Post higher education reporter Jenna Johnson will be live blogging the release of Judge Louis Freeh’s report on the actions of Penn State surrounding the child abuse committed by the school’s former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky. Freeh will take questions from the media this morning. Watch the press conference live at 10 a.m. here:
- » Jerry Sandusky found guilty on nearly all counts of child sex abuse
- » Joe Paterno’s only interview on the Penn State scandal
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Freeh report names officials who failed, including Paterno
The report findings go on to name the Penn State officials who “failed to protect against a child sexual predator harming children for over a decade.” Those names, in the order they are listed in the report:1) Graham B. Spanier, former Penn State president who was forced out of the job in November;
2) Gary C. Schultz, retired vice president of finance and business who has been criminally charged;
3) Timothy M. Curley, Penn State athletic director who has also been charged;
4) Joseph V. Paterno, former head football coach who died in January.
According to the report, these four men concealed Sandusky’s “activities” from trustees and authorities and showed a “striking lack of empathy” for the victims — especially when they did not attempt to identify a child who was allegedly seen naked in a shower with Sandusky.
Freeh report: 'Total and consistent disregard' for safety and welfare of Sandusky victims
I was finally able to open up a PDF of the report, thanks to media outlets that have posted it on their sites. I skipped right ahead to the executive summary that starts on page 13. The first sentence under the title “findings” on page 14 is pretty damning:“The most saddening finding by the Special Investigative Council is the total and consistent disregard by the most senior leaders at Penn State for the safety and welfare of Sandusky’s child victims.”
NCAA: Penn State has four key questions to answer
Bob Williams, NCAA vice president of communications, just released this statement about the Penn State investigation:“Like everyone else, we are reviewing the final report for the first time today. As [NCAA President Mark] Emmert wrote in his November 17th letter to Penn State President Rodney Erickson and reiterated this week, the university has four key questions, concerning compliance with institutional control and ethics policies, to which it now needs to respond. Penn State’s response to the letter will inform our next steps, including whether or not to take further action. We expect Penn State’s continued cooperation in our examination of these issues.”
Penn State releases statement: 'We want to ensure we are giving the report careful scrutiny'
A statement from Penn State leaders and trustees was just posted on the university Web site:“Today with the report released by Judge Louis Freeh, the Penn State Board of Trustees delivered on the commitment we made last November when we engaged Judge Freeh to conduct an independent investigation into the University’s actions regarding former Penn State employee, Jerry Sandusky, and the handling of allegations of the child abuse crimes of which he has since been found guilty.
Judge Freeh and his team conducted a rigorous eight-month investigation into all aspects of the University’s actions to determine where breakdowns occurred and what changes should be made for the future. We, like many others, have eagerly anticipated Judge Freeh’s Report of the findings of his investigation.
His 267-page report has just been released at http://www.TheFreehReportonPSU.com/ and we are currently reviewing his findings and recommendations. We expect a comprehensive analysis of our policies, procedures and controls related to identifying and reporting crimes and misconduct, including failures or gaps that may have allowed alleged misconduct to go undetected or unreported. We will provide our initial response later today.
We want to ensure we are giving the report careful scrutiny and consideration before making any announcements or recommendations. We are convening an internal team comprising the Board of Trustees, University administration and our legal counsel to begin analyzing the report and digesting Judge Freeh’s findings.
As we anticipate the review and approval process will take some time, our initial response and immediate next steps will be presented at 3:30 p.m. at the Dayton/Taylor Conference Room at the Hilton Scranton & Conference Center.
These top-line reactions will provide an overview of our process for developing and implementing a plan once we have studied the report and have a better understanding of what it means and how we can implement findings to strengthen Penn State’s role as a leading academic institution and ensure that what occurred will never be allowed to happen again.”
Freeh: Most powerful men at Penn State failed to protect children
Louis Freeh, who headed the Penn State investigation, has released a copy of the remarks he plans to give at a press conference at 10 a.m. today. You can read the full release online, but here are some highlights:- “The most powerful men at Penn State failed to take any steps for 14 years to protect the children who Sandusky victimized. Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley never demonstrated, through actions or words, any concern for the safety and well-being of
Sandusky’s victims until after Sandusky’s arrest.”
- Investigators did more than 430 interviews, and analyzed more than 3.5 million e-mails and other documents.
- “Our investigative team made independent discovery of critical 1998 and 2001 emails – the most important evidence in this investigation.”
