhem, point shaving, academic fraud and grown men lining their pockets while taking advantage of the athletic talents of the young men in their charge, young men who often do not receive much academic, moral or social instruction during their college days.

The NCAA's swift and unprecedented action against Penn State and against Paterno's coaching record is not about justice or morality. This is really about two things: (1) public relations and (2) taking preemptive action to prevent lawsuits against the NCAA. The NCAA is a greedy and inherently corrupt organization that is more concerned about preserving its revenue streams than anything else.

Not only is the NCAA acting with breathtaking hypocrisy, it is doubtful that the NCAA's actions are legal. ESPN's Jay Bilas, a former Duke basketball player who is also a practicing attorney, says that the NCAA's actions set a precedent that the NCAA is "willing to violate its own rules and act without going through the normal course." Florida-based attorney Michael Buckner goes even further, telling ESPN's Mike Fish that what the NCAA did is "perhaps unconstitutional." Fish reports that Iowa attorney Jerry Crawford says that the NCAA made a "rush to judgment.'' Crawford adds, "I don't know any reason for the NCAA to feel they needed to rush in other than they were getting bullied in the court of public opinion, which they obviously didn't like. What I believe I know is Joe Paterno ran an NCAA sanction[ed] football program that didn't just play within the rules, but played well within the rules. Recruited good people. Got them educations. I thought it was a program the country needed to emulate, not ostracize.''

In Christopher Nolan's recently concluded Batman film trilogy, Batman takes the fall for Harvey Dent (the maniacal "Two Face") so that Dent can be viewed by Gotham's citizens as a hero and as a symbol for justice--but propagating that lie turned out to be very costly for all involved. Jerry Sandusky must be punished for his crimes and anyone who knowingly covered up his crimes should also be punished--but making Joe Paterno and the entire Penn State football program take the fall to supposedly prove the integrity of the NCAA is as bold a lie as saying that Batman is a criminal while Harvey Dent is a hero. Such lies always have dreadful consequences.

Freeh Report Condemns Penn State's Handling of Sandusky Case

The Freeh Report about the Jerry Sandusky child abuse case unilaterally condemns the university--including President Graham Spanier, top ranking officials Gary Schultz and Tim Curley, the Board of Trustees and football coach Joe Paterno--for completely failing to handle the matter appropriately and indeed covering up Sandusky's crimes instead of following federal laws requiring the reporting of accusations against Sandusky. The press release announcing the findings of the Freeh Report includes this statement that will likely forever alter how Penn State and Coach Paterno are viewed:

Our most saddening and sobering finding is the total disregard for the safety and welfare of Sandusky’s child victims by the most senior leaders at Penn State. The most powerful men at Penn State failed to take any steps for 14 years to protect the children who Sandusky victimized. Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley never demonstrated, through actions or words, any concern for the safety and well-being of Sandusky’s victims until after Sandusky's arrest.

When the information about the Sandusky case initially became publicly known last November and the Penn State Board of Trustees reacted swiftly by firing Coach Paterno without even meeting with him, I felt that Paterno was being made into a scapegoat for others' failures. Obviously, if it is true that Paterno clearly knew about Sandusky's criminal actions and participated in a cover-up--as the Freeh Report alleges--then it was correct to fire Paterno. Unfortunately, Paterno became ill and passed away before Freeh's investigators could interview him--and Freeh himself said that he believed that Paterno intended to fully cooperate with the investigation if his health had permitted him to do so. Freeh and his associates reviewed over 3 million documents/emails and conducted more than 430 interviews but--while it is easily confirmed that Spanier, Curley and Schultz directly acted to conceal evidence of Sandusky's crimes--it seems that the main evidence against Paterno is circumstantial: Freeh interpreted the contents of various emails to mean that Paterno had urged Penn State officials--Paterno's superiors, it must be emphasized--to handle the Sandusky matter internally instead of reporting it to outside authorities. Even if that is true--and there is no "smoking gun" that confirms this interpretation of events--the Penn State President and the university's other leaders had a legal and moral obligation to report the allegations about Sandusky to the proper authorities. The idea that Paterno was more concerned about bad publicity than doing the right thing is belied by the high standards that Paterno set for himself and his football program for several decades. In retrospect it is clear that Paterno should have taken a more active role in addressing the Sandusky allegations--Paterno himself expressed regret that he had not done more--but I still find it hard to believe that Paterno knowingly and deliberately covered up child abuse merely to avoid bad publicity for his football program.

