Accounting for Accountability

The Penn State Board of Trustees paid Freeh Sporkin & Sullivan, LLP $6.5 million dollars for the 267-page document commonly known as the Freeh Report. The Report has come under intense scrutiny in the two months since its release and the veracity of the report has been questioned by concerned alumni, as well as by numerous legal authorities.  Perhaps in response to the substantial limitations and errors that have been documented to exist in the Report, the Board has now taken the stance that it will not review the entire document but will only focus on the 18 pages of Chapter 10: Recommendations for University Governance, Administration, and the Protection of Children in University Facilities and Programs.

At an approximate cost of $24,344.57 per page, this seems at first glance to be a waste of $6,061,798. According to Penn State's own figures, this is enough money to have covered the yearly salaries of 54.5 assistant professors or 242.5 graduate teaching assistants, or to fund a year of education for 273 Penn State freshmen.  This is more than twice the amount spent to establish the Penn State Hershey Center for the Protection of Children.

However, could even the $6 million figure be misleading?

Mike McQueary - Reality Challenged?

I've been slogging through the Mike McQueary testimony and the cross-examination of Karl Rominger for a couple of days now and it's tedious going. 

I can't quite decide which is worse - McQueary's obfuscation and sometimes obvious evasion - pretending he doesn't understand the question OR Rominger's bizarre seemingly purposeful ineptitude and lack of focus.  

CORBETT APPROVAL ON SMSS INVESTIGATION AT 17%

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Most Pennsylvania voters give Governor Tom Corbett fair or poor marks for his investigation, as state attorney general, into reports that former Penn State University assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was sexually abusing children, a poll showed on Wednesday.

Only 17 percent of the state's voters think Corbett, who served as Pennsylvania's top prosecutor for two terms before becoming governor in 2011, did a good or excellent job investigating what became a scandal that shook college football, according to the Franklin & Marshall College Poll.
Some 65 percent said Corbett did a fair or poor job on the case that led to Sandusky's conviction in June for sexually abusing 10 boys over 15 years.
G. Terry Madonna, the poll director, said the results reflect a sense that Corbett, a Republican who faces re-election in 2014, did not move the grand jury investigation fast enough and that he did not put enough manpower into the probe.
There are also questions about Corbett's decision to serve on Penn State's board of trustees after being elected governor, he said.
"The prospects that this will be over any time soon are not very good," Madonna said.

The Perjury Trials of Curley and Schultz

Not surprising the court has ruled to not dismiss the Perjury Charges

  This LINK is to the  pdf of the Court order on the motions by Farrell and Roberto to end the Perjury Trials of their Clients - Tim Curley and Gary Schultz 

HARRISBURG, Pa. -- A judge on Wednesday upheld perjury charges against two Penn State administrators accused of lying to a grand jury that investigated allegations ex-assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky sexually abused children.
Dauphin County Judge Todd Hoover ruled against the motions by former vice president Gary Schultz and athletic director Tim Curley that would have thrown out the count of perjury against each man.
The judge did not rule on the other count they each face, failure to properly report suspected child abuse. In that case, the defendants have argued the statute of limitations has expired. The judge said that dismissal request would be ruled on separately.
The judge said the claim made by Schultz and Curley that there is insufficient evidence to corroborate the perjury charges will be more appropriately pursued during the trial. He also said prosecutors have given the defendants sufficient information about which parts of their grand jury testimony make up the perjury allegation.

Some of us still believe the Attorney General will withdraw those charges prior to any trial given what she has to work with and the danger of trying to use Mike McQueary as her star witness.

Message from Anthony Lubrano

At my request, Kathleen Kane called me earlier today and we spoke for about 20 minutes. If elected, she made very clear to me that she intends to immediately begin an investigation into the handling of the Sandusky matter by the AG's office. She also believes that Tom Corbett delayed the investigation so that he could get elected and then during the investigation he ignored the role of the Second Mile due to the political contributions he received from members of the Second Mile Board, She was critical of his use of the Grand Jury. She believes that Corbett is really after Spanier for personal reasons. I shared with her that I felt that the Penn State community simply wants due process and the truth. For the sake of disclosure, I am a registered Republican who actively supported the candidacy of Tom Corbett for Governor. If we have any chance of uncovering the truth, we need to see Kathleen Kane elected Attorney General of PA.

THE SURMA VENDETTA PART 2

DID THE ANGER AND PREJUDICE OF THE SURMA FAMILY PLAY A ROLE IN THE FIRING OF JOE PATERNO AND THE DAMAGE DONE TO PENN STATE? 

By Barry Bozeman

Why were Vic Surma Sr and John P Surma so angry after 2007? 
What made Vic Sr angry enough to threaten Joe Paterno with tirades on a listserv 
for former PSU football players?  - THE SURMA VENDETTA 

In 2003, Vic Surma Sr was quoted in Rich Scarcella's book,

PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS - STADIUM STORIES, as follows:

"Joe instilled in us how to win.

He's a special man, a special person.

There's nobody better at taking high

school players and making them men."

                                  ~VICTOR SURMA

What would cause Victor Surma Sr. to go from that glowing praise for Joe Paterno in 2003 to this threatening indictment in 2007?

Victor Surma <vsurma8215@> wrote:  “The Rat has hurt so many young men; destroyed their self esteem, ruined their confidence, etc.  I feel it is my obligation to expose his fraud to the national media before he checks out. I'm starting with the Pittsburgh Reporter and hope to take his fraud national!!!  I hope you understand.  I was a 3 year letterman – have no axe to grind – just want to set the record straight on the RATS legacy.  Vic S”

That is a rather incredible change of heart to occur in 4 years.

