Paterno's disgraceful legacy
Yael T. AbouhalkahThe facts are out, and deceased Penn State football coach Joe Paterno now stands convicted in the public eyes of protecting a child abuser.
That’s the most sobering finding coming out in news stories about former FBI director and federal Judge Louis Freeh’s report, released today.
Freeh and his investigators found critical evidence that Paterno and top leaders of Penn State University protected assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky rather than the children he was sexually abusing years ago.
The men in question - Paterno, ex-President Graham Spanier, athletic director Tim Curley and former senior vice president Gary Schultz - were named over and over by Freeh as having failed the children who got entrapped in Sandusky’s web of abuse.
The stories about Paterno today keep referring to him as a “Hall of Fame” football coach.
Yes, that’s what he was on the field. You could even say he was a leader of fine young men, as many have claimed in his defense.
He was also a person who protected a monster in Jerry Sandusky, and now that’s part of his disgraceful legacy.
Here’s one of the most damning parts of the whole disgusting episode, from The New York Times story circulating today:
“For Paterno, one of the most damning implications of the Freeh investigation involves the university’s handling of a 2001 report of Sandusky sexually attacking a 10-year-old boy in the football building’s shower.
“A graduate assistant had witnessed the assault, and reported in person to Paterno the next day. Paterno said he would figure out how to handle the alarming report, and inform his superiors. The Freeh investigation suggests that the university’s senior administrators were prepared to formally report Sandusky to state authorities, but that Paterno persuaded them to do otherwise.”
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