Patterico's Pontifications

6/22/2012

Sandusky Guilty

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 8:18 pm

On 45 of 48 counts.

Comments (171)

171 Responses to “Sandusky Guilty”

Ding.
Patterico (906cfb) — 6/22/2012 @ 8:20 pm
I am not surprised. I saw one MSM newsperson the other night saying that it might be hard to convict Sandusky because of all of the support he gets from Penn State fans- which I thought was a totally mistaken perception.

As I understand it, there would have been little more Joe Paterno could have done than personally ask the state AG to follow up on it. The Penn State University police I believe are the police that have official jurisdiction. Paterno saw to it that not only did the direct witness report it to university officials, but to the police dept. as well. In some ways Paterno was bigger than life, but that didn’t mean everybody, including higher univ. officials and DA’s would automatically do what he told them to; and it probably would have been out of character for him to try to bully people.

The remaining question is whether Sandusky/this case/etc. is tied in any way to the disappearance in the early 2000’s of the DA that declined to prosecute Sandusky atound 1998 in relation to an incident which I beleived led to his forced resignation as a PSU coach.

Open to correction if some of those details are not quite right.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/22/2012 @ 8:49 pm
I’m a bit surprised, but I always am when such things come to trial. I must pay too much attention to those cases when they’re overturned, decades later, and hope they won’t happen again. Maybe he indeed did the deed. He’s definitely been found guilty of having done so.
htom (412a17) — 6/22/2012 @ 9:07 pm
In the believe it or not department, the NYT violated the judge’s order to not report any findings until the completion of the hearing. Local media is furious and demanding sanctions.

I want to see if that sanctimonious AG goes after the power that covered this all up. Not just perjury, but conspiracy after and before the facts.

I could not stomach that tool as she lectured police agencies to believe EVERY report when the local agency in HER commonwealth failed to act in 1998. “Every” kid tells the truth, right? Just like the McMartins, eh? She is a disgusting person.
Ed from SFV (68921e) — 6/22/2012 @ 9:14 pm
It would have been nice if CA had pursued the Archdiocese of L.A. as enthusiatically as PA went after Sandusky.
AD-RtR/OS! (2bb434) — 6/22/2012 @ 9:57 pm
It’s difficult to comment on this given the disparity between the political affiliations of those who cried “guilty” when this case first came to the press – they were all over the political spectrum. Granted, it was at least a decade after the facts of the initial allegations.

Many people appear to be judging this case according to their own political assumptions; yet this case has nothing at all to do with national, nor even commonwealth of PA politics. It has everything to do with the lesser-known but equally passionate politics of college sports, who’s affiliations are much more complicated than liberal vs. conservative.

We’ve allowed the powers that be to maintain their dominance without question, and we have no control over the outside influences they may bring into them – namely; circumstance-specific anomalous charitable organizations that reach out to individuals who are not a part of that politic.

In other words, Penn State allowed a jurisdiction (Sandusky’s charitable organization) to have more power than was granted to it. Sandusky’s charitable work was not inside the radar of the college’s political jurisdiction. And Penn State presented a rather casual attitude towards that dynamic, when as an academic institution, they should have known better.

But that does not excuse Penn State from liability in this case. Not addressing certain apparent and anomalous jurisdictions is not an excuse. Someone should have addressed the issue of minors being present on campus without parental supervision.

This started in the 1990s when the law was already very clear about such issues; yet Penn State preferred to ignore the law in order to support the particular peculiarities that made Sandusky desirable. If anyone does not believe that personality quirks do not matter, they need to think again. Sandusky rose above the fray with his do or die personality and that’s what made him attractive; and also what made him potentially dangerous given parameters that are outside the university’s jurisdiction. It’s no different in preferring a soldier who is not afraid to kill, but might be a problem off the battle field.

One might argue “who would have known?,” but such an assessment is inadequate given what became known a short time after his hire. It was clear that he was engaged in out of the ordinary relationships with minors. Even one of his assistant coaches was able to make that assessment based on quite relevant eyewitness testimony; yet Penn State ignored it. For an educational institution to not know those particular parameters and the dangers they might present is astonishing. They clearly failed to put the academic pieces together in order to discover that Sandusky was a dangerous man in the presence of vulnerable minors. All of the data was available to them in one form or another.

It all makes me wonder what the benefit of an academic education is worth if the studies conducted over decades in academic research failed to alert an academic institution to those very dangers present on its own campus. Men who prefer young boys are dangerous. NAMBLA, of all the radical liberal movements has not even succeeded in winning the sentiments of most radical liberals.

But there’s more involved here than just political world-views. What’s involved is institutional evil. The sort of evil that has no political affiliation; but does have a social apparatus. The apparatus of “live and let live.” The apparatus of “see no evil.” The apparatus of employment apart from social and moral responsibility. In all those areas, Penn State has failed as an academic institution, but might prosper as a harbinger of cronyism.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 12:42 am
basically the takeaway is that if you’ve ever played sports in America the chance that this man didn’t molest you is exceedingly small
happyfeet (3c92a1) — 6/23/2012 @ 4:12 am
Great job by the prosecution. Let’s see if we can’t hold some people accountable for complacency in the matter.
tye (60b080) — 6/23/2012 @ 4:12 am
Yes Brandon, the liberals in this country advocate for child molestation. Didn’t you see Obama’s nambla fundraiser last week? Moron. Why do you numbskulls on the fringes make everything about politics? Is it to make yourselves feel better about the people that we’ve executed who were innocent of their crimes?
tye (60b080) — 6/23/2012 @ 4:16 am
tye,

Not sure what you mean.

Holding people accountable is what I’m suggesting as well. It goes far beyond Sandusky and far beyond politics. It’s an issue of training and protocol for an institution. I’ve worked in institutions where employees are held strictly as “mandated reporters of abuse” to the extent that they can be prosecuted for failure to report – but we usually fired them for such failure before the law got involved. Of course the law had access to them if they desired to pursue them, but the point is that people are not so valuable that they can get away with abuse. That needs to be a bottom line for any institution that works with dependent people – minors or otherwise.

Institutions that I’ve worked for take it so seriously such that any hint of abuse must be immediately and intensely investigated and reported; even if one believes it to be frivolous. That’s clearly what needs to happen at Penn State and all other institutions that might permit the presence of parentally unsupervised minors. Most institutions that supervise minors already have such protocol in place. Penn State slipped through the cracks because the presence of parentally unsupervised minors is perhaps not a usual occurrence.

It doesn’t take money to implement such protocol and procedure, but proper training, and re-training until it gets through to the thickest skulls. Such protocol becomes an issue of utmost importance such that retraining occurs several times per year, and people are strictly disciplined for failure to follow the reporting protocol.

Some government oversight committee is going to get their hands on this and try to implement regulations that go far beyond what is necessary. So Penn State ought to treat this with the utmost importance in implementing protocol and procedure that go far beyond what some government agency is going to demand. They need to be better experts on abuse than the government. That’s what happened in the institutions I worked in.

If they don’t want to train their people, then a policy of not permitting parentally unsupervised minors should be in place and enforced judiciously.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:43 am
Brandon,

You said:

NAMBLA, of all the radical liberal movements has not even succeeded in winning the sentiments of most radical liberals.

Tye’s response:

Yes Brandon, the liberals in this country advocate for child molestation. Didn’t you see Obama’s nambla fundraiser last week? Moron. Why do you numbskulls on the fringes make everything about politics? Is it to make yourselves feel better about the people that we’ve executed who were innocent of their crimes?

Your comments are excellent and I agree with your conclusions, especially regarding institutional responsibility. Tye is an occasional liberal commenter who frequently disagrees with things he reads here. I think he was being overly sensitive about liberal-bashing in this instance but, even if he wasn’t, it’s true that liberals are more permissive about sex than conservatives. As a result, your point that “even … the most radical liberals” don’t approve of child molestation is valid.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 6:20 am
It was all but over after the first witness testified.

Stll, I began to be worried when reading press accounts of the defense “finishing strong” – with the defense hoping for Dottie-style denial to protect Penn.

Also see Citizen K for a comparison of methods. Bribery, attention to gain access, control, under the guise of help and guidance – punishment, witholding and cut off from bennies as a means to maintain it whenever any sign of autonomy appears.

The end of chapter 35 of Citizen K will break your heart.
Sarahw (b0e533) — 6/23/2012 @ 6:55 am
I want to celebrate this, but I really just have to imagine that his actual victims will get a modicum of closure and consolation from this, long overdue. Some people will have to live with their own conscience, wondering if they did they right thing, or enough.
JD (33493e) — 6/23/2012 @ 6:59 am
I agree that politics have little to do with this.

I think the biggest danger is for people to think, “How terrible Penn State is, I am glad that couldn’t happen here”.

Brandon, I have a little different view about minors unsupervised by parents. Primarily, your comments seem to suggest to me that what Penn State did was out of the norm. All kinds of colleges all over have all kinds of sports (and academic) camps and such during the summer with probably no different supervision that was at Penn State. All kinds of summer camps exist where children spend several days with staff who may include some “unwholesome” characters who have slipped through the screening process. Indeed, part of this incident shows that, at least initially, it may not be so easy to pick out a dangerous person; that person may have many traits that make them trusted, that make people “give them the benefit of the doubt” when things are “a little funny”, and make it hard for some to even take action when it becomes clear things are not right. I think in some ways his wife does think he is “innocent”, in that she really can’t grasp the reality of who her husband is in a way that allows her to respond fully rationally. I’m not trying to make excuses, I’m trying to help people see what they need to in order to not be part of similar tragedies in their own lives.

I’ve worked in institutions where employees are held strictly as “mandated reporters of abuse” to the extent that they can be prosecuted for failure to report – but we usually fired them for such failure before the law got involved. Of course the law had access to them if they desired to pursue them, but the point is that people are not so valuable that they can get away with abuse. That needs to be a bottom line for any institution that works with dependent people – minors or otherwise

I do not know if you realize that the abuse was reported to the appropriate civil authorities that had jurisdiction for law enforcement. I do not know if you realize that a DA that was involved in this case mysteriously disappeared a few years ago and has never been found.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/23/2012 @ 7:28 am
Michael Jackson just loved little boys and Jerry Sandusky had a heart of gold. The North American Man/Boy Love Association wants to keep Barack Obama in office, and the Democrat Party supports the adoption of little boys by same-sex couples.

If we were moved and outraged by the testimony of Sandusky’s victims, just imagine the tears in our future and the pointed questions the next round of serial molestation victims will have for our politically correct enablers.
ropelight (44c2ac) — 6/23/2012 @ 7:38 am
Sent this to you, Patrick, by email last night. If you get a chance can you give it a shout out? “Debunking Rachel Maddow’s Lies About ‘Fast and Furious’: MSNBC Hack Falsely Claims Scandal Just Like Shirley Sherrod ‘Conspiracy'”. Thanks.
Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) (c33a1d) — 6/23/2012 @ 9:23 am
There ought to be a death sentence for this creep.
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hack xu, hack xu vinagame, hack xu gunny, hack gunny (ba6451) — 6/23/2012 @ 9:48 am
Personal responsibility makes tye feel all *icky*! It’s just too personal.
Icy (f2d3a5) — 6/23/2012 @ 9:53 am
Personal responsibility makes tye feel all *icky*!

Personal responsibility seemed to make Jerry Sandusky feel all icky.

Anybody else get the impression he didn’t think raping little boys was much of a crime?

