The Silent 18's Settlement Decision Is Driven By Secrecy

The recent 18-6 vote to settle with Sandusky victims is further confirmation that the controlling majority of the PSU Board of Trustees will spend large sums of money to keep the truth hidden.

By
Ray Blehar

The vote in favor of the settlement resolution was 18-6.  

The 18 who voted for the resolution didn't provide any reason for their support.  The six who opposed all did and it was trustee Anthony Lubrano's statement that struck at the most likely reason PSU has decided to settle the pending lawsuits.

“Unfortunately, Penn State continues to pay almost three years later, and today we look to pay again.  But I say no more.  No more resolutions to approve settlements while denying trustees access to the materials used to prepare the Freeh Report; no more feeding at the trough of Penn State."

According to two independent sources, Penn State (in 2013) provided settlements to all claimants who would accept below the $2 million per instance or $3 million aggregate limits, as provided by the University's liability insurance.   26 of 32 claimants were awarded settlements. Of the six claimants that were denied, three had requested more compensation than the the limit.  The University stated that the three other claims that were denied lacked merit.  However, it is more likely those claims were denied because the abuse fell in the period during which Sandusky was under investigation by the Attorney General (e.g., D.F. lawsuit).


Victims 6 and 9 were among the three claimants whose attorneys were not satisfied with accepting the "chump change" the University was offering.  Their attorneys pressed on with civil litigation and, as a result, were granted access to the documents used as source material by Freeh, as well as other information which could prove harmful the trustees who control the power base.  

Victim 9's lawsuit resulted in access to all 3.5 million documents used as source materials in the Freeh Report.  While PSU appealed the ruling to the Superior Court, the schedule called for the turnover of all documents by May 4, 2015, which was eventually extended to 29 May.  The pressure was on "silent majority" to make something happen to keep that information under wraps.

What Records Are Being Withheld and Why?

Some might recall that in the early stages of the investigation, Freeh vowed to investigate activities dating back to the mid-seventies.  However, according to documents obtained from Old Main, Freeh requested every "record ever created back to '69."  1969 was the year Sandusky was hired as a full-time assistant football coach.  Information from 1998 forward was used in the report, thus simple math reveals 29 years worth of information was excluded.  

Note that Freeh's charter was to investigate and report on the causes for all of the allegations that were published in the Sandusky grand jury presentment.  He failed to do so by excluding the incidents involving Victims 7 and 10, which predated 1998.  The reason for the omissions was obvious -- there was no evidence linking those crimes to Paterno or other PSU officials. 

In addition, the criminal proceedings in the Curley, Schultz, and Spanier case established that Freeh excluded a number of emails and documents from his report that would have shed light on the failures of the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare (DPW) and Centre County Children and Youth Services (CYS) during the 1998 investigation.  Among omitted documents were a handwritten note by Schultz that reported DPW had received the report from Dr. Alycia Chambers (denied by DPW's Jerry Lauro) and an email revealing CYS remained involved in the case until late May.  The Freeh Report stated CYS recused itself from the case in early May, citing a conflict of interest with The Second Mile.  

A full document dump could also result in exposure of the full, unadulterated, "critical" emails that were used by Freeh and the Attorney General as evidence against the PSU Three. Questions have been raised regarding the provenance on those documents because at least six different dates were provided for when they were turned over to the state police and/or Attorney Generals office.  The testimony of the Attorney General's forensics expert regarding anomalies in the emails was less than convincing.  If it is shown the "critical" emails were subjected to tampering, the narrative of a PSU cover-up scandal would be over (and replaced by the big question of who was behind the tampering).   

FYI: the top candidates would be Cynthia Baldwin and Louis Freeh.  Former officials from the PA Attorney General's office would be co-conspirators.

Other Information

While Victim 6's lawsuit did not yield access to all the Freeh documents, however it has resulted in obtaining a lot of other important evidence.   The court ordered Penn State to provide, among other things, the names of people who talked to Freeh investigators about any Sandusky shower incidents with boys from 1990 to 1998, complaints of sexual misconduct against any employee at the University Park campus from 1990 to 1998, and documents between Penn State and the NCAA from the time Sandusky was indicted to the issuing of the sanctions.