Whether Paterno passively let matters take their course or took an active role in Penn State's deplorable handling of the Sandusky case, this is a sad day not just in college football history but in the history of American sports. If Paterno's "Grand Experiment" is in fact tainted then what hope is there for the future of amateur athletics as a positive force in our society? The influx of big money into amateur athletics has perhaps had an irredeemably corrupting influence; that statement is not meant to justify anything that Paterno failed to do but rather to indicate that if even someone who--over the course of several decades--proved himself to be a fundamentally decent and morally upright person could not stay on the right path then perhaps the entire culture of amateur athletics is inherently corrupt. It is simply inexcusable for the football coach to be the most powerful figure on any college campus--and it is indisputable that this is the case, in practice if not in theory, on many, many college campuses.

Here is a statement from the Paterno family regarding the Freeh Report:

We are in the process of reviewing the Freeh report and will need some time before we can comment in depth on its findings and conclusions. From the moment this crisis broke, Joe Paterno supported a comprehensive, fair investigation. He always believed, as we do, that the full truth should be uncovered.

From what we have been able to assess at this time, it appears that after reviewing 3 million documents and conducting more than 400 interviews, the underlying facts as summarized in the report are almost entirely consistent with what we understood them to be. The 1998 incident was reported to law enforcement and investigated. Joe Paterno reported what he was told about the 2001 incident to Penn State authorities and he believed it would be fully investigated. The investigation also confirmed that Sandusky's retirement in 1999 was unrelated to these events.

One great risk in this situation is a replaying of events from the last 15 years or so in a way that makes it look obvious what everyone must have known and should have done. The idea that any sane, responsible adult would knowingly cover up for a child predator is impossible to accept. The far more realistic conclusion is that many people didn't fully understand what was happening and underestimated or misinterpreted events. Sandusky was a great deceiver. He fooled everyone--law enforcement, his family, coaches, players, neighbors, university officials, and everyone at Second Mile.

Joe Paterno wasn't perfect. He made mistakes and he regretted them. He is still the only leader to step forward and say that with the benefit of hindsight he wished he had done more. To think, however, that he would have protected Jerry Sandusky to avoid bad publicity is simply not realistic. If Joe Paterno had understood what Sandusky was, a fear of bad publicity would not have factored into his actions.

We appreciate the effort that was put into this investigation. The issue we have with some of the conclusions is that they represent a judgment on motives and intentions and we think this is impossible. We have said from the beginning that Joe Paterno did not know Jerry Sandusky was a child predator. Moreover, Joe Paterno never interfered with any investigation. He immediately and accurately reported the incident he was told about in 2001.

It can be argued that Joe Paterno should have gone further. He should have pushed his superiors to see that they were doing their jobs. We accept this criticism. At the same time, Joe Paterno and everyone else knew that Sandusky had been repeatedly investigated by authorities who approved his multiple adoptions and foster children. Joe Paterno mistakenly believed that investigators, law enforcement officials, university leaders and others would properly and fully investigate any issue and proceed as the facts dictated.

This didn't happen and everyone shares the responsibility.

Members of Penn State's Board Attempt to Justify Abrupt Paterno Firing

There has been mounting criticism of the manner and swiftness with which the Penn State Board of Trustees fired Coach Joe Paterno, so 13 of the 32 members of that Board spoke with The New York Times to try to justify their actions. It has almost been an afterthought that prior to firing Paterno the Board also fired Penn State President Graham Spanier but it should be abundantly clear why that decision was not in any way controversial: Spanier kept the Board largely uninformed about the grand jury investigation of former Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky for multiple charges of child abuse and then when the story became public Spanier immediately issued a statement defending Athletic Director Tim Curley and one of the school's former Vice Presidents, Gary Schultz; the grand jury charged Curley and Schultz with failing to report Sandusky's alleged crimes to the authorities and with committing perjury when testifying to the grand jury.