- “Penn State failed to implement the provisions of the Clery Act, a 1990 federal law that requires the collecting and reporting of the crimes such as Sandusky committed on campus in 2001. Indeed, on the day Sandusky was arrested, Penn State’s Clery Act implementation plan was still in draft form. Mr. Spanier said that he and the Board never even had a discussion about the Clery Act until November 2011.”
- Some individuals declined to be interviewed, including Curley and Schultz, the administrators facing charges. The Pennsylvania Attorney General requested that investigators not interview certain potential
witnesses. “Mr. Paterno passed away before we had the opportunity to speak with him, although we did speak with some of his representatives. We believe that he was willing to speak with us and would have done so, but for his serious, deteriorating health. We were able to review and evaluate his grand jury testimony, his public statements, and notes and papers from his files that were provided to us by his attorney.”
Jay Paterno: 'We've never been afraid of the truth'
Jay Paterno, son of the late Joe Paterno, appeared on NBC’s Today this morning to talk about the upcoming release of Penn State’s internal investigation.NBC’s Matt Lauer asked Paterno, dressed in a dark suit, if he had any trepidation about the report, which will be released at 9 a.m. Jay Paterno said no.
“All Joe Paterno has wanted and all anybody at Penn State and certainly my family has wanted is for the investigation to look into the things that have happened and find the truth and go from there,’’ said Paterno, who also coached at Penn State, but has left the program.
The Paterno family has been concerned that most of Freeh’s investigation occurred after the coach died in January. On Wednesday, the family released an essay that they say Paterno wrote before his death.
Names to look for in the Freeh report
There are a lot of names that could appear in this report. Here’s a quick who’s who:Louis Freeh: Former federal judge and director of the FBI who was recruited by the Penn State Board of Trustees to conduct an internal investigation and release a public report.
Jerry Sandusky: Former Penn State assistant football coach and founder of the Second Mile charity, who was convicted in June of 45 counts of child sex abuse.
Joe Paterno: Legendary Penn State football coach who was fired in the wake of Sandusky’s arrest and died in January.
Graham Spanier: Longtime president of Penn State who was forced out of his position the same night as Paterno.
Rodney Erickson: Current president of Penn State.
Tim Curley: Former Penn State athletic director who is currently on leave. Curley is charged with perjury and failure to report child abuse, and has maintained his innocence.
Gary Schultz: Retired Penn State vice president for business and finance who oversaw the university’s police, legal and human resources departments. He is also charged with perjury and failure to report, and also maintains his innocence.
Mike McQueary: An assistant Penn State football coach, who took a break from coaching last season when it became public that he was the former graduate student to report seeing Sandusky naked with a young boy in a locker room shower. McQueary testified at Sandusky’s trial last month.
Joe Amendola: Sandusky’s lead defense attorney, who has a practice in State College, Pa., Penn State’s home.
Karl Rominger: Another Sandusky defense attorney.
Joseph McGettigan III: The lead prosecutor in the Sandusky case.
Tom Corbett: Former Pennsylvania attorney general who launched the investigation into Sandusky. He is now the governor.
Linda Kelly: Pennsylvania’s current attorney general.
Frank Noonan: Pennsylvania State Police commissioner.
Jack Raykovitz: Former CEO of the Second Mile, the charity that Sandusky founded to help at-risk children. He resigned last year. Second Mile has since decided to cease existence and split its assets among other charities in the state.
Sue Paterno: Joe Paterno’s wife.
Jay Paterno: Paterno’s son who also became a Penn State coach but recently left. He has been a spokesman for his family.
Dottie Sandusky: The wife of Jerry Sandusky who testified in defense of her husband last month.
What is the Freeh report?
Click here for a full gallery of the Jerry Sandusky case.
That’s where former FBI director Louis Freeh will release his report on a months-long investigation. Freeh was hired last year by the Penn State University Board of Trustees, following the November arrest of former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky on charges that he sexually abused boys, often on campus, and allegations that Penn State officials did not properly respond to at least one report of such abuse. Here is some basic information ahead of the report release:
Did Penn State trustees or officials review this report before its release? We were told that they would not be allowed to see it ahead of time. The release this morning is supposed to be the first look for everyone.
What did this cost? As of February, Penn State reported that it had spent $5.3 million on the internal investigation AND crisis communications.
How long will this report be? We have no idea, but I imagine that the number of pages could easily number in the hundreds. (A 2007 investigation into the mass shootings at Virginia Tech resulted in a 260-page report.)
What sort of access did Freeh have to the university? The trustees said that Freeh would be given “unfettered access in order to conduct a thorough investigation.” That included access to e-mails, documents and interviews, among other things.
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