The documents between Penn State and the NCAA are likely among the information Penn State wants most to hide.  While the Corman v. NCAA lawsuit provided many emails between the two entities, Senator Corman stopped short of releasing all the documents obtained through discovery.  Those documents would likely provide more evidence confirming that Ken Frazier and Ron Tomalis had instrumental roles in authoring the Freeh Report and additional  evidence confirming that the University and the NCAA had an agreement from the outset to use the Sandusky scandal to penalize PSU football and Paterno.  No doubt, those revelations would send a shock wave across the country and lead to the end of the professional careers of Freeh, Emmert, and others who were involved in the deception.

As shown above, the information that might be revealed through discovery would be ruinous to Rod Erickson, Cynthia Baldwin, members of the PSU BOT inner circle, Mark Emmert, Louis Freeh, and Frank Fina.   All of those people took part in scapegoating PSU officials and/or Paterno for Sandusky's crimes.

Conclusion

In the cases of Victim 6 and Victim 9, the information being sought would most likely blow up the credibility of the Freeh Report.  Ironically, both of their lawsuits borrow heavily from the Freeh Report to make their claims that PSU was culpable for the crimes committed by Sandusky.  

Penn State could easily defend against the lawsuits by publicly rejecting the Freeh Report and then going into litigation with the evidence that undermines Freeh's findings.  Meanwhile, the plaintiffs would be in receipt of the evidence that disproves their cases -- and be left with nothing.  

When you get down to it, the Silent 18 voted to pay a large sum of money to settle cases the University would win.

Read more here: http://www.centredaily.com/2014/03/18/4091149_some-freeh-investigation-material.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy

What you probably didn't know about the 1998 Sandusky investigation

The 1998 incident provided considerable insights into Sandusky's pedophile behavior and one of the cover-ups in this case.

By

Ray Blehar

The often repeated version of the 1998 story doesn't begin to tell the full story of what we assumed was the first incident that resulted in a child abuse investigation of Jerry Sandusky.   

During Spanier's grand jury hearing in April 2011, prosecutor Frank Fina mentioned the Commonwealth was told of a previous Sandusky investigation for illegal contact with a minor in 1984.  Fina stated they were unable to find police record of that incident.  Thus, the 1998 incident may not have been Sandusky's first brush with the law about child sexual victimization.

As for the 1998 incident, the popular version of it goes like this...

A boy arrived home with wet hair from showering with Sandusky after a workout on PSU's campus. That upset the mother and she called the University Park police who investigated the case.  The incident involved Sandusky giving the child a hug while they were both naked in the shower. After a lengthy investigation, no charges were filed and the case was closed by then Centre County District Attorney (DA) Ray Gricar.

As the Sandusky scandal unfolded, and police reports and psychology reports were released, the story broadened and the public learned that three other arms of government -- the PA Department of Public Welfare (DPW), Centre County Children and Youth Services (CC CYS), and the State College Borough police were also involved in the investigation, as was psychologist Dr. Alycia Chambers and unlicensed counselor, John Seasock.  

The Freeh report added additional information, when the "secret file" of Gary Schultz revealed notes that he had kept from his discussions about the case (presumably with University Park police Chief Tom Harmon).

A fuller picture of a botched investigation appeared, with conflicting evaluations of the victim, missing reports, and other bureaucratic bungling.   And what appeared to be a concerted effort by the Commonwealth and Louis Freeh to cover up the mistakes.

Ironically, the actions of Sandusky and his interactions with Victim 6 and the second boy, BK, were only examined superficially.  We just got the highlights.

When you examine the complete timeline of Sandusky and his interactions with these boys, what materializes is a story of a pedophile who surreptitiously accessed, abused, and then stalked a vulnerable boy.

The Timeline

April 1998: Sandusky met Victim 6 at a TSM picnic in Spring Creek Park.  

Sunday

5/3/98 3:36PM - Jerry called V6 to set up work out

5/3/98 5:42PM - Jerry called V6 to provide his arrival time

5/3/98 7:00PM - Jerry picked up V6 to go the workout

5/3/98 7:15-8:45 - Sandusky and V6 toured locker room, worked out, & showered. 