Whether or not Spanier, Curley and Schultz are criminally guilty, it is obvious that Penn State should want to sever ties with those men. However, the grand jury found Joe Paterno's testimony to be credible and the grand jury concluded that Paterno fulfilled his responsibilities by informing Curley and Schultz--who was then in charge of, among other things, Penn State's campus police--about what Mike McQueary had told him regarding Sandusky's suspicious conduct with a young boy in the Penn State locker room shower area. McQueary did not explicitly tell Paterno that Sandusky had committed sexual assault and thus Paterno understandably turned the matter over to his superiors with the expectation that they would take whatever action was appropriate and necessary. The fact that Curley and Schultz failed to do so is why the grand jury indicted both men.

Paterno has a sterling record not just as a field general but also as a contributor--both in the literal sense of financial contributions and also in the sense of the standards he set for his players--to the Penn State community. Scientists often say that extraordinary theoretical claims require extraordinary proof; that kind of standard should have been applied when the Board of Trustees met to decide Paterno's fate: firing Paterno would place a large taint on his good name and such a decision should not be taken lightly or made hastily. The 2011 football season was almost over and it was pretty obvious that Paterno's physical condition would not permit him to coach the team much longer. Rather than publicly disgracing a man who had served so well for so long, the Board could have and should have permitted Paterno to finish out the season before retiring. Instead, the Board took the quick and easy path, dismissing Paterno with a dismissive phone call; the Board members were too cowardly to even deliver the news face to face.

It is easy for people to say that if they had been in Paterno's shoes they would have handled the situation better. For instance, several ESPN employees made that assertion on the air but their commentaries ring hollow in light of the fact that ESPN and other media outlets suppressed for nearly a decade an audio tape Bernie Fine accuser Bobby Davis made of Fine's wife admitting knowledge of Fine's homosexual/pedophilic proclivities and activities. Unlike ESPN, Paterno did not cover up anything; McQueary made a vague report of alleged improprieties to Paterno and Paterno immediately informed his superiors about what McQueary had said. Sandusky was not a member of Paterno's coaching staff at that time and there really is nothing more that Paterno could have or should have done. On what basis could Paterno have gone to the police based on what he knew? It was up to Curley and Schultz to investigate the situation and decide upon an appropriate course of action. Perhaps Paterno should have followed up with Curley and Schultz to find out what they did but I suspect that Paterno had a great degree of misplaced trust that those men would handle things the right way.

The Penn State Board of Trustees was asleep at the switch for a long time and when the Sandusky charges woke them up they decided to make Paterno a high profile scapegoat for their own inadequacies and for the allegedly criminal conduct of two men (Curley and Schultz) employed by their university.

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Further Reading:

Cowardly Lions: Penn State Acted Slowly on Sandusky Allegations but Swiftly Made Paterno a Scapegoat (November 10, 2011)

Christine Flowers Blasts Penn State for Hastily Firing Joe Paterno (November 11, 2011)

Joe Posnanski Criticizes the Media's Coverage of the Sandusky Scandal (November 11, 2011)

Bernie Fine Case Reveals Double Standards

As soon as the grand jury released its report about alleged pedophile Jerry Sandusky, ESPN and other media outlets essentially formed a lynch mob demanding Joe Paterno's head, a demand that the Penn State Board of Trustees eagerly met; while the media applauded the Board of Trustees' action, the Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office was less than impressed: spokesman Nils Hagen-Frederiksen said, "We have a cooperating witness [Paterno], an individual who testified, provided truthful testimony but two others who were found by a grand jury to commit perjury whose legal expenses are being paid for university. One is on administrative leave. Very interesting development. It's certainly curious and [has] not been explained yet. Speaking as a prosecuting agency, we have a cooperating witness who has not been charged, while two individuals accused of committing crimes continue to be affiliated."