I could be wrong, but it seemed to me the guy was marching around like the whole thing was some kind of a joke.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 10:03 am
Interesting legal factoid probably lost on non-lawyer types — I always smile when I see a jury in a case like this include an acquittal or 3 on specific counts. I’m sure they don’t understand what they have done, but the result is that the verdict is pretty much bullet-proof.

There is a line of authority in case law involving highly charged emotional cases like this that a verdict can sometimes be undermined on appeal by claiming that the jury allowed its emotions to get the best of its judgment, and it stampeded itself into guilty verdicts on all counts, when the law requires individualized consideration of the evidence at to each count separately.

This is not normally a successful argument on appeal following a conviction by a jury, but it is something for a defense to push forward to an appellate panel. In a case where there might be other evidentiary issues which might otherwise fall in the category of “harmless error”, a claim of a runaway jury can tip the scales.

But where, as here, the jury acquits on one or more counts, it pretty much inoculates the verdict from the claim that the jury was swayed by its emotions rather than carefully considering the evidence. The acquitted counts pretty much establish that the jury gave individualized attention to the evidence of each particular count, as they found 3 counts to be not sufficiently supported.
shipwreckedcrew (06750d) — 6/23/2012 @ 10:10 am
shipwreckedcrew @ 21,

I assume the jury is not informed of this beforehand and most non-lawyer jurists aren’t aware of this, so in light of that, wouldn’t this then speak highly of the jury and their having done due diligence with regard to each and every charge?

I recall that there had been some concerns with the jury members and their various connections and/or loyalties to Penn State. In the linked article, it states,

“The judge, however, said Penn State connections would not automatically disqualify potential jurors as long as they could pledge to be impartial. “
Dana (4eca6e) — 6/23/2012 @ 10:42 am
Interesting legal factoid probably lost on non-lawyer types

I’m sure lots of things are lost on us non-legal types.

But shouldn’t they be?

A jury of your peers doesn’t mean the 1996 graduating class of Yale Law school.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 10:57 am
I think in some ways his wife does think he is “innocent”, in that she really can’t grasp the reality of who her husband is in a way that allows her to respond fully rationally. I’m not trying to make excuses, I’m trying to help people see what they need to in order to not be part of similar tragedies in their own lives.

I believe Mrs. Sandusky has rationalized and found a way to keep the horrible, horrible truth somewhere at the far periphery of her mind where it does not intrude on her daily living. Perhaps willfully or perhaps a survival mechanism kicked in, but it seems unlikely that there wasn’t some moment where a sickening realization swept over her, no matter how fleeting. I can’t imagine what it would be like to be married for so long to such a monster. I can’t imagine how and where to compartmentalize such knowledge, thus don’t know that I would react any differently. It would take unspeakable strength and courage to face this squarely about one’s mate and take appropriate action. However, the power and strength it would take to push this away or mask it would seemingly be equal to fully confronting it, too. It makes me wonder if she were disconnected from this long, long before the victims spoke out and perhaps way back when, when something happened in their home and she knew. Somewhere along the line, she made a deliberate choice, it would seem…
Dana (4eca6e) — 6/23/2012 @ 11:03 am
From what I’ve seen, her story was basically “I know that Jerry didn’t have any inappropriate contact with those boys when he was alone with them in our basement.”

An’ dere’s a river called de Nile in Egypt, too.
Icy (f2d3a5) — 6/23/2012 @ 11:09 am
Somewhere along the line, she made a deliberate choice, it would seem…

I don’t begrudge an individual the right to contest their innocence. Even if it’s not true.

It strikes me, though, that the there were a bunch of characters who didn’t think what was going on was a big deal. Not Jerry Sandusky. Not the wifey.

Some 200 plus pound guy is playing tickle monster with a ten year old boy. She’s cool with it.

She belongs in prison.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 11:23 am
thanks 21.
mg (44de53) — 6/23/2012 @ 11:39 am
Steve57,

Accessory?
Dana (4eca6e) — 6/23/2012 @ 12:18 pm
What if she knew what her hubby was up to, and she did nothing.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 12:59 pm
Horrible people are horrible. News at 11.
Jamie (ee4a20) — 6/23/2012 @ 1:06 pm
@Steve57–

I agree with your comment at 10:03am. I really don’t think Sandusky is right in the head (in a rather different way from the usual situation that all pedophiles are not right in the head). Several of his published statements and letters to the victims suggested that he is genuinely clueless about his actions being off the charts of normal societal behavior. I wish he had testified because I think it would have been interesting if not shocking to hear what he thought was OK in the course of his “work” with youth.

If one reads about confessed pedophiles most of them seemed to know that what they were doing was wrong (or a sin) and do recognize that they were not supposed to be doing it–but they just couldn’t control their impulses. So they sneak around and cover their tracks. It sure seems that Sandusky’s use of his own home, his own “charity”, publicly going on trips, and openly using his access to the facilities at Penn State did not constitute “sneaking around” in the traditional sense. Several things he’s said suggest that he still believes he did much more good than ill for the troubled boys.

Be that as it may, Sandusky did evil deeds and has ruined untold lives. He deserves to die in prison. Penn State needs to be investigated every way from Sunday and made to pay for its coverup. And like MD in Philly I still want to know what happened to the disappeared DA.
elissa (81baaa) — 6/23/2012 @ 1:10 pm
The whole point of denial, delusion, repression, … is that they are not conscious choices, they are psychological ego defenses that prevent you from knowing the hidden events, and neither the defenses nor the events are available to the normal mental reviewing process. If (not when) the delusion comes undone, the denial stops, and the repressed memories return it can be a real shock. People look at you and ask “How could you not have known?” and you don’t have an answer. You don’t even have a bad answer. Those you’ve hurt frequently find it impossible to believe you didn’t know. If you’re very lucky, you and your victim have mutual friends who’ve known something goofy was going on between you, who can reassure you that you’re not suddenly crazy, and your victim that you were a little out of your mind. It’s not easy for anyone involved, and that’s just when it’s about a pair of fifty-year-old unrequited crushes. Something like this …
htom (412a17) — 6/23/2012 @ 1:10 pm
Sometimes the spouse in stories like this seem worse to me than the abuser, especially when the spouse is a mother. How can a mother sacrifice her own or someone else’s child?
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 1:19 pm
DRJ — because she does not know that’s what she’s done. Casey Anthony comes to mind; I think it’s very likely that Caylee died accidentally and Casey hid the body, and then repressed all of that. She does not know that she did. Denial is not lying, saying you didn’t when you know you did; it is saying you didn’t because you believe you didn’t.
htom (412a17) — 6/23/2012 @ 1:27 pm
There’s a difference between being in denial because of actual ignorance and being in denial as a protective mechanism. IMO, the best you can say is that she was in denial to protect her family’s provider and lifestyle.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 1:39 pm
elissa,

I also feel that Sandusky has something more off than the standard pedophile (no irony intended). He seemed clueless about his perception of young boys as well as how the public perceived him when the victims started speaking out. Almost as if it were a shock he was being asked the questions – in spite of the victims’ statements.

What comes to mind most is his stumbling through the painful Bob Costas questioning. An immediate No would have been the appropriate and expected answer from anyone – that he hemmed and hawed was telling. It’s difficult to wrap one’s mind around this.

Costas: “Are you sexually attracted to young boys, to underage boys?”

Sandusky: “Am I sexually attracted to underage boys?”

Costas: “Yes.”

Sandusky (after a two-second pause): “Sexually attracted? You know, I enjoy young people. I love to be around them. I… but no, I’m not sexually attracted to them, to young boys.”
Dana (4eca6e) — 6/23/2012 @ 1:47 pm
There’s a difference between being in denial because of actual ignorance and being in denial as a protective mechanism. IMO, the best you can say is that she was in denial to protect her family’s provider and lifestyle.

The problem to the rest of us comes in the distinction between “in denial” and “denying to”; the former is the ego defense, repressing the knowledge (“That didn’t happen.”); the latter is suppression of the knowledge, which requires having been conscious of that which was suppressed (“I’m going to pretend that didn’t happen”.)
htom (412a17) — 6/23/2012 @ 2:04 pm
Further, from Sandusky’s 2000 autobiography, Touched,

‘I believe I live a good part of my life in a make-believe world,’ Sandusky wrote in one of the final chapters. ‘I enjoyed pretending as a kid, and I love doing the same as an adult with these kids.’
Dana (4eca6e) — 6/23/2012 @ 2:12 pm
Those are all good examples to support what we are sensing about him, Dana. It could be interesting to hear what some of his chums from his own childhood and adolescence might have to say were they to come forward.
elissa (81baaa) — 6/23/2012 @ 2:21 pm
DRJ asked — 6/23/2012 @ 1:19

How can a mother sacrifice her own or someone else’s child?

I asked the exact same question of my own mother and she said she didn’t think she had any other choice.
ropelight (44c2ac) — 6/23/2012 @ 2:43 pm
As a result, your point that “even … the most radical liberals” don’t approve of child molestation is valid.…
Except, where they do!
http://pjmedia.com/zombie/2012/06/18/occupy-oakland-protests-in-favor-of-child-sex-trafficking/
AD-RtR/OS! (2bb434) — 6/23/2012 @ 2:44 pm
What if she knew what her hubby was up to, and she did nothing.

She’ll probably get along famously with Cardinal Roger Mahoney.
AD-RtR/OS! (2bb434) — 6/23/2012 @ 2:49 pm
Here is the story of a wife and mother who indeed did not know that her husband was not only a pedophile, but on the Board of Directors of NAMBLA (the mind boggles).

In her case, overcome by the revulsion of what and who he was and crimes committed, she divorced her husband and her family no longer has any contact with him. That seems the reasonable response to making such a discovery.

That Mrs. Sandusky remained with her husband in spite of the vitims’ collective testimony, and her steadfast denial of having knowledge of what was taking place under their roof leads me to believe she began her deep denial from the get-go, way before it became public. Somehow, she was able to steel herself, look the other way, to the point of re-shaping reality: He really *is* innocent.

Which doesn’t excuse her.
Dana (4eca6e) — 6/23/2012 @ 2:51 pm
ropelight,

Sometimes we don’t have a choice but I don’t see that in this case. I admit I’m looking at this from afar, but it appears to me that the Penn State authorities and Mrs. Sandusky had choices. They just didn’t like those choices as much as the status quo.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 3:13 pm
DRJ, you’re on the right track, now imagine looking at it from the child’s perspective.
ropelight (44c2ac) — 6/23/2012 @ 3:27 pm
Yes. That’s the perspective real adults should care about.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 3:29 pm
Nancy Garrido (wife of the monster who kidnapped and kept Jaycee Dugard captive for 18 years) also comes to mind when one considers “choices” and “looking the other way” and “sacrificing someone else’s child”.

There are just some sick, sick people out in the world. The monsters and psychopaths and sociopaths– along with all their other issues– often seem unusually adept in choosing helpmates who are vulnerable and needy themselves.
elissa (81baaa) — 6/23/2012 @ 3:33 pm
DRJ and elissa, the child has two parents, one is an abuser and the other is such an ineffective protector that her good intentions only result in extending the abuse till the child is old enough to leave home.
ropelight (44c2ac) — 6/23/2012 @ 3:44 pm
I think I understand, ropelight. As elissa said, they are helpmates and enablers. Perhaps some of the abusers go even further because they have that support.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 4:18 pm
htom #37,

I understand the distinction you’ve drawn but please explain to me which you think applies here and why you think it matters, either legally or morally. I’m sure it matters from a medical perspective and feel free to opine on that, too, but the legal and moral issues are what interest me.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 4:37 pm
I really don’t think Sandusky is right in the head (in a rather different way from the usual situation that all pedophiles are not right in the head). Several of his published statements and letters to the victims suggested that he is genuinely clueless about his actions being off the charts of normal societal behavior.

