By
Ray Blehar
February 14, 2019, 11:40 AM EST
After WJAC's report on leaked alumni-elected trustees critique of the Freeh Report, the true "deniers" quickly appeared on the scene to denounce and criticize the report.
Mark Dambly and Eric Barron stated the report merely reflects the opinions of its authors, while Louis Freeh's statement accused the authors of "blindly disregarding the incontrovertible facts."
Given the speed of the response from key "denier" Freeh, it was obvious he responded without reading the alumni report. In fact, his rebuttal states he hadn't obtained a copy of it.
As it turns out, Freeh will be surprised to learn he is the alumni report's star witness.
No Evidence of Protecting "JP or the Football Program"
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"I understand -- there is a stronger case to be made for "protecting the university" than JP or the 'Football Program' -- which is never really articulated in any of the evidence I've seen."
How did that happen?
The alumni-elected trustee report shows that former trustee, Ken Frazier, who was overseeing the Freeh investigation as co-chair of the PSU Board of Trustees Special Investigations Task Force, sent a July 23, 2012 ESPN column to the Freeh team that may have had undue influence on shifting the focus to football. The column, written by Howard Bryant, speculated that PSU and others didn't report Sandusky to protect Paterno and the football program.
Freeh and his team discussed the ESPN column and how it fit with public expectations to put the focus on Paterno and the football program for enabling Sandusky crimes.
However, there was push back from within the ranks about assigning motivations to the actions of PSU officials "since only the principals truly know" (and they hadn't been interviewed). Another team member added, "I still maintain we should not say anything that we can't support."
Focus on Scant Evidence, Not Fact Checking
Apparently, the time frame from the end of the trial (when Bryant's column was published) and the release of the Freeh Report was used to put emphasis on highlighting the scant information to indict Paterno and the football program instead of verifying that the information in the draft report was accurate.
You know, things like making sure the report accurately reflected what just transpired at the trial.
At Freeh's press conference in July 2012, he commented that the football culture existed from the top to bottom, citing the janitors "were afraid of being fired for reporting a powerful football coach." And amazingly, Freeh doubled down on the janitor incident in his rebuttal to the alumni report, stating that it demonstrated the culture problem.
The alumni elected trustees' report simply blows the janitor incident out of the water.
It reveals that 8 janitors were interviewed by Freeh's team including the three that were present during the incident. All three who were present that night were consistent in that they encouraged Janitor A (Calhoun) to report the incident.
As it turns out, the Freeh Report's theme "of fear of being fired" relied on a single statement from a janitor -- who was not even present that evening.
As notpsu.blogspot.com demonstrated, the Freeh Report's version of the janitor incident was not consistent with facts provided during the Sandusky trial.
Nor were his inflammatory press conference statements regarding it.
“The janitors, that’s the tone on the bottom. Ok. These are the employees of Penn State who clean the locker rooms in the Lasch building where young boys are being raped. They witness, what is probably, in the report, the most horrific rape, that’s described.”
The testimony and verdicts from the Sandusky trial were clear that no one was anally raped in the Lasch Building. Moreover, there was no evidence presented at the trial that any victim alleged being subjected to an anal rape on the PSU campus, let alone the football facilities.
The evidence surrounding the janitor incident exemplifies that it was Freeh who was, and still is, "blindly ignoring" the facts.
Next: Fact-Checking Freeh's Rebuttal