Sandusky had not been on Coach Paterno's staff for more than a decade by the time the grand jury report came out--but Syracuse assistant basketball coach Bernie Fine was literally Jim Boeheim's right hand man for the past 36 years, during which time Fine allegedly abused at least three children, including two Syracuse ball boys. While Paterno expressed sympathy for Sandusky's alleged victims and remorse that he had not been able to do more--even though the grand jury found that Paterno had not committed any wrongdoing--Boeheim called Fine's accusers money-hungry liars while sanctimoniously declaring, "I'm not Joe Paterno. Somebody didn't come and tell me Bernie Fine did something and I'm hiding it. I know nothing. If I saw some reason not to support Bernie, I would not support him. If somebody showed me a reason, proved that reason, I would not support him. But until then, I'll support him until the day I die." Boeheim certainly is "not Joe Paterno"--Paterno has a much better resume as an educator, philanthropist and coach than Boeheim does. There is also no indication that Paterno had direct knowledge of Sandusky's conduct, while at least one of Fine's accusers states that Boeheim saw him staying in Fine's hotel room on the road (it is unusual for ball boys to travel with a team, let alone stay in the same hotel room with an assistant coach).

After the evidence against Fine piled up--including a tape of Fine's wife admitting that she knew about Fine's conduct--Syracuse fired Fine on Sunday and Boeheim went into a full backpedal, apologizing for attacking the integrity of Fine's accusers and stating that victims of abuse should not hesitate to come forward. It is not yet clear exactly what Boeheim knew about Fine's alleged misconduct but Boeheim certainly was in a greater position to know about what Fine was doing--and had a greater responsibility to keep tabs on his right hand man--than Paterno was in position to know about the actions of someone who had not been on his staff for more than 10 years. I am not saying that Boeheim should be fired but at the very least he should be formally reprimanded for the irresponsible comments he made right after the Fine investigation became publicized; obviously, if any evidence comes to light that Boeheim in any way covered up for Fine then Boeheim should be fired (I have the same opinion about Paterno--the reason I object to his firing is that Paterno was fired without any evidence that he did anything wrong).

Meanwhile, the same ESPN that littered the airwaves with high-minded commentary about Paterno's supposed moral failings suppressed for nearly a decade the tape that Fine accuser Bobby Davis made of Fine's wife admitting knowledge of Fine's homosexual/pedophilic proclivities and activities. Why didn't ESPN turn that tape over to the authorities? How many children did Fine abuse after ESPN had reason to believe that he is a sexual predator? ESPN and other media outlets insisted that Paterno deserved to be immediately fired even though a grand jury found that he committed no wrongdoing and had no knowledge of Sandusky's conduct; applying that reasoning, how many ESPN executives and reporters should be immediately fired for not alerting the police about the Davis tape?

Joe Posnanski Criticizes the Media's Coverage of the Sandusky Scandal

The most striking thing about ESPN's seemingly around the clock coverage of the Sandusky Scandal is that Jerry Sandusky's name is hardly mentioned at all. ESPN and other media outlets have made Joe Paterno the face of this scandal--and Penn State's Board of Trustees piled on by unceremoniously firing Paterno instead of letting him retire after his contract expired at the end of this season.

Joe Posnanski, who has been working on a biography of Paterno for the past two years, strongly believes that the voracious appetite of the 24 hour news cycle has unfairly chewed up and spit out the good name of a fundamentally decent man. Here is an excerpt from Posnanski's take on Paterno's firing:

I’m not saying I know Joe Paterno. I’m saying I know a whole lot about him.

And what I know is complicated. But, beyond complications--and I really believe this with all my heart--there’s this, and this is exclusively my opinion: Joe Paterno has lived a profoundly decent life.

Nobody has really wanted to say this lately, and I grasp that. The last week has obviously shed a new light on him and his program--a horrible new light--and if you have any questions about how I feel about all that, please scroll back up to my two points at the top.

But I have seen some things in the last few days that have felt rotten, utterly wrong--a piling on that goes even beyond excessive, a dancing on the grave that makes me ill. Joe Paterno has lived a whole life. He has improved the lives of countless people...