I can deal with the idea that Sandusky wasn’t right in the head. But everyone around him? How could they not notice? That’s the part I can’t wrap my mind around.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:01 pm
MD in Philly

I read all of the prosecution’s case when Sandusky was arrested. So I know that it was reported. However, the assistant coach did not report it to the police right away. He reported it (I believe) to some administrator and Joe Paterno the next day.

Mandated reporting protocol is quite clear that administrators, while they might be what’s called an “abuse coordinator,” they are not law enforcement.

The way most reporting systems work is that one person in the institution is designated as an abuse coordinator, and it’s that person’s responsibility to coordinate reporting to law enforcement and other governmental agencies. Usually they have a 24 hour window to conduct their own investigations, but it’s also general protocol to remove any alleged abuser. What we usually did was to suspend any alleged abuser until the investigation was complete. Then when we’ve completed our own investigation, we would fax all of our reports to law enforcement and all the agencies we were mandated to report to. Those agencies would come to us and conduct their own investigations as well.

I don’t know much about the law concerning abuse to minors, because I worked mainly with dependent adults – I suspect it’s even more strict as far as reporting. But the actual form in CA on which an employee is to file a report of abuse, states that failure to report directly to law enforcement may lead to criminal incarceration.

The way most facilities get around staff having to call the police every time there is an allegation of abuse, is through a system whereby the reports are faxed by the abuse coordinator to law enforcement within 24 hours of the alleged abuse. Staff are then trained on what that system entails. Of course they are also instructed that if they feel law enforcement is needed immediately, they also have the option to do so. But they all know who the abuse coordinator is, and what their responsibility is concerning informing that person immediately upon any suspected or allegation of abuse.

Penn State did not appear to have such a system in place, so reporting abuse to an administrator who apparently does not understand his own legal responsibility, is hardly reporting.

You mentioned sport camps on campus. I believe that anyone working with children should have a police check for any history of abuse. There is a national data base that keeps this information, and a person’s status can be determined within just a couple of hours.

But Sandusky didn’t have a police record to my knowledge, so just because somebody is not on the national data base does not imply that they are trustworthy. They may have just never got caught.

So you also need certain practices in place to prevent any potential perpetrator from being alone with minors.

We had a practice to protect male staff from being accused by a female resident of abuse. That practice was that whenever a male staff is present with a female resident, a female staff is also present.

So with the shower situation, you make certain that there’s at least two staff present. The one staff who might witness the other staff abuse a child knows that he/she is a mandated reporter who could be arrested and incarcerated for failure to report. Crony systems don’t tend to work in these types of situations when people know that their jobs and their freedom are on the line. A system like that would be essential, in my view for any program working with minors or dependent adults.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:04 pm
Maybe I’m weird, but if I’m married to you and I find out you’re a child rapist, I’m first in line to hold you down so a relative of someone you raped can beat you to death.

And, no, I don’t believe that’s a particularly noble sentiment. In case anyone was wondering.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:08 pm
I was taught (long ago and far away) that for someone to be found legally guilty required that the accused be found beyond reasonable doubt to have:
1) committed the act and
2) that the act be illegal in law at the time of the act and
3) the act be committed with criminal intent.
(I understand that this teaching would these days be considered to be old-fashioned at best, and wrong by many.)

If someone commits a murder while sleepwalking, do they have criminal intent? (I don’t know; if the victim was someone with whom they’d had previous violent encounters there’d be a different case than if the victim was a total stranger, and it would be different again if the victim was a look-alike for an abusive parent.) If you do not consciously know, can you form intent, legal, moral, of any kind?

We seem to be proceeding on a path that says since she could have known, or should have known, or might have known … that she did know, and thus she intentionally did not act on this knowledge. In a way, that’s worse than demanding proof of innocence — which is sometimes available — it’s “prove you did not know”. I think that’s a proof that can never be given, and to ask for it is immoral. It’s probably legal to do so, and that says more about the legal system than those convicted because they couldn’t make the proof.

Did Mrs. Sandusky consciously know that her husband was abusing those children? I don’t know. I think it is possible that she did not; information that would indicate he was behaving in that way was so repressed that she was never aware of it. And if that’s the case, she could not act on it. Would it be moral or legal for her to complain that her husband was abusing children if she did not know of such, but only thought that it was possible for him to be doing so? That’s true of everyone, and hardly a useful complaint.

Not that our legal system doesn’t seem to embark on such cases at times. In a very strange way, I hope that Mr. Sandusky did indeed commit these acts, because he will never be able to escape the blame for them, even if it’s somehow shown he did not.
htom (412a17) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:18 pm
As I understand it, there would have been little more Joe Paterno could have done than personally ask the state AG to follow up on it. The Penn State University police I believe are the police that have official jurisdiction. Paterno saw to it that not only did the direct witness report it to university officials, but to the police dept. as well. In some ways Paterno was bigger than life, but that didn’t mean everybody, including higher univ. officials and DA’s would automatically do what he told them to; and it probably would have been out of character for him to try to bully people.

Had he done so, he may well have jeopardized the investigation and prosecution.
Michael Ejercito (2e0217) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:18 pm
Penn State did not appear to have such a system in place…

If a university system does have such a system in place, isn’t that just a roundabout way of saying you’re not going to report child molestation to the cops?

What stops someone from walking off campus and telling the local sheriff that assistant coach so-and-so is diddling the water boy.

Except maybe an official policy. Which means someone thought of this.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:20 pm
Potentially big problem with this verdict now.

Apparently the defense attorneys filed a motion to delay the trial or to be relieved from the case because they claimed they needed more time to prepare. The judge denied the motion.

This is a huge problem because this case went from indictment to trial in approximately 7 months — that is very very fast.

If the defense lawyers showed in their motion that they had prepared diligently, but even having done so there were other things they wanted to do prior to trial, but the judge denied them the time to do that, he has created a huge problem with regard to the defendant’s 6th Amendment right to effective representation by counsel.

I don’t know anything about the trial judge, but this kind of decision — forcing defense counsel to trial before when they say they are not ready, in a case that is going to trial very quickly, given the stakes involved — is a fertile ground for appeal.

And because it involves a constitutional question, this issue will survive all his state court appeals, and will be an issue that can be raised in a habeas corpus filing in federal court.

This is a very big deal.
shipwreckedcrew (06750d) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:23 pm
htom,

I said I’m interested in the legal and moral issues, but you seem to be conflating the two. Proving someone is legally responsible is much different than moral culpability.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:25 pm
Jerry Sandusky is a nithing- homo sapiens by birth, subhuman by choice. The key word is choice. He was born with the same human nature as the rest of us. His choices made him a nithing.

Bill explains what nithings are.

http://www.israpundit.com/2008/?p=9446

Define and Dehumanize the Enemy: Jihadists as Nithings or Nidings

by Bill Levinson
It is an ancient principle of magic (which modern people recognize as
stories that reflect a society’s culture and psychology) that
knowledge of a person’s real or True Name delivers power over that
person. What it really means is that, if you know the person’s
psychology, you can gain an advantage over him. It is also well known
that the side that controls the language of an argument controls the
argument. As an example, Hamas terrorists and their enablers refer to
Israel’s military as an “occupation force” and terrorisitic violence
against civilians as “resistance.”

We have long sought a single word that strips the enemy of all
humanity, and reduces him to something less than an animal that is
worthy of nothing less than extermination. As far as we know, the
English language contains no such word, although “dreck” (garbage or
refuse) comes close. “Homo sapiens by BIRTH, subhuman by CHOICE”
describes Islamic supremacists perfectly, but it is a phrase and not a
word. We now propose to refer to Islamic supremacists as nithings or
nidings: a Scandinavian word that strips its object of all humanity.
Webster’s dictionary (1913) defines it as “A coward; a dastard; — a
term of utmost opprobrium.”

We remind readers who object to the dehumanization of Islamic
supremacists that those enemies are already attempting to dehumanize
Jews, and to a lesser degree Christians, with images that could have
come directly from Adolf Hitler. As they have chosen to sow the
dragon’s teeth, our position is that they must now reap their rightful
harvest: the complete hatred and loathing of all civilized human
beings.
nithings

Nithing or niding was more than a common insult, because Scandinavian
culture required its subject to fight a duel with the accuser or
become an outlaw: totally devoid of rights, honor, and even
recognition as a human being. Per the Wikipedia entry,

The actual meaning of the adjective argr or ragr [= Anglo-Saxon
earg] was the nature or appearance of effeminacy, especially by
obscene acts. Argr was the worst, most derogatory swearword of all
known to the Norse language. According to Icelandic law, the accused
was expected to kill the accuser at once. …If the accused did not
retort by violent attack yielding either the accuser to take his words
back or the accuser’s death, he was hence proven to be a weak and
cowardly nithing by not retorting accordingly.

A nithing was devoid of all human rights, and he was considered the
enemy of civilized humanity: a perfect depiction of Islamic
supremacists. The word therefore strips the enemy of all humanity, and
degrades him to the status of a wolf or strangler (per Scandinavian
tradition) or a virulent disease like the Black Plague. Black Plague
is a deadly and contagious disease whose vector consists of plague-
carrying rats, while the Green Plague of militant “Islam” is a deadly
and contagious ideology that is spread by bipedal rats: nidings or
nithings, non-humans that raise violent hands to all of civilized
Humanity.

The immediate consequence of being proven a nithing was
outlawing. The outlawed did not have any rights, he was exlex (Latin
for “outside of the legal system”), in Anglo-Saxon utlah, Middle Low
German uutlagh, Old Norse utlagr. Just as feud yielded enmity among
kinships, outlawry yielded enmity of all humanity.[63] …”Yet that is
but one aspect of outlawry. The outlaw is not only expelled from the
kinship, he is also regarded henceforth as an enemy to mankind.”

The actual definition of a nithing is somewhat more involved and
complex, and it gets into sexual perversions and zoomorphical
transformations (Loki’s transformation of himself into a mare to have
sexual intercourse with a stallion, and thus beget Odin’s horse
Sleipner is probably an example), but the following line is pertinent:
“The nithing used its malicious seid magic to destroy anything owned
and made by man, ultimately the human race and Midgard itself[6], due
to its basically unlimited envy, hate, and malice that were nith.”

“Destruction of everything owned and made by Man” (the Palestinians’
destruction of the greenhouses in Gaza comes to mind immediately) and
“unlimited envy, hate, and malice” describe militant “Islam”
perfectly, and further underscore the application of nithing or niding
to describe it. The propensity for mindless destruction also appears
in Orson Scott Card’s Alvin Maker series, in which a supernatural
enemy is known as the Unmaker: a personification of evil that is the
total antithesis of God the Creator.

The Unmaker is the main antagonist in Orson Scott Card’s
alternate history/fantasy series The Tales of Alvin Maker. Never
directly confronted, it is a supernatural force that breaks apart
matter and aims to destroy and consume everything and everyone. …To
make something is to oppose the Unmaker, but a point often made is
that this is futile. By natural law the Unmaker can tear down faster
than any man can build.

This also is an outstanding definition of militant “Islam” or Islamic
supremacy: an ideology that seeks to destroy everything into which it
comes in contact, and with which no reason, negotiation, or compromise
is possible.