5/3/98 9:00PM - Sandusky dropped V6 off at his family's apartment

Monday

5/4/98  Mother & son met with police, CYS, and psychologist Chambers 

Tuesday

5/5/98 1:55 PM DPW's Jerry Lauro informed Schreffler he was following up on the case

Wednesday

5/6/98 9:19PM - Jerry called Victim 6 

Thursday

5/7/98 11:15AM  Lauro, Schreffler, & Weaver interview mother of V6 at apartment

Friday

5/8/98 2:00 PM Seasock evaluated V6

Saturday

5/9/98 12:10PM Seasock discussed evaluation with Schreffler

Sunday

5/10/98 4:20PM - Jerry called & left message for V6 to call him.

Monday

5/11/98 3:45PM - Jerry called V6 to invite him to go to Altoona. V6 responded that he'd  need his mother's permission.  Jerry also talked to BK and asked him how his baseball practices were going.

Tuesday

5/12/98 Jerry called V6 to ask to pick him up on the 13th.

Wednesday

5/13/98 3:55  Jerry called V6 to confirm pick-up

5/13/98 4:00  Jerry arrived. Confronted by mother about incident (Police eavesdropping)

5/13/98 4:05  Jerry left premises without V6.  Mother reported that the first time Sandusky came to her home, he came to the rear, sliding glass door.

5/13/98 6:00  BK reported Jerry was at his little league field (Gill Field) talking to him.

Tuesday

5/19/98 Jerry arrived at V6 apartment and is questioned by mother and admitted to showering with other boys before.  The mother informed Sandusky he should not attend any more of her son's baseball games.

Monday

6/1/98  11:00AM Schreffler and Lauro interviewed Sandusky.

What you likely missed in the official 1998 reports?

There are some lesser known facts from this case that few people know and then there are some things you can glean by reading between the lines.  

1.  Possible DPW/CYS Tip-offs to Sandusky/TSM.  According to member of TSM, they had no idea that Sandusky was investigated in 1998 and blamed Penn State for keeping the information away from them.  As most readers of this blog know, CC CYS was required by the Public Welfare Code to contact TSM at the outset of the 1998 investigation and put a safety plan in place.  Obviously, that didn't happen, but the idea that Sandusky or TSM didn't know about this incident until the end of the investigation is highly debatable.

As the investigation progressed, Sandusky appears to have called Victim 6 in close proximity to the times an action was taken on the case.  To wit:

On Monday 5/4, Victim 6 met with police & caseworkers.

On Wednesday, 5/6, Sandusky called Victim 6 at 9:19PM

On Friday, 5/8, Victim 6 was evaluated by Seasock

On Sunday, 5/10, Sandusky called Victim 6 at 4:20 PM

Was Sandusky trying to find out what the young boy had told investigators?  These calls were obtained from caller ID and the purposes are not stated in any report.

According to Sandusky's prison interview, he stated he was surprised when he was approached on June 1st by Schreffler and Lauro and claimed it was the first he had any idea he was under investigation.   

I'd take that statement with a grain of salt.

At least 16 known individuals and other unspecified persons definitely had knowledge of the 1998 incident, some of them who were friends and associates of Sandusky.  Those sixteen were:  

Subjects/Complainants:  Victim 6, his mother, and BK;

Police:  Schreffler; Weaver; Harmon, and Ralston (and other police);

DA's Office:   Arnold, Sloane, and Gricar;

Child Welfare:  Lauro, DPW (and his supervisor) and Miller, CYS (and associates)

PSU Officials:  Schultz and Curley 

Other:  Dr. Alycia Chambers (and associates), John Seascock

Former Police Chief Tom Harmon

Former Police Chief Tom Harmon, who was at one time a neighbor of Sandusky's and went to the same church as Jerry, could have been tipping him off to what was happening every step of the way.  Harmon deserves particular scrutiny in this case because he is the person responsible for mislabeling the police report as "Administrative Information" so that the media would not discover it.



Other State College policemen, aside from Ralston, were aware of the 1998 case.  One recalled Schreffler stopping by to ask someone to go on the first sting with him.  The mother also first called the State College police, who referred her to University Park.

Dr. Chambers reported one of her associates was familiar with Sandusky from interactions with TSM.  One way or another, it is likely word got back to Sandusky and/or TSM during those 37 days that he was under investigation.

