Friday, May 13

Legal Filing Confims PA Media's Agenda

Today's legal filing by various PA media outlets exposed that the media continues to ignore the facts of the Sandusky case -- because a Penn State scandal sells newspapers.

By
Ray Blehar

As concerned Penn State Alumni and supporters continue our efforts to inform the government, media, and child protection advocates that the focus on our University, the football program, and its former legendary coach will not fix Pennsylvania's broken child protection system, the media confirmed that it is only interested in writing stories that sell newspapers.

Today, the Harrisburg Patriot-News, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Philadelphia Inquirer, Daily News, and Philly.com (otherwise known as the PA Corruption Network's media arm -- minus the Pittsburgh Tribune Review) filed to have the records of the Sandusky settlements unsealed.


Their argument, as cited in media reports, exposed that they will not accept the fact (in spite of a Judge's ruling and mounds of evidence) that Sandusky's employment at Penn State was NOT a factor in his commission of crimes against children.   

The media should be the last people on the planet to be making any judgments from the evidence. 

A passage from the filing shown below proves my point follows (my emphasis added):

"Public interest in these proceedings is immense....may shed further needed light on a matter that is of serious public concern - sexual abuse of children over decades by an employee of the largest public university in the commonwealth."

Ruling: No Vicarious Liability
In November 2013, U.S. District Judge Court Judge Anita Brody  dismissed a count of “vicarious liability” against the university, ruling that Penn State cannot be held liable for Sandusky’s acts simply because he was an employee at the time.

Obviously, the legal teams of the Corruption Network's Media Arm must have missed that ruling or simply refuse to accept it.   And they refuse to accept the evidence from the Sandusky case that backs it.

Evidence
Sandusky's crimes continued after he left his employment with the University in 1998 and continued until 2009. There is no evidence of a crime being committed on the PSU campus after 2001 based on the Sandusky Bill of Particulars and the trial verdicts.  Therefore, there is no correlation or causation between his PSU employment, his emeritus status which he retained until 2011, and his commission of crimes against children.

The common thread running through all the confirmed cases of child sexual victimization/abuse from 1996 through 2009 was Sandusky's AND the victim's associations with THE SECOND MILE.  In fact, it's a perfect, positive correlation.

How long can the PA Corruption Network's media arm continue to ignore this?


Media Unfit

While I am all for getting the truth out in the open in the Sandusky scandal, it bears repeating that the media is the very LAST group of people who should be determining the validity of a settlement claim or to evaluate evidence.

This passage of the filing confirms that argument (my emphasis added).

"The information concerning when these acts occurred, the circumstances surrounding them, and the evidence in support of these claims, or lack thereof, must be made public. Allowing these records to be made public will quell rumormongering and unfounded conjecture."

Starting last Thursday night, the media has done nothing but write stories based on uncorroborated information.  The media stoked the rumormongering and conjecture.  Giving the media the information will cause even more of it.

Next, PSU President Barron stated the claims in Judge Glazer's legal filing were uncorroborated.  There was no evidence used in the vetting process.   That was obvious because statements made by claimants after the settlements were inconsistent with their trial testimony.  In other words, the legal team of Feinberg Rozen didn't do the minimum to vet the claims. 

The media also states it must know when these acts occurred and circumstances surrounding them so they can be assessed.  The 1971 story is proof that the media is unable to assess the validity information.  Neither the author nor the media overall revealed the ability to critically think about the allegations made by the phony victim and his collaborator.

1971 Story Not Credible

The allegations made in the 1971 story were only credible to people who had:
1. NO knowledge of the Sandusky trial evidence;
2. NO knowledge of when Sandusky founded THE SECOND MILE charity;
3. NO knowledge of when Sandusky was employed at PSU; and
4. NO understanding of PARENTING.

Point 1: Sandusky was an acquaintance offender.  This is the most important fact ignored by the media.  He befriended his victims. He was not what was known as a "stranger danger" offender.

Point 2: Sandusky formed THE SECOND MILE in 1977.  As such, the phony 1971 victim's claims that Paterno didn't act because of "all the good things" that Sandusky had done doesn't hold water.

Point 3: Given that Sandusky joined the PSU football staff in 1969, was a young assistant in 1971, and had no history of charitable work, the idea that Paterno dismissed the complaint also doesn't hold water.  