In summary, a nithing or niding is the enemy of Civilization, a
subhuman (through its behavioral choices, and emphatically NOT due to
its racial or ethnic origin) monster with total hatred and malice
toward all human industry and arts, and worthy of nothing but
extermination like any virulent disease. This is the word we will now
apply to Islamic supremacists and their enablers, and we encourage
others to do likewise.
Michael Ejercito (2e0217) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:30 pm
Did Mrs. Sandusky consciously know that her husband was abusing those children?

She knows. Her kids know. I realize that no Earthly court will bring her to justice if that is in fact the case.

It seems to me that you’ve got to be deliberately playing the fool to not know what’s going on in your own basement.

That’s just how it seems to me.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:33 pm
DRJ,

“I think he was being overly sensitive about liberal-bashing in this instance”

That’s pretty clear, I guess. I was not bashing all liberals, just those I consider radicalized to the point where they might be inclined to accept pedophilia as normative. I pointed out that it’s rare even among “radical liberals.” Should I have stated that it’s rare even among radical conservatives? That wouldn’t have made sense to me, since on the spectrum between conservative and liberal, sexual deviance is more accepted the more radically liberal one is. The radical conservatives, on the other hand, would be more inclined towards a desire to torture and kill pedophiles and other sexual deviants. That’s equally abhorrent to me.

So it’s not an insult to those who don’t accept sexual deviance, just a recognition that those who do, and desire to render it normative tend to be leftists with very radical views.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:44 pm
SWC–
from Joe Crowley in the Chicago Sun Times:

“What this tells me is this jury acted genuinely,’’ Sandusky’s attorney Joe Amendola told gathering reporters after the decision was reached. “They acted in good faith, acted on the evidence as it was presented, and I don’t dispute the decision. We had a good jury.’

And a jury that only needed two days of deliberation to convict Sandusky. Reading some of the transcripts from the eight young men who testified in the central Pennsylvania courtroom since the trial began, the jury could have reached a decision in two hours.

The abuse this man handed out for years ranged from kissing and groping to oral sex and anal rape. At times, reading some of the accounts were tough to get through. For a parent, almost impossible to fathom. To read the obvious heartbreak coming from the mother of Victim 9 when she took the stand and detailed the fact that her son’s underwear were seldom found in the laundry because of the blood from the raping he took from Sandusky, there is almost no sentence fitting enough.

“Jerry indicated he was disappointed with the verdict, but ultimately he has to live with it,” Amendola said.

Your point about grounds for appeal is well taken, SWC, but it does not sound like either Amendola or Sandusky look to appeal. This case is so ugly who would want it to continue?
elissa (81baaa) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:45 pm
DRJ — I see the legal as a subset of the moral, in this case. Punishing (even trying) someone for something you imagine they might have consciously known is immoral, to my way of thinking. And so it should be illegal.

Steve57 — My world seems to be more complicated than yours.
htom (412a17) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:49 pm
Steve57,

From reading much of the prosecution’s case; which was based primarily on interviews with victims and witnesses, if the college had a system, they didn’t consider it to be of utmost importance. They were rather casual about it; probably due to cases like this being very rare. I get that. But it took them quite a while to get to the point of reporting – not really knowing that there was such a protocol. In my thinking, some of them were decent people who knew something was wrong, but they weren’t adequately trained as to what their responsibility was, and they did nothing about the alleged perpetrator still having access to minors. Clearly, whatever system they had in place was inadequate and it did not prevent more abuse after the fact of their reporting. It in fact went on for another decade.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 5:58 pm
And now moving along to the liability cases against Penn State Officials, here from Reuters’ Andrew Longstreth:

A grand jury report made public in November found that Curley and Schultz, who oversaw the campus police, lied about their response to a 2002 report from Mike McQueary, then a graduate assistant for the football team. McQueary testified to he told Curley and Schultz he witnessed what he believed to be Sandusky having anal sex with a boy in a shower on campus.

NBC reported last week that newly obtained evidence includes emails showing Curley, Schultz and former Penn State President Graham Spanier discussing how to handle the McQueary report. Spanier and Schultz, according to NBC, agreed that it would be “humane” to not report Sandusky to social services agencies.

Prosecutors for the Pennsylvania attorney general alluded to the new evidence in recently filed court papers. They claimed that a grand jury had “long ago” subpoenaed evidence relating to Sandusky from Penn State, but that the university only recently provided a file that was maintained by Schultz.

In a statement following the NBC report, Penn State said the emails were discovered during the course of an independent investigation led by former FBI Director Louis Freeh and were immediately turned over to the state attorney general.
elissa (81baaa) — 6/23/2012 @ 6:21 pm
They were rather casual about it; probably due to cases like this being very rare. I get that. But it took them quite a while to get to the point of reporting – not really knowing that there was such a protocol. In my thinking, some of them were decent people who knew something was wrong, but they weren’t adequately trained as to what their responsibility was…

I see your point. I still think you would have to be working overtime to miss the fact your husband is raping little boys in the basement.

But that’s just me.

I’m not being sarcastic. Although I can see how I’m coming across that way. Believe me, I can see how someone would want to see the best in a person you’d marry.

If I was wrong, though.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 6:22 pm
htom:

Punishing (even trying) someone for something you imagine they might have consciously known is immoral, to my way of thinking. And so it should be illegal.

I think you meant to say “Punishing (even trying) someone for something you imagine they might not have consciously known is immoral, to my way of thinking.”

If so, I agree but it’s very hard for me to contemplate that people living in the same house didn’t even have a suspicion that something was going on. Even the Penn State people he only saw now and then had more than suspicions.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/23/2012 @ 6:32 pm
“I could be wrong, but it seemed to me the guy was marching around like the whole thing was some kind of a joke.”

Sandusky was a celebrity protected by the college’s cronyism. Or at least he thought, until some sensible and responsible people determined to look beyond his community pillar persona and peer in more closely behind the veneer.

Sandusky knew it was wrong as well. Otherwise he wouldn’t have rewarded his victims with goodies in exchange for them keeping their mouths shut, or in some instances, threatening them.

Sandusky knew enough such that getting involved with children in a charitable way might hide any suspicions of his guilt. He was much like John Wayne Gacy in that respect; a self-inflated pillar of decency in the community. He hid it from his wife by waiting until she was out of town before bringing a boy over. That sort of secretive behavior in my thinking is indicative of knowledge that his behavior was both immoral and illegal.

Sandusky was a walking representative of the proverbs “when something looks too good to be true, it is,” and “beware of wolves in sheeps’ clothing.”
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 6:46 pm
“I see your point. I still think you would have to be working overtime to miss the fact your husband is raping little boys in the basement.

But that’s just me.

I’m not being sarcastic. Although I can see how I’m coming across that way. Believe me, I can see how someone would want to see the best in a person you’d marry.

If I was wrong, though.”

Well the wife is another matter. I believe there was stuff going on in the basement that she might not have known about because she was out of town.

I’m more concerned with Penn State and also the charitable organization as far as responsibility. Because I think the fact that Sandusky was able to have kids over to his house was a part of a system that failed before he got them to his house. What sort of accounting did the charity have as to the whereabouts of their children?

And on campus, what sort of precautions were in place to prevent whatever occurred there? A private citizen, such as Sandusky’s wife is in my view less liable, since a private home is not mandated to implement protective systems to prevent child abuse. A private home does not receive any kind of government funding, and is not subject to regulations beyond community building codes and such.

Penn State and the charity are or should be so regulated. It would be their responsibility to assure that minors are protected from abuse.

Here’s a scenario that I’ve seen all to often in institutions where there’s likely to be abuse perpetrated by a client or an employee:

Susie staff witnesses Johnny client hit Robert client.

Susie staff reports what she witnessed to Linda staff. Linda staff is not a supervisor, but a co-equal of Susie.

Susie assumes that since she told Linda, it’s been reported.

Linda assumes that Susie followed protocol and reported it to the abuse coordinator, so she ignores it.

In situations like this, both Susie and Linda are liable. They can both lose their jobs for failure to follow the proper protocol. If you fail to report any allegation or self-report to the abuse coordinator, you’re liable.

That’s why systems of this sort need to be made very clear to staff. They need to be trained on what constitutes abuse; and in institutions where there are dependent people, abuse can be neglect, physical abuse, verbal abuse, fiduciary abuse and several other categories. They all need to know the specifics, because believe me, you come across some pretty dense people when you work in these types of settings. When people start losing their jobs, it becomes quite clear what is expected.

Also, you are better able to figure out who is responsible when everybody is adequately trained.

I don’t know much about the Charity. I’m assuming that they ran some residential facilities for these kids. I think that’s right. As such, no staff should be allowed to check out a child when they are off shift. Outings and such are supervised by more than one staff.

But see, this is the kicker here; Sandusky was the big boss. Nobody questioned when he checked a child out.

So some simple regulations need to be enforced for such charities; or implemented if they are not already in place. No administrator should be considered above the regulation.

Penn State should have something similar in place, and it’s pretty likely that the Sandusky case will be treated as a trend; necessitating more regulation or oversight if that hasn’t happened already. I’d be surprised if it hasn’t.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 7:23 pm
____________________________________________

agreed that it would be “humane” to not report Sandusky to social services agencies.

Merely a variation of the human nature behind the phrase that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Moreover, Jerry Sandusky was a VIP with the built-in benefits of prestige and sway. So it was that much easier for third-party observers to let him travel freely and speedily on that notorious road.

The details behind his story are not exactly foreign to the hierarchy of the Catholic church. And they’re not too distant from the illustration of the dynamics seen in the story of Nidal Hasan, the US military and the ensuing Fort Hood massacre. IOW, enablers here, enablers there, enablers everywhere.

So when some activists (eg, certainly those who are “radical liberals”) say that Sandusky and his victims have absolutely no relation to the changing morals of society — or certainly the desensitization that most of us are going through — or the idealization of “GLBT,” they’re being either naive or disingenuous, if only based on the history (and cycles) of civilizations going back centuries.

plato.stanford.edu: Even though the gender that one was erotically attracted to (at any specific time, given the assumption that persons will likely be attracted to persons of both sexes) was not important, other issues were salient, such as whether one exercised moderation. Status concerns were also of the highest importance. Given that only free men had full status, women and male slaves were not problematic sexual partners.

The central distinction in ancient Greek sexual relations was between taking an active or insertive role, versus a passive or penetrated one. The passive role was acceptable only for inferiors, such as women, slaves, or male youths who were not yet citizens. Hence the cultural ideal of a same-sex relationship was between an older man, probably in his 20’s or 30’s, known as the erastes, and a boy whose beard had not yet begun to grow, the eromenos or paidika…. The boy was not to submit too easily, and if pursued by more than one man, was to show discretion and pick the more noble one.

The relationship was to be temporary and should end upon the boy reaching adulthood. To continue in a submissive role even while one should be an equal citizen was considered troubling, although there certainly were many adult male same-sex relationships that were noted and not strongly stigmatized. While the passive role was thus seen as problematic, to be attracted to men was often taken as a sign of masculinity.

Greek gods, such as Zeus, had stories of same-sex exploits attributed to them, as did other key figures in Greek myth and literature, such as Achilles and Hercules. Plato, in the Symposium, argues for an army to be comprised of same-sex lovers. Thebes did form such a regiment, the Sacred Band of Thebes, formed of 500 soldiers.
Mark (d5d5cf) — 6/23/2012 @ 7:38 pm
Penn State did not appear to have such a system in place, so reporting abuse to an administrator who apparently does not understand his own legal responsibility, is hardly reporting.
– While the witness, for whatever reasons, did not report the crime until the next day, it is still my understanding that the proper law enforcement authorities with jurisdiction were contacted. If this was not so, please state this. I don’t care what system Penn State did or did not have in place if in fact the appropriate legal authorities were notified.