2. Access without parental consent.  The fact that Sandusky came to the rear sliding doors of the apartment the first "known" time he came there indicates that he had been to (or at least by) the apartment without the mother's knowledge.  The mother was troubled by Sandusky coming to the back door and brought it up to the police on May 13th.  She asked  how he knew which back door was their's because there was nothing to identify the apartment. Given that her son was in little league, that activity gave Sandusky an opportunity for access without her knowledge.  It is likely that Sandusky  may have followed Victim 6 home from baseball practices (or perhaps gave him a ride home) and observed him enter the apartment through the rear doors. 

3. The workout and shower incident.  Most of the attention focused on the shower incident itself and the fact that Sandusky hugged the child while naked, however, there is more to the story.  

Det. Ronald Schreffler

First, Detective Ronald Schreffler testified that he believed Victim 6 did not fully disclose what happened to him, stating, and “I felt there was more that <redacted> hadn’t told me."

Schreffler's police report stated that Sandusky was "biting (kissing him on the arm)."  This fact was not brought out in most media reports or at the trial -- the only kiss most heard of was the one Sandusky gave the boy on the forehead during the workout.

Next, Victim 6 has never fully disclosed the details of the incident. He testified that things went "black" from the time he was in the shower with Sandusky until the time he arrived home.  This is consistent with the behavior of many boys who are vitcimized by a man.  Disclosures are often inaccurate and the level of abuse is typically disclosed incrementally. His memory of his arrival at home differs from that of his mother's.  Victim 6 always says his hair was wet, however, the mother told Dr. Chambers the boy's hair was bone dry.

His behavior after coming home indicates that something happened which made him feel "dirty,"   According to Schultz's notes and other reports, he took a shower after arriving home that night and again the next morning.  

Interestingly enough, the fact that he showered two times in the 11 hours after he had showered with Sandusky was not mentioned in the grand jury presentment, in the text of the Freeh Report, or at any time during the trial of Sandusky.  

Those omissions were not by accident.

The context of Sandusky's "playful" behavior with Victim 6 was also never fully explained.  The lowering of sexual inhibitions is usually done so gradually and skillfully the victim does not realize he or she is a victim until it is too late.  The activity can progress to fondling while wrestling, drying the child with a towel, massaging an injury, giving a back rub, tickling, playing a physical game, or cuddling in bed.  In this instance, Sandusky first got the boy on the floor by engaging in a game of "Polish soccer" (where a rolled up sock or tape ball would be kicked into a garbage can/target) then moving from that game into a wrestling match.  As we learned, Sandusky then worked out with the boy and suggested they shower.

Sandusky's coaxing of the boy to shower with him was also a typical pedophile behavior.  Again, he had selected a vulnerable boy who was at an age where he didn't fully understand what behaviors were normal between males.  When Sandusky said "all the guys do," Victim 6 believed him and took a shower with Sandusky, even though it made him uncomfortable.  This statement - "all the guys do" and similar statements are used by pedophiles in the seduction process of their young victims.

4.  Possible stalking behavior.  The fact that the mother told Sandusky to not attend her son's baseball games reveals that Sandusky, after being rebuffed on the 13th, he attempted to stay in contact with Victim 6 (without the knowledge of the mother) by attending his baseball practices.  

Of course, with Sandusky being a local celebrity of sorts, word filtered back to the mother that Jerry was hanging out at practice.  Even after she told Sandusky to stop going to her son's practices, he continued and the mother was forced to pull her son out of Little League.

Sandusky also exhibited this behavior with Aaron Fisher (Victim 1) and other boys at Central Mountain High School.  According to Vice-Principal, Steve Turchetta, when the boys broke off their relationships with Sandusky he became clingy and needy.   He got into shouting matches with the boys in which Turchetta played referree. Aaron Fisher testified that Sandusky followed his school bus home and chased him from the bus stop to his home, stopping at times to yell at Aaron to get into his car.  Fisher ran away, hiding behind bushes, as he made his way back to his home.

Victim 4 also testified that his "break up" with Sandusky was similar, with Sandusky becoming emotional and writing him "creepy love letters" in an effort to pull him back into the relationship.  