Please recall that in 2012, the media believed that Sandusky was forced to retire in 1999 due to the 1998 unfounded child abuse complaint.  So a thirty year assistant gets immediately fired but a two year newbie doesn't.

Consistency? Bueller?  Bueller?

Point 4: No parent, even a foster parent, is going to tell a child who was just raped to call Penn State and talk to Paterno.  When Barron stated the stories were incredulous, this is one of the examples.

Interestingly enough, Ganim's story that broke news of the Sandusky grand jury, that was part of the Pulitzer Prize submission, exhibited an incredible lack of understanding of parenting.  

In that story, Ganim wrote that the mother of a ten-year old boy waited outside the interview room while her son talked to the police -- but then never asked him what he talked to the police about.  

From the article:

"When reached by phone, his mother said she took her son to Penn State police for questioning in 1998 but didn’t listen to the interview. She said she never asked her son what happened."


Her Pulitzer prize pretty much confirms the media has no idea how to evaluate the credibility of stories. 

And the media has no need to in this case.

Allegations neither valid or invalid

In a perfect world, all the rumormongering and conjecture should be quelled by revealing Paragraph 3 of the John Doe A settlement (that states the claims are neither valid nor invalid).







A judge will likely dismiss the media's arguments for disclosure based on that passage alone. 

But it's not a perfect world, and if the media doesn't like the answer, it will continue to pursue the story that it wants.

PSU Cover-Up Not Credible 

The story of a Penn State cover-up and enabling Sandusky's abuse was not credible from DAY ONE.  The evidence didn't support it.

That a full investigation was conducted of the active Defensive Coordinator of the football team in 1998, but was circumvented in 2001 (when Sandusky was retired), for the purpose of avoiding bad publicity is completely illogical.

The evidence also revealed that PSU reported Sandusky outside the University to every authority in 1998 and reported him, at a minimum, outside the University to THE SECOND MILE in 2001. Those facts certainly don't support a Penn State cover-up.

The report of the 2001 incident stopped at THE SECOND MILE and that's where the cover-up occurred.

However, the media knew that there was no BIG STORY  in writing about a cover-up by a charity that was unknown to most people outside of Pennsylvania. 

Public Interest
The Sandusky scandal coverage should have informed the public about the dangers of acquaintance offenders and how to recognize the signs of possible victimization.  Priests, teachers, youth sports, and youth service organization members are all individuals who have access children and victimize them through gaining the trust of their families.  

The person need not be famous or be associated with a top flight college football program to commit acts of child sexual victimization.  All they need is access to the child.

It didn't make a difference that Jerry Sandusky was the defensive coordinator at Penn State in State College or if he was the offensive coordinator at Texas A&M in College Station.  It wasn't his job.  It wasn't the town.  It was his role (and lack of rules) at THE SECOND MILE that provided him with access to children.

The media knows that -- and today's legal filing proves that the media has no interest in telling that story.



14 comments:

  1. Something bothers me here. It is my understanding that fiduciary responsibility entails protecting an institution from financial damage due to frivilous or fraudulent claims. A payment made for a claim outside the statute of limitations for civil claims, a known fraudulent claim, or a claim that has no nexus to the institution would be considered dereliction of fiduciary duty, or out here in California, felony fraud. And trying to collect from an insurer compounds the felony into insurance fraud. Am I missing something here?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Gregory,
      Nice to see you back here and commenting on the blog.

      I agree with you and I've already written on the possible insurance fraud in this case.

      I don't know if the fiduciary violations are felonies in PA, however.

      Delete
    2. A 17 year old high school quarterback (Victim X) alleged he was raped by Sandusky in the summer of 1988 at a Penn State football camp.

      He complained to CNN that the statute of limitations had run out for civil suits yet Penn State offered him a settlement anyway for his unbelievable story.

      I don't see the logic of settling with very old accusers, especially when their claims don't fit Sandusky's MO of grooming boys he met through his charity.

      Delete
  2. Someone with the username Bernie McCue posted at State College News about the 1971 "Victim A." He said that Ganim didn't tell the whole story she was told.