You mentioned sport camps on campus. I believe that anyone working with children should have a police check for any history of abuse. There is a national data base that keeps this information, and a person’s status can be determined within just a couple of hours.
– Of course. To volunteer to help in a child’s class at public school we need to have those checks done in PA. Just because this action is taken is no guaranteee that there are not dangerous people around and the need to be vigilant still exists.

But Sandusky didn’t have a police record to my knowledge,
– Sandusky may not have had a police record, but many should have known he had been investigated for allegations of sexual misconduct I believe in 1998 that was involved in his “retiring” from Penn State. My understanding is that there was substantial evidence, but apparently not enough for the DA to press charges. This is the DA that later disappeared sometime after the 2002 incident that eventually became the needed force to bring attention to sandusky for prosecution.

just because somebody is not on the national data base does not imply that they are trustworthy. They may have just never got caught.
Agree, as stated above.

So you also need certain practices in place to prevent any potential perpetrator from being alone with minors.

I am getting the sense that you think that if all procedures were clear and followed these types of things would never happen. Perhaps that is my misinterpretation. I am all in favor of background checks, having lines of communication and authority in place, etc. I’m just saying that among the thousands of sports and academic camps around and the tens or hundreds of thousands of participants, there will not be strict accountability to make sure that an individual student will never be alone with a same sex staff member.

People can be very strange. I do not want to excuse Sandusky or his wife in any way, but I do caution everyone who thinks they “really know” what Mrs. Sandusky knew and how she processed it, consciously or unconsciously. I had a patient for several years and had helped pull him through a lot. He stated that he had no history of mental problems. Through a family member I learned that he had a psychotic break at about 12 yo when his father died and had been institutionalized for many months. I raised this with him, and his response was a flat, “Oh that”. Yeah, they would wrap me up in a wet sheet when I was out of control and I would just laugh at them.” This same patient literally went blind in one eye one morning and did nothing about it. As “luck” would have it, I was planning to see him that afternoon to monitor his condirtion and compliance with medication. After we talked about a number of things, he mentioned that BTW, he had lost his vision in one eye that morning. I don’t think being apathetic about going blind is very normal, but other than this observation, I have little understanding as to how his mind perceived life.

I’ve also known people who have said things like, “My childhood wasn’t too bad…”, but when you hear specific details you’re thinking, “Are you crazy? That was hell that you were put through…” The heart has it’s reasons that reason knows not thereof, for all kinds of things.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/23/2012 @ 8:54 pm
@67, DRJ — :shaking head: The not wasn’t omitted. Sue imagines that Jo might know X, or should know X, and reports Jo for not disclosing that Jo knows X. Jo is punished for not disclosing something that Jo didn’t know.

Possible cases:
1) Jo knows X.
1a) Jo knows X and denies knowing X.
2) Jo does not know X.
2a) Jo does not know X but is convinced by her friends that X is true, and claims that X is true.
3) Jo is so terrified by seeing X that her mind blocks it out, it is as if Jo does not know X. Jo denies knowing X.
4) Jo is so afraid that X might be true that she imagines seeing X, and claims to have seen X.
5) … then things get complicated.
htom (412a17) — 6/23/2012 @ 8:56 pm
“I am getting the sense that you think that if all procedures were clear and followed these types of things would never happen.”

Where did I say that? If anything, the fact that they are in place is an acknowledgement that bad things can actually happen. It’s what you do about them when they do happen in order to prevent them from happening again that is the key. If you do nothing, then they are more likely to happen; you’ve enabled the abusers. If you do something and treat it as though it is so important that people can lose their jobs and their freedoms over it; then it is less likely to happen than had you done nothing. Is that a better clarification?

It’s the “see no evil, hear no evil” mentality that apparently went on at Penn State, which contributed to Sandusky’s enablement.

And yes, I’ve seen the difference when people are well trained as opposed to not being trained. I worked in a facility that was in dire trouble in that area, and I stayed all through its reform (I was one of the reformers) and 7 years past that point, and as such I was afforded the ability to actually see how such a system works compared to when it’s not in place. Night and Day; and we actually kept our own statistics on trends regarding abuse. This was no small facility. It had over 100 beds and over 100 employees.

Prior to the point when the reforms began the facility was more interested in filling beds and keeping up the veneer that they were helping people. Good intentions do not prevent abuse. What prevents abuse is diligent monitoring of those in your care, and a keen ability to monitor trends, make changes and continue to train and retrain when trends are detected. Before the reforms, despite all the good intentions, abuse was rampant, and the reporting to outside agencies was being done by residents, individual staff and visitors rather than by the facility itself. When that starts to happen, you know you’re in trouble.

Ideally, a facility that knows abuse has occurred prior to law enforcement and outside agencies finding out about it; is way ahead of the game.

In the case of Sandusky it was the victims who were reporting it long before anybody at Penn State did so in any official capacity. The same goes with the charity.

Yeah, regarding your partially blind patient. The adults I worked with were chronically mentally ill and some had developmental disabilities. I’ve encountered many cases where a patient didn’t seem to know how seriously they were injured, or how ill they were in some cases. So yeah, mental illness can numb the senses that are common among us that tell us something’s wrong. That’s why I’m hesitant to talk too broadly about Sandusky’s wife and her state of mind at the time; ’cause I don’t know if it’s an issue of mental illness, which is of course a possibility. But even if it were an issue of mental illness, that’s a very private matter as far as the law is concerned.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 9:51 pm
I’m more concerned with Penn State and also the charitable organization as far as responsibility.

As opposed to, what, the woman who was married to this man didn’t really know him?

Penn State had an excuse. Penn State had him for only eight hours a day. The rest of the time, she had him. At least when he wasn’t raping kids.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/23/2012 @ 10:13 pm
“While the witness, for whatever reasons, did not report the crime until the next day, it is still my understanding that the proper law enforcement authorities with jurisdiction were contacted. If this was not so, please state this. I don’t care what system Penn State did or did not have in place if in fact the appropriate legal authorities were notified.”

Yes they were notified, but it’s my understanding that they continued to allow Sandusky on campus. They did not remove him. In fact, in some of the criminal reports, Sandusky was already in retirement and had been issued a key to the locker room and showers while not on faculty. But when the first clear indication came up several years before, they should have removed him immediately from campus at least until they had completed their own investigation. Also, they apparently (well, at least to my understanding) depended upon law enforcement to investigate without doing their own internal investigation – that seems to be what happened based on the documents I read; but I could be wrong. Also, while they did notify law enforcement, if I remember correctly, there was discussion among them as to whether they should do so or not. In any case of alleged abuse, that should never be a question. The answer should be quite clear; you notify law enforcement. If you’re wrong, there’s really no consequence, but if you’re right, you’ve potentially prevented more abuse.

But you see, law enforcement is not responsible for monitoring trends of abuse at Penn State. All they are responsible for is arresting the alleged abuser and conducting an investigation as it pertains to said abuser. I’m of the opinion that law enforcement may not have done a thorough enough investigation in the one case that occurred in the shower, was witnessed by an assistant coach and reported to administration, who reported it to law enforcement, but ultimately they would share that responsibility with the Penn State administration. They don’t have to be concerned with trends of abuse, because it’s not their jurisdiction. It’s Penn State’s jurisdiction. Penn State was responsible for making the effort to prevent future abuse. To my knowledge they did none of that. Maybe I missed something in the prosecution’s or defense’s cases, but the prosecution seems to have made the case that there were factors on campus that contributed to the continuing abuse as I already outlined.

Penn State isn’t being prosecuted in this case, that’s true. While I think maybe someone needs to be held accountable in addition to Sandusky in whatever capacity is appropriate – that’s not my overall concern. I simply believe that they need to think about the future and what they are going to do to prevent such a thing from happening again. They are under new leadership. Let’s hope that new leadership has the foresight to do what’s right.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 10:32 pm
Steve57

“As opposed to, what, the woman who was married to this man didn’t really know him?

Penn State had an excuse. Penn State had him for only eight hours a day. The rest of the time, she had him. At least when he wasn’t raping kids.”

But Steve, Sandusky hid behind a veneer of community miracle worker with the kids. Apparently his wife was not the only one fooled.

But at Penn State, they had several incidents both witnessed and reported by victims. They had less of an excuse than the wife or the community IMHO.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 10:38 pm
Apparently his wife was not the only one fooled.

You’re assuming his wife was fooled.
Dana (4eca6e) — 6/23/2012 @ 10:51 pm
“You’re assuming his wife was fooled.”

I think to some extent and at a certain point she was. At one point she saw her husband as a charitable man. I’m not certain at what point if any she ever began to doubt that. I suppose after he was arrested she might have harbored different thoughts, but it could have started long before that. If she wasn’t fooled, then she may very well have been a party to it and just as guilty, but I don’t know that. I am unaware of any evidence that would substantiate that, so I leave it alone.

I just think that it’s rather irregular that in one instance he brought a boy home to the basement when she was out of town. That indicates that there was some deception on his part and she was kept from finding out – completely unaware of that one particular incident.

But to tell you the truth, I haven’t really paid much attention to the wife, because my focus in this whole affair – my interest is in the cases of the institutions involved. I’m concerned with institutional reform, because that comes from my own experience.

But I find it much more plausible that the wife knew very little than that the institutions knew very little. That assessment comes from my own experiences with working in institutions. Where there are large groups of people in confined areas, ongoing and persistent abuse is not likely to go unnoticed; but it can go unreported, and it often does.

Instinct and logic tell me that It’s easier to keep a secret from one person (a spouse) than from a group of people (staff and students at a university) – particularly when that secret involves actions and not simply information. I’m not saying she didn’t know, but it’s more plausible that she didn’t as opposed to Penn State not knowing; particularly when there’s already evidence that certain people at Penn State knew something, yet there doesn’t seem to be any hard evidence that the wife did. All I’ve heard are arguments from incredulity – IOW “I find it hard to believe that she lived there all that time and didn’t know what was going on in her own basement”; and those types of arguments are insufficient. You certainly couldn’t convict a person on such arguments.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/23/2012 @ 11:22 pm
But Steve, Sandusky hid behind a veneer of community miracle worker with the kids.

With all due respect, if I’m going to marry someone I would like very much to know that person.

Admittedly, there was a veneer.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 2:57 am
That’d be ahead of the marriage. And Sandusky was something like 70 when he was convicted? That tells me the wife had a lot of years to get to know just what kind of man she had hooked up with.

I understand that he showed one face to the world. But how do you have a more intimate relationship than a marriage? How do you end up being 70 and still hide that sort of thing from your wife? Unless she didn’t not want to know.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 3:07 am
Brandon,

One of the Sandusky’s adopted sons claims he was abused, too. If that’s true, doesn’t it seriously undermine your statement that “it’s more plausible that she didn’t [know] as opposed to Penn State not knowing”?
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 5:09 am
And of course we can’t convict someone based on speculation, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make moral judgments.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 5:11 am
Drj- I agree with your statement when you said something regarding the general attitudes about sex (liberaks and conservatives). My point was that it is a giant leap to get from there to say that liberals somehow condone that behavior. Other than serial killers, child molesters/pedophiles should have the stiffest sentences. The recidivism rate on these crimes is astronomical. They simply can’t be cured.
tye (3755f8) — 6/24/2012 @ 7:58 am
Consider a case where everyone knew. Michael Jackson was abusing young boys.