Even more important is the same change of attitude of John P. Surma at the same time. People who knew John were confused by his evident change of heart because he had been a staunch Paterno supporter but after 2007 made no attempt to hide his antipathy for the aging coach. John P. Surma is the younger brother to Vic Surma and was Vice Chairman of the Penn State Board of Trustees in Nov of 2011.

John P. Surma led the charge to fire Joe Paterno 

Near the back of a conference room littered with coffee cups and plates of half-eaten fudge brownies and chocolate-chip cookies, a 79-year-old trustee and philanthropist named Mimi Coppersmith stood up and beseeched her colleagues to reconsider what they were poised to do. "Coach Paterno is revered here in State College," she said. (Image Mimi Coppersmith) 

"We're not going to drink the Kool-Aid," snapped John P. Surma, then the board's vice chairman and the chief executive officer of United States Steel Corp. "This is what we need to do."  

Surma then asked whether any trustee objected to the firing of coach Joe Paterno.             The question was met with silence.

VIC SURMA JR. 

The Mind of a Pedophile - Getting it Right

NEW YORKER's Malcomb Gladwell - A realistic look at Sandusky in The Mind of a Pedophile. 

It has been a long time coming but is there finally some common sense and reality slipping into the conscience of the media?

The PSU Board of Trustees could have made this a real debate 10 months ago had they simply stood by Joe, Tim, Gary, and Graham Spanier and made the Attorney General prove her absurd charges that a cover up of a known pedophile had occurred at PSU. Instead led by Tom Corbett and John P. Surma they hired Louis Freeh to cement the idea of a cover up in the public consciousness. 

This move to hire disgraced former FBI failure Louis Freeh for a second unwarranted fictional indictment compounded the egregious error by John P Surma - who cancelled Joe Paterno's press conference and then led the charge to fire him and Dr Spanier - signaling the media that the Board of Trustees believed they were guilty of this Linda Kelly imagined cover up. Surma evidently did this as part of a personal vendetta against the aging coach. 

 — the people who knew Sandusky, saw him with children, saw him playing and touching and even showering with them, and never suspected he was what he was.

Childcare specialists  trained in identifying the tell-tale signs of pedophilia cleared Sandusky during the 1998 probe into a mother’s concern over a workout and shower. No charges were brought in that case.

A Handy Resource: The Biggest Media Myths of the Jerry Sandusky Scandal

LINK -  JOHN ZIEGLER'S CLIFF NOTES on the Media Myths 

For the Uninitiated: The Biggest Media Myths of the Jerry Sandusky Scandal

Since details don’t seem to really matter anymore, here is the “Cliffs Notes” version of how the media created a false narrative (which they refuse to correct) in the Jerry Sandusky scandal. You might think of this as “Why Nearly Everything You Think You Know About the Penn State Story is False.” Please feel free to share it as a resource with those whose minds you are trying to open about what really happened here.

In the basic order in which they occurred, these are the biggest media-created myths…

Dr Dranov's Testimony - Transcript

THE TESTIMONY OF DR. JOHNATHAN DRANOV in Transcript is now Available 

We can now see word for word what Dr Dranov said that convinced the jury to find Sandusky not guilty on the prosecutions claim that Mike McQueary SAW a boy being subjected to anal intercourse and told that to Joe, Tim and Gary.

Mike McQueary heard sounds "of a sexual nature" SOUNDS!!!!

Mike McQueary was asked three times by his doctor - if he SAW anything Sexual "I kept saying what did you see and he kept coming back to the Sounds"

TAILGATE and TAKE SIGNATURES TEMPLE STYLE - CELEBRATE 250,000 SMSS VISITORS

THE SECOND MILE SANDUSKY SCANDAL WEBSITE and our 36 FREEHdom Fighters Appreciate your Support - and Welcome our 250,000 Visitor to SMSS 
 

We are encouraging our readers to attend the TEMPLE TAILGATE  and MORE.

WANT TO JOIN THE FREEHdom FIghters? Here's How You can Help or Join 

ACTION ITEMS FOR SATURDAY'S GAME WITH TEMPLE

1) PRIOR TO GOING TO THE GAME
A) DOWNLOAD AND PRINT as many copies as you can carry of these petitions.
    DUE PROCESS FOR JVP AND PSU 
    NEVER MOVE ON or FORWARD Until the Fight has been Won 
B) Have a clipboard and several pens on hand


2) GET SET TO TAILGATE and GET SIGNATURES AND SIGNATURE TAKERS. 
    A) Visit Ray Blehar at the SECOND MILE SANDUSKY SCANDAL tailgate site. Ray will have extra petitions on hand. 

 SOUTH RED LOT close to the Bryce Jordan Center. Space 2472 -   

Facing Dauer Drive - Under the Banner you see atop this website.

Online Due Process Petition LINK

and

Online DON'T MOVE ON LINK

   B) Make sure everyone knows about SMSS, how to download petitions & sign them online. 

  C) Make sure everyone who arrives at the game has a chance to sign the petitions. 

  D) Don't just get a signature when you can get a signature taker. !!! 

4) REPORT BACK TO SMSS with your pictures and signature tallies. 

    A) TAKE Your Camera and I Phone - take pictures and send them to aurabass@yahoo.com for our live blog on the tailgate and petition drive. 

    B ) Help us create excitement online with a LIVE BLOG of the Taligate with videos and 

Pictures and a running count of the signatures you are collecting - and more importantly the 

number of petitions you have given to other Joe Pa supporters who agree to get them signed