    Also according to McCue, Ganim got two more facts wrong. Victim A did not have a heart attack but bypass surgery. McCue was told victim A's story in 1974, not 1972 as Ganim reported.

    http://www.statecollege.com/news/columns/with-paterno-allegations-reporting-has-merit,1467815/

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tim,
      I was alerted to a similar post on Bernie's Facebook page. Those details don't make a difference in terms of why the story is false.

      Bernie is coming a bit unhinged because PSU defended itself this time around, rather than just accepting the stories as fact.

      Delete
    2. You know its bad when Ganim can't even get the "facts" that she got from the town crackpot correct.

      Delete
    3. Jeff Williams - Another possibility is that Bernie McCue couldn't remember what lies he told to Ganim.

      Ray - Do you know the specifics of the harassment charges against McCue in 2006 and 2012?

      The one 2006 charge was listed as "Harassment - Comm. Repeatedly in Anonymous Manner."

      That's consistent with a claim on the internet that McCue removed newspapers from the rack, wrote nasty comments on them, and then put them back for others to read.

      The other two charges were "Harassment - Course of Conduct W/No Legitimate Purpose."


      https://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/MDJCourtSummaryReport.ashx?docketNumber=MJ-49201-NT-0000620-2012

      Delete
  3. Thank you. I assume the BOT answer is that if they did not just pay, the financial damage would have been worse.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Bob,
      The reason given by the BOT was that settlements would be less costly and AVOID BAD PUBLICITY/OPTICS over tussling with claimants.

      That's not the real reason, but it's the one they gave.

      These decisions were really about MAKING money. That will come out in the future.

      Delete
  4. The PA and local media MUST get out in front of this. They knew, at minimum, as much as Paterno and CSS knew. I'll ask Dave Jones again, what did you know and when did you know it? I will never stop asking you that question Dave.

    I'm still watching

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Misder2,
      Thanks for your comments.

      Keep after Jonesy. I'll take care of Ganim.

      Cheers!
      Ray

      Delete
  5. Thanks again Ray for your tireless efforts to simply just unravel the lies about Joe Paterno. The media is willfully propagating these lies in an organized fashion. I agree with everything you've said here except for one statement: "the media knew that there was no BIG STORY in writing about a cover-up by a charity that was unknown to most people outside of Pennsylvania". They knew full-well there was a MASSIVE story to be told about Jerry Sandusky's "quiet" Second Mile--the role it played in providing boys to upper-level government officials and other corporate elite. The story wasn't told about the organized child rape because the media is complicit in protecting the rapists! As the old saying goes, "you don't bite the hand that feeds you"! The only thing that actually ties PSU to this is, their Old Guard BoT, business and industry leaders are inextricably linked to the child sex trafficking. And their media accomplices are going full-tilt to scapegoat lower-level people in the university. As proven by the BoT's complete dereliction of their fiduciary responsibility to the university, they should not even be considered or referred to as "PSU". It's clear they are a corrupt and separate corporate entity that has placed blame where it doesn't belong.

    The corrupt PA and national media(Jenkins), are exploiting the general public's lack of knowledge about a university's power structure. Joe Paterno was a PSU celebrity because he was a winning coach, that's all. But he was not one of the omnipotent business and industry leaders on PSU's corrupt BoT. That's why the media played up the absurd, "most powerful man in PA" nonsense about Paterno. All of this about Paterno is organized slander by the media to cover-up organized corruption within the Old Guard BoT and dirty PA government. We need someone in power in our current PA government to make an appeal to congress to begin a RICO corruption investigation of Rendell, Louis Freeh, Tom Corbett, Cynthia Baldwin, Linda Kelly, Frank Fina, Seth Williams, Frank Noonan, the Old Guard BoT, Risa Ferman, and the media outlets that are willfully printing slander about Joe Paterno. It's organized, willful slander, and it's being done with impunity.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh yeah, I left off Ronnie "the hot" Tomalis from the list of PCN(PA Corruption Network)criminals. That's most likely going to be the endearing nickname given to him by his two big cellmates--Ronnie "the hot" Tomalis! Sweet poetic justice for keeping PA kids in harm's way.

      Delete
    2. Truthseeker,
      I agree that a Congressional Inquiry into PA's child protection failures, focused on the Sandusky case, and the government/media cover-up is a possible solution.

      I'll put it on my "to do" list.

      Cheers!
      Ray

      Delete