Tom Sneddon, the 6 term DA in Santa Barbara, investigated Jackson in 1993 but failed to indict him, the case fell apart when the boy’s father, Jordon Chandler, withdrew his accusations (for a cash payment of between 15 and 20 million)although the facts clearly indicated guilt, Jackson’s money bought both silence and acquittal.

Subsequently, for the next 12 years Jackson continued to abuse boys until he was tried in 2005 and was again acquitted because of a flaky parent. The abuse took place on overnight stays at Neverland, Jackson’s honey trap, his own private Santa Ynez Valley version of Disney world. It was irresistible to children and star struck parents.

Parents gladly lined up to deliver their little boys into Jackson’s clutches, and as the inebriated boys shared Jackson’s bed the inattentive parent enjoyed the flattering attention and lavish diversions provided by Jackson’s able staff of enablers and accomplices.

Everyone knew, a few tried to put a stop to it, like Tom Snedden, but Jackson’s money and fame combined to create a protective shell that allowed him to continue on with his abuse for more years and the largest part of it right under the acquiescent noses of the children’s parents.

Sneddon was mocked without mercy, but at least he tried to put a stop to Jackson’s serial molestations.
ropelight (b2a8c7) — 6/24/2012 @ 8:04 am
My opinion is that it’s futile now to speculate on what Dottie knew or didn’t know or suspected– or what she might have repressed either out of emerging horror or by a blind loyalty to her husband. What I do think is worthwhile, though, is to take some of these these same questions about awareness, morality, human psychology, and protecting turf and reputation, and look to apply them honestly for ourselves and in our own lives and communities.

I mean, with Dottie and Penn State fresh at the forefront maybe we should ask ourselves similar questions in terms of our own spouses, our own children, clergy, school administrators, coaches, and politicians. It’s called being mindful. What is there that might be going on around us that needs attention, but that we are not noticing or are choosing (in some manner) to ignore?

mind·ful [ mndfəl ] 1.aware: actively attentive, or deliberately keeping something in mind
Synonyms: watchful, aware, wary, heedful, alert, careful, attentive, chary, sensible, thoughtful, conscious
elissa (c98b98) — 6/24/2012 @ 8:42 am
htom:

DRJ to htom: I think you meant to say “Punishing (even trying) someone for something you imagine they might not have consciously known is immoral, to my way of thinking.”

htom to DRJ: The not wasn’t omitted

Okay. I was putting the emphasis on the wrong word. I thought your point was that it’s wrong to punish someone for something they might consciously know — putting the emphasis on whether they *consciously* knew it or now. But now I think the emphasis was on imagine, as in it’s wrong to punish someone for something you *imagine* they know.

I agree, of course. We don’t punish people for something we imagine they knew, although the law can impute motives and thoughts to people based on the evidence and circumstances. However, the standard of proof for a criminal conviction is not the same as the standard for a moral judgment.

From a legal standpoint, Mrs. Sandusky testified she never heard or saw anything inappropriate, and specifically denied Victim 4’s claim that “she came into a room while her husband sexually assaulted him during a trip with the family to the Alamo Bowl in 1999.” This report indicates the jury found Sandusky guilty re: Victim 4’s claims so, to me, that calls her denial into question.

From a moral standpoint, I’m sure there are wives (or husbands) who are truly in the dark about their spouse’s actions. Others may have deluded themselves into thinking everything is okay. I’m not suggesting spouses should be tried as accomplices without proof, but that doesn’t prevent me from having moral concerns in cases like this where the evidence of misconduct is so pervasive and continuous.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:24 am
@ DRJ,

From a moral standpoint, I’m sure there are wives (or husbands) who are truly in the dark about their spouse’s actions. Others may have deluded themselves into thinking everything is okay. I’m not suggesting either should be tried as accomplices without proof, but that doesn’t prevent me from having moral concerns in cases like this where the evidence of misconduct is so pervasive and continuous.

Read the link at 43. Apparently, it is indeed possible for a spouse to be in complete ignorance of their spouse’s activities.

What further gives credence to that is evidenced by their subsequent actions after having made the discovery. In this particular case, the wife immediately filed for divorce and completely distanced her family from the convicted spouse. That seems the absolute reasonable and healthy response.

However, upon hearing the charges against her husband and hearing victims’ explicit testimony, Mrs. Sandusky remained unmoved. She did *not* distance herself from her husband, let alone divorce him. That she has remained steadfast causes me to believe that somewhere along the line (and I believe early on), her survival instinct kicked in, and she made a conscious decision live in denial.
Dana (4eca6e) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:42 am
DRJ, I’m not suggesting that someone should be tried without proof.

Actually, let me cut to the chase and say what I am suggesting. I really don’t understand how she could say she didn’t know what was up.

We have a legal fix for when you figure out you’re wrong about the person you married. It’s called a divorce. Or, if you’re Catholic, an annulment (they used to have a saying in Italy; there is no divorce in Italy, and only Catholics can get one). People use them all the time.

I would hazard a guess that if you looked at the percentages most divorces don’t happen because of child rape.

That’s the kind of thing the Catholic church will fix you up with an annulment for. Go talk to any priest, and he’ll tell you that’s a good reason for wanting out.

And what’s more, I don’t see that as the sort of thing you can hide. I don’t see where Jerry Sandusky was even trying to hide it. He was traveling around the country with little boys. He was bringing them home with him. OK. She didn’t hear the screams. The thought should have still crossed her mind.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:52 am
tye, in a (very) rare act of actually engaging in fair debate, wrote:
My point was that it is a giant leap to get from there to say that liberals somehow condone that behavior.
— Three syllables: Po•lan•ski

Other than serial killers, child molesters/pedophiles should have the stiffest sentences.
— So to speak
Icy (6540e1) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:00 am
Other than serial killers, child molesters/pedophiles should have the stiffest sentences.

I don’t want to give the impression I’m soft when it comes to punishing child molesters. I would caution that there is the danger of turning child molesters into child murderers if they figure they’ll suffer no worse punishment if they eliminate the only witness. Which I don’t see as the solution to the problem.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:22 am
Dana,

I wish she would disavow her husband’s actions, too, but I’ve also read that their son has made accusations and perhaps may have even filed charges against his father. If so, she may have legal problems that make denial even more attractive.

Steve57,

I don’t think you advocate trying anyone without proof. If anything, I thought htom seemed to think that about me. Did I get mixed up on who I was talking with?
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:44 am
Icy and Steve57,

You’re killing me with your imagery.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:46 am
I don’t think you advocate trying anyone without proof. If anything, I thought htom seemed to think that about me. Did I get mixed up on who I was talking with?

It was probably me who was at fault. Talk to any woman I ever even dated; she’ll tell you that.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:54 am
Heh. I doubt it, Steve.

It’s a group discussion so everyone is welcome to respond to anything I say, but I didn’t want you to think my comments were directed at you.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 11:02 am
DRJ, if a tree falls in the forest, and no one is around to hear it, is the man still wrong?
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 11:05 am
89-what about polanski? Pedophiles- lock em up. Throw away the key. Done. I think the danger in some of these discussions is taking an individual case, noting how one person you may know reacted to that situation, then ascribing that behavior to everyone. People whose views fall to the right of centet have certainly engaged in some unsavory behaviors.
tye (3755f8) — 6/24/2012 @ 11:15 am
All they are responsible for is arresting the alleged abuser and conducting an investigation as it pertains to said abuser. I’m of the opinion that law enforcement may not have done a thorough enough investigation in the one case that occurred in the shower, was witnessed by an assistant coach and reported to administration, who reported it to law enforcement, but ultimately they would share that responsibility with the Penn State administration. They don’t have to be concerned with trends of abuse, because it’s not their jurisdiction. It’s Penn State’s jurisdiction. Penn State was responsible for making the effort to prevent future abuse. To my knowledge they did none of that. Maybe I missed something in the prosecution’s or defense’s cases, but the prosecution seems to have made the case that there were factors on campus that contributed to the continuing abuse as I already outlined

I think we are still not communicating completely. It is my understanding that the area under the ownership and management of Penn State has as its local law enforcement the Penn State police. Penn State jurisdiction and local law enforement jurisdiction are the same thing. I do not know if a local municipality in PA is under the oversight of the county or the state. (Philadelphia City and County have the same geographic boundaries, so it’s an atypical situation).
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/24/2012 @ 11:19 am
What elissa said at 85.

If 10 forensic psychiatrists evaluated Mr. and Mrs. Sandusky I wonder how many possible interpretations/explanations would be presented. I think it is hard to predict what a person would do, including oneself, when placed in a psychologically overwhelming situation.

Add to that the complications of deciding what to do about things that happened in the past. An imperfect analogy is the bullet or piece of shrapnel that is left in place because of concern that surgery to remove it is more hazardous than leaving it there.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/24/2012 @ 11:27 am
MD in Philly, I believe you’ve touched on a truth that needs to be emphasized.

There are campus cops. Got it. But does that mean no one else has any jurisdiction? And no one notified them?

The assistant coach who walked in on Sandusky and the boy in the shower told Paterno and his dad about it. So that means at least 3 people knew. If 3 people knew, the whole world knew. Anything known to more than 2 people is no secret.

What I find so amazing about this story isn’t that Sandusky is one twisted character. It’s that no one had what I would consider a normal reaction when confronted with the possibility.

These are 2 wildly different circumstances, but if memory serves it was the brother of the Virginia Tech cannibal who turned him into the cops. That, I consider normal. I love my brothers, but if I walk in on one of them eating a human heart, I’m not just going to tell the head coach and then drop it. Same thing if I walk in on you having sex with a child in the shower.

I’ll write you in prison, bro. I love you, but get right with God and the law.

Sandusky was diddling a little boy in a shower in a school gym. Which tells me that he figured there was just about nothing he couldn’t do and not get away with it. That was basically the same thing as doing it in the street. It’s difficult to get more public than that.

Sandusky had sex with a boy in public because he evidently figured he could. And for 10 years he was right. What’s everyone else’s excuse for this?
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 11:52 am
htom:

DRJ — I see the legal as a subset of the moral, in this case. Punishing (even trying) someone for something you imagine they might have consciously known is immoral, to my way of thinking. And so it should be illegal.

It’s my fault for not understanding your statement because it was clear. I don’t know what Mrs. Sandusky knew but the totality of the circumstances make me want to investigate what she knew.

Furthermore, I would measure her conduct according to what a reasonable person would know, suspect, or believe in that situation. I have a feeling this is where you and I might part company. I’m not trying to put words in your mouth but I suspect you would not be surprised if Mrs. Sandusky was in denial about the facts of her husband’s abuse of children in his care, perhaps even to the point that she couldn’t process or deal with it. If so, you think it would be immoral and illegal to hold her responsible.

On the other hand, if the facts show a reasonable person (who knew what she knew) would know about her husband’s abuse, then I would hold her legally and morally responsible unless she has a mental disease or defect. And I’m not sure denial rises to that level. Does it?
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 1:13 pm
I don’t understand how this happened to go unaddressed so long either, Steve. I just want details to be clarified as possible and “easy” answers not used to “explain it away”.

And I would like some resolution to the disappeared DA.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/24/2012 @ 1:14 pm
I think the danger in some of these discussions is taking an individual case, noting how one person you may know reacted to that situation, then ascribing that behavior to everyone.