I am sickened, absolutely sickened, that some of those people whose lives were fundamentally inspired and galvanized by Joe Paterno have not stepped forward to stand up for him this week, have stood back and allowed him to be painted as an inhuman monster who was only interested in his legacy, even at the cost of the most heinous crimes against children imaginable.

Shame on them.

And why? I’ll tell you my opinion: Because they were afraid. And I understand that. A kind word for Joe Paterno in this storm is taken by many as a pro vote for a child molester. A quick, “Wait a minute, Joe Paterno is a good man. Let’s see what happened here” is translated as an attempt to minimize the horror of what Jerry Sandusky is charged with doing. It takes courage to stand behind someone you believe in when it’s this bad outside. It takes courage to stand up for a man in peril, even if he stood up for you...

...the way Joe Paterno has lived his life has earned him something more than instant fury, more than immediate assumptions of the worst, more than the happy cheers of critics who have always believed that there was something phony about the man and his ideals. He deserves what I would hope we all deserve--for the truth to come out, or, anyway, the closest thing to truth we can find.

I don’t think Joe Paterno has gotten that. And I think that’s sad.

Christine Flowers Blasts Penn State for Hastily Firing Joe Paterno

When I criticized Penn State's Board of Trustees for firing Joe Paterno I realized that I was swimming against a tidal wave of public opinion but I simply felt that someone has to speak truth to power regardless of how controversial that stance might be; no matter how many people say otherwise, it is not justified to fire Joe Paterno without clear cause nor does that summary action realistically bring comfort to Jerry Sandusky's alleged victims. It is heartening to find that at least one other writer is not afraid to speak an unpopular truth: a Philadelphia Daily News column by Christine Flowers brilliantly makes it clear that it is possible--and indeed quite reasonable--to feel full compassion for Sandusky's alleged victims while also believing that Penn State's Board of Trustees acted in a cowardly and disgraceful fashion toward Paterno. Flowers' entire piece is worth reading but her conclusion is particularly stirring:

I'm seething with anger that Penn State decided to fire Paterno before letting the legal system wind its way through the normal processes. This is a man who gave unerringly of himself to the college, who built Penn State and who didn't deserve to be kicked to the side of the road for appearances sake.

Was it too much to ask for a little introspection before trashing his legacy?

It's not a simple case of blind loyalty, nor does it mean that we're ignoring the plight of the abused kids. Clearly, there is evidence that heinous crimes were committed. But, why is it only when the accuser is a child or a woman that the usual presumption of "innocent until proven guilty" is exchanged for "hang 'em high"?

And the fact that the board of trustees didn't even have the decency to tell the greatest coach of the last half-century, in person, that he was being fired is a disgusting example of cowardice.

Pliny once wrote, "It is generally much more shameful to lose a good reputation than never to have acquired it."

JoePa definitely acquired it. But the shame is ours.

The Penn State Board of Trustees claims to be acting in the best interests of Penn State University and most media members are blindly parroting that idea but the Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office--which presumably knows more about this case than ESPN's talking heads and the various other commentators who apparently delight in bashing Paterno--has a completely different take: spokesman Nils Hagen-Frederiksen said, "We have a cooperating witness [Paterno], an individual who testified, provided truthful testimony but two others who were found by a grand jury to commit perjury whose legal expenses are being paid for university. One is on administrative leave. Very interesting development. It's certainly curious and [has] not been explained yet. Speaking as a prosecuting agency, we have a cooperating witness who has not been charged, while two individuals accused of committing crimes continue to be affiliated."

The way that Penn State has handled this entire matter is a joke but not a very funny one. Why did Penn State muzzle Paterno (by cancelling his regularly scheduled news conference prior to firing him), not bring forth any administrator to publicly speak about the scandal and then send out interim head coach Tom Bradley to face questions that he cannot--and should not have to--answer? What possible sense does it make to fire Paterno and yet retain the services of Mike McQueary, the person who witnessed--and did nothing to stop--a criminal act? Why did Penn State initially indicate that McQueary would be on the sidelines during Saturday's Nebraska game and only after much public outcry then switch gears and say that--allegedly for his own protection--McQueary would not in fact be on the sidelines? If the idea behind firing Paterno was to prevent the Nebraska game from becoming an unseemly spectacle it is fair to say that the Board of Trustees completely failed--and that this failure was quite foreseeable.