Conclusions

In 1998, a mother came forward purely out of the interest of protecting her son.  There was nothing for her to gain financially.  She protected her son from Sandusky as best as she could during the investigation, often paging the police when Sandusky would make unauthorized contact.   After the investigation concluded and Sandusky was cleared, she took steps to ensure Sandusky never had one-on-one access to her son again.

The victim's story of the incident, which he appears to be downplaying, has stayed consistent throughout and led to convictions on three sex offenses.  Only he and Sandusky may know what happened in that period that went "black."  

Sandusky's behavior far exceeded what is acceptable behavior for anyone who works with children in youth programs and were determined to be consistent with "grooming" according to Dr. Chambers.   His known actions with this victim clearly violated the statutes related to Megan's Law (i.e., sexual offenses).  His "need" to maintain contact with Victim 6 eventually forced the mother to pull the boy out of little league to ensure Sandusky did not have access without her knowledge. 

Numerous people were aware that Sandusky was under investigation and it is very likely that TSM and/or Sandusky was informed about it while in was in progress.

The Commonwealth and Louis Freeh attempted to bury one of the most important pieces of evidence in this case, if not the entire scandal -- that Victim 6 took a shower just hours after showering with Sandusky, then took another shower the next morning.  Police and caseworkers were aware of this fact, as well as over a dozen signs of possible child sexual abuse in this case. Despite the evidence of possible sexual abuse, DPW decided to "resolve the matter quickly" less than 10 days into the investigation.

There is more than one cover-up in this scandal and the evidence indicates that the Commonwealth and Louis Freeh were involved in covering up the failure of DPW in 1998.

Victim 6 Case's Discovery Materials Could Reveal True Sandusky "Cover-ups"

While Judge Anita Brody ruled the claims of "vicarious liability" were not substantiated, expansive discovery could prove that a "civil conspiracy" took place

By
Ray Blehar

Recent headlines in the Victim 6 lawsuit against PSU trumpeted that the judge ruled against the University's request to delay the lawsuit and went on to discuss the broad range of documents requested for discovery.   

However, the ruling that could tell the story - and perhaps get the media's attention - will be the ruling on the claims of civil conspiracy and the associated discovery.

Victim 6's lawyer, Howard Janet said Penn State officials gave Sandusky access to campus facilities where he abused children. 

Janet argued that their client suffered from “the fruits of an unlawful conspiracy” that was designed to conceal the shower incident and shield the university from negative public reaction.

“Permitting Sandusky to remain as a coach with unrestricted access enabled the abuse to continue and strongly supports an inference that inappropriate sexual relations were condoned by Penn State,” Janet wrote.

The Law

 A plaintiff bringing a civil conspiracy claim is required to aver “material facts which will either directly or inferentially establish elements of conspiracy.”  Id. Additionally, a plaintiff must allege (1) the persons combined with a common purpose to do an unlawful act or to do a lawful act by unlawful means or unlawful purpose, (2) an overt act in furtherance of the common purpose has occurred, and (3) the plaintiff has incurred actual legal damage.  Id.  Importantly, absent a civil cause of action for a particular underlying act, there can be no cause of action for civil conspiracy to commit that act.

Janet Is Arguing the "Wrong" Conspiracy

First, Janet is trying to shoe horn this into a civil conspiracy by stating the abuse occurred due to an unlawful conspiracy at PSU based on the scant evidence in the Freeh Report.

If Victim 6's abuse occurred in late 2001 or later, he might have an argument but 1998 was the first known incident of Sandusky showering with a child to be reported to PSU officials. 

Next, there was absolutely no effort on PSU officials Schultz, Spanier, Curley, or Paterno to conceal the 1998  incident.    Prosecutor Frank Fina is on record that there is NO evidence Paterno was involved in a cover-up, however he is pressing on with his charges of "endangerment" based on the 2001 incident, not the 1998 case.

The report of abuse in 1998 was fielded by University Park police and jointly investigated with caseworkers from the Department of Public Welfare. The investigation was joined by the State College police and had involvement the Centre County District Attorney's office.  

To make an argument of concealment of the 1998 incident against Spanier, Curley, and Schultz is a losing argument.