— I, for one, do NOT ascribe to the liberal disease of absolutism. However, as has been well documented by, among others, our host, there is a significant part of the liberal community (from Whoopi Goldberg on The View basically saying that Polanski’s victim ‘was asking for it’ on down) that is willing to forgive just about anything.
Icy (6540e1) — 6/24/2012 @ 1:20 pm
MD,

This article from November 2011 touches on some of the questions you want answered, except for the missing DA.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 1:23 pm
tye: “what about Polanski”

Yet another example of tye’s ignorance, history begins last week for tye.
SPQR (b88d65) — 6/24/2012 @ 1:25 pm
And I’m not sure denial rises to that level. Does it?
Comment by DRJ

Good question. From the hip I would say that if it can be shown that she acted rationally in regard to the facts in some situations (like not allowing grandsons to be alone with him), then more of an argument could be made that she “knowingly did nothing” and can be held responsible.

But I’ve seen people act as if they believe one thing today, and another thing tomorrow, and not be aware of it. I can make guesses, but I still have no real idea what is what.

As a question, I believe there is something about not being allowed to force a spouse to testify, I guess kind of an extension of the 5th amendment. If that is true, I guess there must be some kind of fuzzy area as when a spouse simply cannot be forced to be a witness, and when the become an accessory to a crime or conspiracy. Of course, most of the criminal law I know came from Perry Mason, Matlock, and Law and Order.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/24/2012 @ 1:26 pm
Thanks for the link DRJ, though rather than resolving the issue it points out there is a discrepancy as to whether “the police” were notified.

I think the assumption that was made (myself included) was that the campus police were more of a private security force, perhaps not even armed, whereas at Penn State they are more of a “full police force”, though as stated, answerable to university officials not elected officials or appointees of elected officials.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/24/2012 @ 1:39 pm
I’m not trying to put words in your mouth but I suspect you would not be surprised if Mrs. Sandusky was in denial about the facts of her husband’s abuse of children in his care, perhaps even to the point that she couldn’t process or deal with it. If so, you think it would be immoral and illegal to hold her responsible.

DRJ, I’m no saint myself. But it strikes me that it isn’t immoral to hold Mrs. Sandusky responsible. There are just so many clues I find it difficult to believe she couldn’t have suspected something was going on.

For instance, from what I’ve read this Sandusky guy would have boys sleep over, and then head down to the basement and have his way with them.

And, from the testimony, Mrs. Sandusky was in the house on some of these occasions. I’m leaping to the conclusion these occasions were at night. Given that the boys testified he crawled into bed with them, and night time would be the most likely time they’d be in that bed in the basement.

My question would be, how do you not know if your husband is in bed with you or not? If that happens regularly when your husband is bringing little boys to the house, how do you not put 2 and 2 together?

If it were immoral to hold her responsible, I’d be forced to take a dim view of the lawsuits that will inevitably follow this trial. But I don’t. I approve of them. And if one or a dozen of these victims can prove she had to make some sort of willful effort to avoid knowing what her husband was up to, or God forbid she did know but just chose not to act on the information, I hope she experiences whatever amount of justice the law allows.

If it’s not obvious, I don’t think denial is a valid excuse. You said maybe she couldn’t process or deal with it. I would counter that it was her obligation to process it and deal with it. If it was difficult for her to deal with the reality of situation, how much more so for the children he was abusing? There are certain responsibilities that go with being an adult, and she failed.

As an aside, regarding denial in general, you have to know what it is you’re denying so you can avoid dealing with it. I say this as an authority on the subject. I’m perfectly willing to enter a blissful state of denial especially if it has to do with someone I love. But my ability to deny only goes so far. If this woman has the ability to suspect but deny this sort of depravity, she ought to be locked up just as long as her husband.

Denial isn’t a crime, though. Nor do I think it should be. So locking her up is out of the question. But this sort of industrial strength denial ought to have painful consequences, if it is as I suspect.

For the encouragement of others.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 2:41 pm
DRJ —
Furthermore, I would measure her conduct according to what a reasonable person would know, suspect, or believe in that situation. I have a feeling this is where you and I might part company.

I think her conduct shows what she knows better than her words do:
If she acts like he is an abuser and says he is not, to me that says she is lying (with her mouth.)
If she acts like he is an abuser and says he is, that’s rational.
If she acts like he is not an abuser and says he is, again, she’s lying.
If she acts like he is not an abuser and says he is not, she is either rational (if he is not) or self-deceived (if he is). This self-deception is what I’ve been refering to as denial.

I’m not trying to put words in your mouth but I suspect you would not be surprised if Mrs. Sandusky was in denial about the facts of her husband’s abuse of children in his care, perhaps even to the point that she couldn’t process or deal with it. If so, you think it would be immoral and illegal to hold her responsible.

You’ve come very close, ma’am. The way our system is set up, I think that legally she’s not responsible, because the law would seem to require that she has to act irrationally, against her reason. Morally, if the denial dissolves and she comes to realize her self-deception and then the consequences, she’ll probably need psychological treatment for a long time. It may drive her to suicide.

On the other hand, if the facts show a reasonable person (who knew what she knew) would know about her husband’s abuse, then I would hold her legally and morally responsible unless she has a mental disease or defect. And I’m not sure denial rises to that level. Does it?

I think that it can. If this was three years ago, I would have said it couldn’t. I’ve had a psychological denial dissolve, and it has not been pleasant. It was a petty matter in many ways, really, not something like this. I’m not at risk of suiciding over it. If I had known then, a half-century ago, what I know now (and probably half of my high school classmates knew then), my life (and many others) would have been different, in some cases very different. Better or worse, I don’t know, but different. Or maybe not; there are so many paths we didn’t take, and some of them lead back to the path we did. The repressed memories come back in a trickle, not an organized flood, and all I know for sure is that I now have conflicting memories of events, and don’t know which — if either — is “real”.
htom (412a17) — 6/24/2012 @ 3:09 pm
104-I know your reading level makes this difficult for you but you should read more than the first four words of my posts if you plan to comment on them.
tye (3123ce) — 6/24/2012 @ 4:53 pm
My question would be, how do you not know if your husband is in bed with you or not?

For all we know, maybe he never was. This is one example of what you assume you think you know, that you don’t know at all.

As an aside, regarding denial in general, you have to know what it is you’re denying so you can avoid dealing with it.

It sounds like you are speaking of a conscious process, “I don’t want to deal with X so I will pretend I don’t know about it.” I don’t think it is that conscious and volitional. Yes, there are some instances where thie is what denial is, “I just find things easier if I ignore it”.

But this sort of industrial strength denial ought to have painful consequences, if it is as I suspect

We would agree with you, if it is as you suspect, but we suspect, and believe, that it is somewhat different than you suspect.

I have a real hard time reading people’s minds when they are mentally healthy; I have even less confidence if they are not.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/24/2012 @ 5:17 pm
htom,

I agree with you that her conduct matters more than her words.

I wasn’t trying to put words in your mouth and I apologize that you feel I came close to doing that. My point was to state what I thought your position is and, from reading your response, it appears I stated it accurately. You do seem to think it would be immoral and illegal to hold her responsible if/while she is in denial.

In general, to be excused from criminal liability, a defendant must have a mental disease or defect that leaves him or her unable to form criminal intent. I wondered if denial is a mental disease or defect that leaves someone unable to form criminal intent as recognized by psychology. I don’t have any idea but I’m sure it can cause significant problems and anguish, as your comment indicates. I’m glad you made it through.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 5:17 pm
I would venture to guess that Penn State had no protocols in place for child abuse situations because there are few if any children on the Penn State Campus. Other than perhaps the children of some of the faculty, or perhaps some of the married grad students, how many children would there be? And Paterno and McCreary reported the crime to the equivalent of the Chief of Police, After you report a crime to the Police Chief, would you check back every day to see how the investigation is going?
Mike Giles (bba016) — 6/24/2012 @ 5:37 pm
DRJ — I meant that as a compliment. I thought you’d understood what I meant and expressed it a bit differently, but very like I would have with a different draft.

“I don’t want to know this and I’m going to pretend I don’t know this” is (if I understand correctly) called “suppression”, because it includes the “this”; in denial, the “this” is known only to the patient in a negative form, “this isn’t true”. Sometimes when the denial goes away, memories of this are revealed, but not always. This is where the entire “repressed memory” mess comes in. Memories can be planted as well as found, and it can be done unintentionally.
htom (412a17) — 6/24/2012 @ 6:51 pm
tye, since you never addressed the Roman Polanski reference in the rest of your comment, its not my reading comprehension deficiencies that are on display. Its yours.
SPQR (26be8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 7:05 pm
My question would be, how do you not know if your husband is in bed with you or not?

For all we know, maybe he never was. This is one example of what you assume you think you know, that you don’t know at all.

Actually I don’t assume any such thing at all. It is a question I would ask. I think when the victims in this case sue Mrs. Sandusky their lawyers will ask that question or something similar. And a lot more besides..

I think it’s reasonable to wonder what sort of circumstances provided Jerry Sandusky with the opportunity to molest children while she was home. At least one of the boys testified that she was in the house when Jerry Sandusky was raping him. And that he figured the basement was soundproofed as she didn’t respond to his screams.

All my questions are basically variations of “how could you not know.”

It’s possible that she has answers that would clear up my doubts about her role in all this, or whether she even played a role. Maybe the Sanduskys lived like some 1950s sitcom couple, sleeping in separate beds or maybe even in separate bedrooms. Maybe Jerry Sandusky’s hobby (other than raping kids) was woodworking and he did succeed in soundproofing the basement, telling his wife that he didn’t want the noise of his power tools bothering her.

I don’t believe it’s probable, but it is possible.

Of course, she’s obviously not obligated to answer any of my questions. I think it’s dead certain that somebody will raise these questions and either prove to a jury’s satisfaction that she did know or should have known, or fail to make the case.

No matter how it turns out, I am convinced she failed those children. A lot of people around Jerry Sandusky seem to have failed those kids.

It sounds like you are speaking of a conscious process, “I don’t want to deal with X so I will pretend I don’t know about it.” I don’t think it is that conscious and volitional.

Yes, I am speaking of a conscious process. I’ve never met anybody who was in denial who was completely unaware of it. I don’t believe it happens quite the way you put it either, but maintaining a state of denial takes some amount of effort.

As opposed to being in a state of complete ignorance. Which is when you truly don’t know about something. That takes no effort at all. But if you’re in denial, then you must know or suspect whatever it is you’re denying. Otherwise you would have nothing to deny.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/24/2012 @ 7:19 pm
Actually I don’t assume any such thing at all. It is a question I would ask.
It didn’t seem to be presented as a question you would ask, but an argument as to why you don’t believe Mrs. Sandusky.

I’ve never met anybody who was in denial who was completely unaware of it.
I am sure you never have by definition. The only situation where you would have met such a person is if you knew firsthand someone who was in that state, somehow came out of it, and had some very good reason for telling you. As it is likely such a state was linked to a tremendously emotionally “violent” event, it would be unusual for the experience to be shared with you.

I don’t believe it happens quite the way you put it either, but maintaining a state of denial takes some amount of effort.

If you are simply offering your opinion then you are entitled to it. If you are trying to persuade others then I wonder what credentials you have that give weight to your opinion. I am not fully convinced you are wrong, but I have seen in first hand experience enough to make me realize there is a lot I do not know or understand about what goes on inside of a person’s mind, and I would be slow to say what a person “can’t” experience in terms of thinking and feeling.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/24/2012 @ 8:10 pm
Steven57 — But if you’re in denial, then you must know or suspect whatever it is you’re denying. Otherwise you would have nothing to deny.

