Commentary: Penn State Officials Needed to Step in, by Tom Flynn, The Patriot-News, November 7, 2011

Commentary: Penn State Officials Needed to Step in

By Tom Flynn
The Patriot-News
November 7, 2011

http://blog.pennlive.com/patriotnewssports/2011/11/commentary_penn_state_official.html

Penn State head coach Joe Paterno.

Given the horrific reports about a former football coach at my alma mater, it's weirdly comforting to fall back on my high school days in suburban Philadelphia. It's not the first time that people of educational power have let me down.

I graduated from Cardinal O'Hara High School, Class of '81. Several priests who taught at O'Hara during my school days were named in the sexual abuse scandals of the Philadelphia Archdiocese.

We've reacted in different ways; some have walked away from the Catholic Church entirely, some have supported the church, no questions asked. I think the majority of us are in the middle, angry that these priests sullied our school and our faith but trying to not let their actions affect the roots of who we are and what we believe.

Penn State alumni, students and fans are immersed in the same emotional tornado after the shocking news that Jerry Sandusky, the beloved former defensive coordinator, has been charged with multiple counts of sexually abusing boys.

This scandal has the very real potential of ending the Hall of Fame career of head coach Joe Paterno. It certainly will tarnish the careers of Athletic Director Tim Curley and university Vice President Gary C. Schultz, and very possibly university President Graham Spanier.

(Late Sunday night, Curley asked to be placed on administrative leave and Schultz asked to step down and return to retirement at an emergency meeting of the university's Board of Trustees. Resignations of Paterno and Spanier weren't discussed at the meeting, which was arranged Sunday and lasted two hours, university spokesman Bill Mahon said.)

One of the few positive notes that could be taken out of the voluminous grand jury report is Paterno's cooperation. When a graduate assistant coach, identified by The Patriot-News as current wide receivers coach and recruiting coordinator Mike McQueary, reportedly saw Sandusky in the football locker room with a boy, he reported it to Paterno.

Paterno then reported what McQueary told him to Curley, his immediate supervisor. Paterno has given the same account to the grand jury.

Did Paterno do what was required of him by law? Apparently so. Did he do what morals and ethics — the bedrock on which he built Penn State's "Success With Honor" football program — dictated him to do?

No.

Paterno, who famously chased Curley and Spanier out of his house a few years ago when they suggested that he might be getting too old to coach, is one of the most powerful men in this state. He could have and should have done more.

And what about Curley and Schultz? Once they knew, what was their response? Allegedly they told Sandusky and The Second Mile, the charity for at-risk kids that Sandusky created, that he couldn't bring any more kids into the football offices, a ban that all have said wasn't sustainable.

Curley also reportedly informed Spanier of this action; Spanier apparently did nothing further with this information.

For not reporting Sandusky's alleged incident to the police, Curley, who played football for Paterno and thus was immersed in the Penn State way, and Schultz have been charged with perjury in their grand jury testimony and for failing to alert police and other agencies — as required by state law — of their investigation into the allegations.

What is disgusting to me and many of my Penn State buddies is that the very people who preached responsibility and honor did all they could to protect the reputation of the football program ahead of the children who Sandusky allegedly abused.

How dare they? Why didn't any of these people — Paterno, Curley, Schultz or Spanier — contact the police with what was obviously a criminal matter?

Why do some people, whether it's at Penn State, in the Catholic Church hierarchy or any at institution with power and influence, think of these children as expendable? What is wrong with these people, this nation, when we stop caring about the most vulnerable among us?

That's what has so many Penn Staters upset. We're part of an institution that has long carried itself as doing things the right way. We believed in it. No matter how this sordid chapter unfolds, we'll never feel the same way about Penn State again.