Penn State's Senior Vice-President for Business and Finance, Gary Schultz, was informed by then-Chief of Police Tom Harmon that there was no criminality to the incident, thus neither Schultz nor any other University official could have believed there was inappropriate sexual relations, let alone condoned it. 

Janet is simply grasping at a straw, much like Kenneth Frazier did, to conclude Schultz believed there was "inappropriate behavior" based on a few words written on Shultz's note.  However, those words were most likely attributable to Tom Harmon, but also could have come from Detective Ron Schreffler or caseworker John Miller.

If Janet wants to win this case, he is going to have to cast a wider net and use something more that the faulty conclusions emanating from the fake investigation of Louis Freeh -- specifically, that the PSU BOT influenced the 1998 case.

Casting a Wider Net at Penn State

According to press reports, the legal team of Victim 6 made 33 discovery requests for a wide range of information from Penn State, including the names of everyone Freeh interviewed, the entire police file from 1998, and every single document the university gave the grand jury investigating Sandusky.

Freeh stated his team reviewed 3.5 million documents.  As Eileen Morgan pointed out, that was mathematically impossible to cull through that much information in the eight months Freeh's team got paid for not investigating the case.  

We also know that key word searches were performed for Paterno, Spanier, Schultz, Curley, and McQueary.  It is unclear what other search terms were used or if the PSU IT department or OAG computer forensics teams searched on other names.

However, if Howard Janet wants to prove a "civil conspiracy," he may want to use the chart below for the list of names to search in those 3.5 million records.

As you can see, some of the people who were around in 1998 were still on the BOT in 2011 as trustees or emeriti trustees, including Joel Myers, Cynthia Baldwin, Ted Junker, David Jones, Ed Hintz, Al Clemens, Anne Riley, Robert Metzgar, and Barry Robinson.  Janet may want to search those names and see what he comes up with.

Note that Schultz's name appears as Treasurer of the BOT.  His role on the BOT may be unfortunate for the other members if he instructed PSU's IT department to transfer the BOT e-mails (as he did his own) during the 2004 system switch-over.

Casting the Net At The Second Mile

Janet also filed suit against The Second Mile (TSM), however TSM's lawyers denied any knowledge of the 1998 incident, claiming that Penn State "concealed" evidence of that incident from their organization. TSM also continued to repeat the false story that none of Sandusky's abuse occurred during any programmed activities of TSM.  

TSM's claims are quite tenuous regarding its knowledge of 1998 -- and they made a similar claim when the story of the Sandusky investigation broke in March 2011.

 As I pointed out at Upon Further Review on November 9, 2013, TSM's Executive Director, Dr. Jack Raykovitz was being untruthful about TSM's knowledge of Sandusky's activities when he wrote the charity was "shaken" when it learned of the allegations in the March 2011 Sandusky grand jury.   A number of press reports and the testimony of Clinton County CYS Supervisor, Gerald Rosamilia, made it clear that TSM was informed of the Sandusky investigation at its outset on November 20, 2008.  Sandusky lost his clearance to work with children and abruptly resigned from the charity in the Fall of 2009.   Yet TSM continued to use Sandusky in their fund raising efforts and did not announce his "retirement" from the charity until September 2010. 

In the same op-ed, Dr. Raykovitz repeated the claim that the charity received no reports of abuse related to any official TSM activities.  

"Throughout our history, there have never been allegations made with regard to misconduct occurring during any Second Mile program."

That claim just doesn't hold water for the 1998 incident (and the 2001 incident).

First, TSM's 1999 Annual Report (not available on-line) shows that $75.242 was spent on the Friend/Friend Fitness program and that 48 "kids between both the State College and Indiana sites" were served by the fitness program by 36 mentors.  In the 2001 incident, the Annual Report shows $95,334 spent on the program and 40 participants.  Reasonable people (i.e., a jury) would probably conclude that Sandusky was using the Friend Fitness program as a means to take showers with youths.  Howard Janet's discovery request should include the Friend Fitness program records for all years there were victims.


As I noted in Report 1, Centre County Children and Youth Services (CYS) was required under the Public Welfare Code to notify TSM of the initiation and closure of the 1998 investigation, as well as work with TSM to put a protection plan in place during the investigation.  While it's clear the latter was not performed, it is unclear whether or not CYS made the notifications.  Despite the fact no records from an unfounded report would be available, Mr. Janet should utilize the provisions of the Public Welfare Code to make his case against TSM. 