The Board of Trustees acted with but one goal in mind--turning Paterno into the public face of and scapegoat for the Sandusky Scandal; the Board is despicable and most of the media coverage of Paterno's firing is equally despicable.

Cowardly Lions: Penn State Acted Slowly on Sandusky Allegations but Swiftly Made Paterno a Scapegoat

Penn State University officials acted very slowly regarding allegations that former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky sexually abused children--so slowly, in fact, that two high ranking Penn State officials have been charged with perjury and with failing to report child abuse. Now that Sandusky faces a 40 count indictment, Penn State has decided to act quickly--not to punish the aforementioned two officials but to zero in on the biggest name tangentially associated with this case and transform him into the scapegoat for the university's sins. Joe Paterno, the winningest coach in major college football history and a respected figure with an exemplary record on and off the field during his 46 year tenure as the face and voice of Penn State Nittany Lions football, was unceremoniously fired on Wednesday night via a hastily arranged phone call. The 84 year old Paterno, whose name scarcely appears in the 23 page Grand Jury report about Sandusky and who was absolved of any wrongdoing--unlike former Penn State Athletic Director Timothy Curley and former Penn State Senior Vice President Gary Schultz--offered to retire at the end of this season (when his contract expires) but rather than allow the legend to bow out gracefully the Board of Trustees shamed and embarrassed a man who has devoted his life not just to the school's football program but also to upgrading the school's academics.

Above and beyond Paterno's numerous on-field accomplishments, Paterno donated and raised tens of millions of dollars for Penn State's library and for the school's various colleges/academic departments. Paterno certainly valued winning but he emphasized doing things the right way; he suspended star players Curtis Enis and Joe Jurevicius for the 1998 Citrus Bowl for infractions that probably would have been ignored at most other big-time college programs. In 2000, Paterno caught some flak for not suspending starting quarterback Rashard Casey, who was charged with assault but later found not guilty. Those two snapshots from Paterno's career demonstrate his character: when he knew that star players had committed wrongdoings he kicked them off of the team even though that could have cost Penn State a big win but when he believed that his player was innocent he stood behind that player despite receiving a lot of very public and very harsh criticism. Jerry Sandusky, Timothy Curley and Gary Schultz have been charged with crimes but the Penn State Board of Trustees would like to turn Paterno into the public face of this scandal, make him the official scapegoat and then run him out of town, presumably carrying the bulk of the filth from this mess on his back.

The press conference announcing Paterno's firing was surreal. John P. Surma, the Board's vice chairman and the designated spokesman for the evening, could not provide one specific reason that Paterno had to be fired immediately. Surma admitted that he and the Board did not have all of the facts of the case and did not know anything beyond what appears in the Grand Jury's report. Surma would neither confirm nor deny that Penn State is paying the legal fees for Curley and Schultz. All Surma could do was mindlessly repeat the mantra that firing Paterno was "in the best interest" of Penn State University. That would certainly be true if, in fact, Paterno had committed a crime or if there were good reason to believe that he had been grossly negligent--but based on the publicly available information, it could be argued that the most that Paterno is guilty of is having too much faith in the ability/willingness of his superiors to properly handle the situation that he had brought to their attention, namely that (according to Paterno's testimony, which the Grand Jury found to be credible) in 2002 Mike McQueary had told Paterno that he saw Sandusky engaging in some kind of "horseplay" in a shower with a 10 year old boy. McQueary now says that he saw Sandusky sodomize the boy but there is no evidence or testimony that he communicated that important detail to Paterno; thus, Paterno immediately passed on what he knew--that McQueary had seen Sandusky conduct himself in a questionable manner--to Curley, who did not pursue the matter in 2002 and who provided testimony that the Grand Jury considered to be false. Why is there not more anger directed at McQueary? If McQueary, then a 28 year old adult, truly witnessed Sandusky sodomizing a boy in a shower why didn't McQueary immediately take physical action to prevent the crime and/or call the police? Surma indicated that no action has been taken to fire McQueary, who is now Penn State's recruiting coordinator/receivers coach. Why is it apparently so important to fire Paterno but not important to fire McQueary?