Finally, the search terms for PSU's records should use the names of Board Members and key donors at The Second Mile, which can be obtained from their 1997 IRS 990 Form (for year ending 8/31/1998) and 1998 Annual Report.   Searches of data are cheap, so why not run these names on the PSU data and see what comes up (Moulton and the Feds do should do the same).

Freeh Whiffed on TSM and PSU BOT Nexus and Protected TSM

Report 2 exposed that only 12% of Freeh's findings related to the NCAA sanctions held water, however, one of the few that I found to be correct was that Spanier, Curley, Schultz, and Paterno did not interfere with the 1998 investigation.  

What is not certain is if any of the members of the BOT interfered or pulled strings to ensure Sandusky was not indicated as a child molester.   While the Freeh Report erroneously faults Spanier and Schultz for not informing the BOT about the 1998 case (clearly a duty that belonged to the PSU General Counsel, Courtney, under the Standing Orders of the BOT), the Freeh Report did not consider other means in which the BOT may have learned of the investigation -- namely from TSM, the police, or from CYS.  

In other words, the BOT may not have gotten official notification but certainly could have learned of it through unofficial channels.  And that is where the relationship between the PSU BOT and TSM comes into play.


Chapter 7 of the Freeh Report, titled "Sandusky's Post-Retirement Interactions With The University," fell woefully short in identifying any of the PSU BOT members, past or present, that had ties to TSM. 

The TSM Annual Reports from 2005 to 2010 showed that USSteel and Merck, both with high ranking officials on the PSU BOT, were donors to TSM.  In addition, other BOT members such as Lloyd Huck, James Broadhurst, Paul Silvis, Anthony Lubrano, and Linda Strumpf were donors.  Trustee Ira Lubert sat on the Southeast Region Board of TSM for several years.  Again, this information was available on public records and should have been identified in Chapter 7, but was conspicuously missing.  

Full, fair, and complete investigation?  Not by a long-shot.


Freeh Attempted to "Cover-up" for TSM
There are numerous other errors describing the relationship between PSU and TSM on page 107 to 109. but what is particularly notable is the last paragraph on page 109, which appears to provide a "cover-up" for TSM by making no mention of the Friend Fitness program.

"Second Mile also offered a "Friend Program," a mentorship program that matched a college volunteer with an at-risk elementary student.....Friend Program events included picnics, holiday parties, swimming, and bowling.  Sandusky sometimes participated in the Friend Program at the Altoona campus.  When he did, Sandusky often arrived accompanied by a boy for Second Mile who was not part of the invited group.  According to a Director of Programs at Second Mile, the last time he saw Sandusky participate in any Second Mile activities was in 2008."

The Freeh Report also states that TSM's summer camps on the PSU campus took place from 1999 to 2008, but TSM's Annual Reports ending August 31, 2009 and 2010 show that TSM paid $119,592 and $124,587, respectively,  for food and lodging to PSU for its camps.  Clearly, those camps took place on PSU's campus through 2010.  I suspect the 2008 cut-off was done to protect TSM from criticism or liability for allowing Sandusky to interact with children after he was indicated for abuse.

(Note:  Similar tactics were used in later news articles written by Sara Ganim in the Patriot News)

Conclusion

For Howard Janet to succeed in the "civil conspiracy" case, he must widen his scope past the false allegations made in the fake investigation conducted by Louis Freeh.

Janet must use the discovery materials to dig into the areas that the original Sandusky investigation and the fake Freeh investigation failed to explore -- specifically, the PSU BOT, TSM, and DPW.  


Given the power and influence of the PSU BOT and TSM Board members, particularly their associations with government officials, I find it curious that the 1998 investigation was taken over by an investigator from Harrisburg, rather than the office that had jurisdiction, in Cresson.  

If there is a civil conspiracy in this case, it spans at least these three organizations, and possibly a few others.

https://www.pennstatesunshinefund.org/donate/

Read more here: http://www.centredaily.com/2013/10/17/3842964/sandusky-victims-lawyers-request.html#storylink=cpy