Much has been made by the media about Paterno's recent statement that he wishes he had done more but, as ESPN's Rece Davis astutely pointed out, the full quote from Paterno is that "in hindsight" Paterno wishes he had done more; Davis noted that there is a big difference between saying that in hindsight one wishes that one had done more and saying that one believes that he did not do enough based on what he knew at the time. I would hope that in hindsight each person associated with this sordid case wishes that he had done more but the Board of Trustees owed it to Paterno to let Paterno clearly state what he knew and when he knew it before just ending his career in such an impersonal and abrupt manner. Paterno wanted to answer questions about the Sandusky scandal but Penn State cancelled Paterno's regularly scheduled Tuesday press conference. Paterno abided by the university's wishes that he not speak publicly but that just seemed to make the situation worse; various media members took the absurd position that Paterno must be fired now because it would supposedly be an untenable situation for Paterno to answer questions about Sandusky for the first time after this Saturday's Nebraska game. Instead of cancelling Paterno's press conference and then firing him for not talking, wouldn't it make more sense to simply let Paterno talk? Unless, of course, the Board of Trustees is more interested in creating a scapegoat than really finding out exactly who was negligent back in 2002.

I don't care if people would be rioting to get Paterno fired or rioting for him to keep his job, the Board of Trustees should make decisions based on facts--not on emotion and not on perceived public relations/crisis management considerations. You don't fire a good man because this may create a favorable soundbite or reduce the media crush. The Board should have met with Paterno face to face and given him an opportunity to explain what he did or did not know and what he did or did not do regarding whatever McQueary told him in 2002. If Paterno could not satisfactorily explain his conduct then it certainly would make sense to fire him--but in the absence of clear evidence of Paterno's guilt or complicity how can the Board justify dismissing him without even giving any cause? In the absence of overwhelming evidence, decades of devoted service should not be obliterated by a brief, impersonal phone call. The sad, perverted irony is that Sandusky will get more of an opportunity to plead his case in court than the Board of Trustees gave Paterno to salvage his good name.

I don't know if Sandusky is guilty of some or all of the heinous charges against him but has everyone forgotten the Duke lacrosse scandal and the Kobe Bryant case? Public opinion vociferously spoke out against the Duke lacrosse players and against Bryant but in both instances the criminal charges were ultimately dropped. Sandusky will get his day in court and it makes sense for Penn State to suspend or fire various officials who face criminal charges and/or clearly did not perform their basic duties but it is unfair and unjust to fire Paterno without ascertaining the basic facts--and Surma stated that the Board has not ascertained those basic facts.

Paterno's "Grand Experiment"--the idea that academic achievement, integrity and high level athletic accomplishment are not mutually exclusive goals at major colleges--has now ended with Penn State humiliating and betraying a man who made so many contributions not just to his football program but to his school. The Penn State Board of Trustees voted unanimously to immediately fire Paterno; I hope that they are damn sure that he is as culpable as everyone will assume him to be in the wake of the disgrace that they have heaped upon him and his good name, because terminating Paterno's career in this abrupt manner has placed a permanent stain on his legacy.

The stark reality is that Paterno is either a basically good man who has been taken down by a Board that has been pressuring him to retire off and on for several years or he is to some degree complicit in horrifying acts of abuse against defenseless children. In the absence of evidence to the contrary, I believe that the former is the case--but, regardless of what will come out in the ensuing days, weeks and months, Paterno's "Grand Experiment" has ended ignominiously and its demise may very well be the death knell for any hope of salvaging the integrity of collegiate sports: the whole infrastructure of major collegiate athletics needs to be reconfigured, most likely by reorganizing it as various minor leagues that are partially, if not completely, separated from the academic mission of our nation's universities; the unholy marriage of higher education with big-time sports seems to be irredeemably corrupt on multiple levels, resulting in an endless parade of scandals, criminal charges and broken lives.