You’re playing on the word “deny”. Denial as manipulation. Yes, that can be done, but that does not mean that all denial is.
htom (412a17) — 6/24/2012 @ 8:10 pm
htom,

I feel like I’ve been a step behind with every comment. Thanks for being so patient with me.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:34 pm
Via the Instapundit: NBC’s editing of a Sandusky interview may be one basis for his appeal.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:35 pm
DRJ–I refuse to believe that a professional news organization such as NBC could edit something like an important exclusive interview in a careless manner without it being caught immediately by a fact checker. No, it is not possible.
elissa (1109de) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:43 pm
Inconceivable. Obviously.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:52 pm
Vizzini would agree, Elissa.
narciso (8bfa44) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:52 pm
Somebody relied on NBC’s coverage? Another one born every minute.
Dustin (330eed) — 6/24/2012 @ 9:59 pm
DRJ — You listen far better than I write. Thank you for helping me explain myself.
htom (412a17) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:05 pm
If everybody was like DRJ and htom, there would be no war. And what fun is that?
Dustin (330eed) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:07 pm
These editors seem to have been taught in a different school than I was. Maybe it’s just the computer editing suites used today; I can imagine it’s far easier to fat-finger an error than to make such an error with a razor blade and tape.
htom (412a17) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:09 pm
114-again…. read the rest of the comment. Infer. Not the most intelligent bloke are ya?
tye (3123ce) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:20 pm
Then again, it was on Rock Center, it wasn’t meant to be actually seen,
narciso (8bfa44) — 6/24/2012 @ 10:55 pm
Steve57

“With all due respect, if I’m going to marry someone I would like very much to know that person.”

Of course you’re right in that respect, but it’s still no argument for charges against the wife. Suppose she was completely ignorant? I know it’s difficult to fathom, but as I already suggested, incredulity just doesn’t pass muster in a court of law. You have to have hard evidence. But – I will grant you that the person who by their incredulity is encouraged to dig deeper, is likely to come upon the hard evidence. It just is not present at the moment as far as I can tell. This story isn’t over by a long shot.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 2:45 am
DRJ

“One of the Sandusky’s adopted sons claims he was abused, too. If that’s true, doesn’t it seriously undermine your statement that ‘it’s more plausible that she didn’t [know] as opposed to Penn State not knowing’?”

I don’t think it undermines it at all. What I’m assessing is a degree of plausibility in two different instances of knowing. Penn State had in their hearing credible evidence apart from conjecture. All we presently have with the wife is conjecture and arguments from incredulity. That’s fine; but it needs to lead somewhere. I’m not saying that she’s completely innocent at all. All I’m saying is that there’s not enough hard evidence such that a reasonable prosecutor would go after her. Apparently there’s already a case being built upon Penn State’s alleged complacency. But whoever’s investigating is in a predicament of getting beyond apparent circumstances regarding the wife, and the speculation that that entails, and actually finding hard evidence. I’m not saying that such hard evidence does not exist, but they haven’t found it yet. Therefore, it is more plausible that she might not have known than that Penn State did not know.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 2:52 am
DRJ,

“And of course we can’t convict someone based on speculation, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make moral judgments.”

You absolutely cannot make moral judgments without knowing facts. Speculation does not suffice. We don’t condemn a person to jail time based on speculation. We need hard evidence. And until that time, I think that in this particular case, judgment needs to be restrained. That of course doesn’t stop anyone from going after the hard evidence based on the type of speculations that make for good police work.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 2:56 am
tye,

“Other than serial killers, child molesters/pedophiles should have the stiffest sentences. The recidivism rate on these crimes is astronomical. They simply can’t be cured.”

Understanding your different perspective, I hesitate to go in a direction of accusing you of being ignorant simply because your view is different than a majority here. I had to say that up front, so that you can understand my perspective a bit more clearly.

I worked with sex offenders. I provided an educational program for them on the criminal justice system and their rights. I also worked with psychologists as advisors on behavioral interventions for working with these people. I respect the psychologists I worked with and valued their opinions as well as their expertise.

One psychologist I worked with was of the opinion that pedophiles cannot be cured, and as such, we shouldn’t “shame” them with consequences for their behavior. We should try to work with them and help them to make better choices, certainly; but ultimately they will continue their behavior, and no amount of consequence is going to make them change. He was not of the opinion that the pedophiles we currently had locked up should have been locked up in the first place; despite their recidivism. I looked at that opinion to be quite radical, and I knew particularly that he was basing his data on pedophiles that had actually acted on their urges, as opposed to those who hadn’t. And that’s a very crucial distinction. There may be many people who have pedophillic urges, who nonetheless never act on their urges to the point of committing crimes. We simply do not have sufficient data on such people because we have focused on pedophilia from a criminal justice perspective with the subsequent relative data. But we have to look at it differently. There are certainly people who have urges to kill others who do not act on those urges. Why should it be any different among people who have strong sexual urges towards minors? To believe that all pedophiles eventually commit crimes, I believe is an absolute form of discrimination and it ought not to be considered without better, more sufficient data. We should be engaged in more research before making that charge.

So the question to be asked here is: Why then should we treat pedophiles that do act on their urges/impulses to the point of committing crimes any different than other people who have urges and act on them criminally? In other words, the one who has urges to murder but does not is not punished. The one who has urges to have sex with children but does not is not punished. But there certainly is a distinction then between those who do and those who do not act on impulse. There should be consequences in all case of criminality in my view and to argue otherwise is a form of discrimination against those who chose to be moral, as well as against the victims of such crimes.

That is the one issue where I think many liberal thinking people who truly desire to rehabilitate pedophiles in a humane way fail. They aren’t looking at the larger picture. And the system dictates that we only look so far in order to base conclusions. And that to me is highly inadequate.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 3:21 am
“Tom Sneddon, the 6 term DA in Santa Barbara, investigated Jackson in 1993 but failed to indict him, the case fell apart when the boy’s father, Jordon Chandler, withdrew his accusations (for a cash payment of between 15 and 20 million)although the facts clearly indicated guilt, Jackson’s money bought both silence and acquittal.”

I don’t know if currently proposed tort reform proposals address such issues, but your insight here would certainly warrant looking into the issue of compensation vs. incarceration for violent crime if one happens to be rich enough. Should that even be allowed?
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 3:32 am
Elissa,

“I mean, with Dottie and Penn State fresh at the forefront maybe we should ask ourselves similar questions in terms of our own spouses, our own children, clergy, school administrators, coaches, and politicians. It’s called being mindful. What is there that might be going on around us that needs attention, but that we are not noticing or are choosing (in some manner) to ignore?”

I appreciate your input and perspective.

People have their comfort levels, and some are more ingrained than others. Mrs. Sandusky is no different, and I’m guessing that her comfort level is more ingrained than many. It’s difficult to come forward with indicting evidence against a spouse when one has depended on that person for such a long time. Anybody who believes that it’s easy might have a less stringent comfort level and a stronger sense of justice; but their strengths do not necessarily indict whatever weaknesses Mrs. Sandusky might have. Whatever speculations and feelings of incredulity regarding her behavior are present in a keen criminal investigator should be pursued. But at this point, that’s as far as this can go.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 3:41 am
MD in Philly,

“I think we are still not communicating completely. It is my understanding that the area under the ownership and management of Penn State has as its local law enforcement the Penn State police. Penn State jurisdiction and local law enforement jurisdiction are the same thing. I do not know if a local municipality in PA is under the oversight of the county or the state. (Philadelphia City and County have the same geographic boundaries, so it’s an atypical situation).”

Ah, I see what you’re getting at. It’s my understanding that it did get reported to at least the campus police, but I believe that eventually off campus local police were alerted as well. I’m not certain the time frame.

But my point is with regard to different jurisdictions as far as enforcing and/or policing a college campus. That’s the responsibility of Penn State, and not the local police to my knowledge. So the campus police are certainly relevant here.

But I was making a judgment based on an institution that might not have a “campus police,” because I’m trying to assess this from normal circumstances with institutions. Not all institutions have their own police force.

Thus, if there’s a potential for abuse in an institutional setting, you’d think – and it is rather normative in American institutional settings, that the institution itself has some responsibility of assuring that abuse does not occur and when it does, to initiate it’s own investigation and report appropriately to law enforcement and regulatory agencies. That’s pretty standard nowdays.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 3:50 am
MD in Philly,

And I think the further question to be answered is to what extent do campus police have to investigate and make an arrest that would have meaning outside the campus? I’m not certain. Are they simply an over-inflated security force, or do they have the power to conduct an investigation that would be meaningful in a court of law? I assume that they would. As such; their jurisdiction and more importantly their responsibility would be far more involved than in simply monitoring the safety of individuals on campus. But that may be beside the point, since local police were also informed.

But the fact that no arrest was made at the time when there was apparently sufficient evidence and testimony to do so is part of what I’m questioning. And it doesn’t matter really, to what capacity the campus police had to make an arrest, because the facts stand that no arrest was made – by either the campus police or by local police. Is State College that big a town with such a skyrocketing crime rate that they are too busy to be bothered with such inquiries? I don’t know, but it just sounds rather peculiar to me. Penn State, if I understand correctly is a city in itself. As such, they ought to have the same apparatuses in place in which to investigate and enforce the law as any small American city. And it’s to my belief and opinion only, that if they were not a “city” that was so concerned with its nationally popular sports team and the personalities involved in making it that way, that they would not have been so blinded and as such, done a better job.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 4:17 am
Mike Giles,

“I would venture to guess that Penn State had no protocols in place for child abuse situations because there are few if any children on the Penn State Campus. Other than perhaps the children of some of the faculty, or perhaps some of the married grad students, how many children would there be?”

That was my initial assumption, but some here have pointed out that that might not have been the case; that they were conducting routine summer sports camps for minors.

If that’s the case, then they even more responsible for what went on than had it been a rare occasion. But again. I don’t know the facts on this matter. Clearly what they had in place or the lack thereof did not prevent abuse when it could have. Some here disagree with me that no matter what you put in place, somebody is going to find a way of slipping beyond the radar. There’s a lot of truth to that, but in this case, I don’t see any evidence that they had an adequate system implemented to even attempt to prevent what occurred.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 4:27 am
This will be my last comment in this section unless there’s need for further clarification. I think it would appear obvious to most readers here that this issue I feel very passionate about due to my experiences.

That being said, I think I should clarify my underlying philosophy when it comes to government oversight of industry and institutions. I’m a conservative. And as such, I believe that government regulation often gets in the way of industry. We certainly could use less regulation and more ethical behavior on the part of industry as a collective of responsible citizens interested in profiting from such industry.

Industries that provide services to independent people, however are quite different than industries that provide other services and products.

I worked in the nursing home industry and am now retired. The nursing home industry is perhaps the most regulated industry in America for good reason. It is the most common form of long-term residential services to people who require such services. And nursing homes have a long, well-documented history of abuse and neglect. They should be so regulated.

The average person would not feel very comfortable placing a loved one in a nursing home if said nursing home did not have some system of oversight in order to prevent the types of abuse that have a long and well-documented history in such institutions. And more than not, even with the regulations in place, the abuse persists.

Translate that to institutions that provide services to minors. In this case, sports camps on college campuses and charitable residential services to troubled youth. You would expect that the same regulations that provide oversight to nursing homes that receive government funding in the area of medicare and state disability insurance would fall under very similar regulations. Apparently that is not always the case. Certain programs slip between the cracks because either nobody has thought that such abuses could occur, or they make excuses that they cannot afford such oversight when all it takes is some simple reforms in how employees are trained, or because when they do occur there’s not sufficient detection and reporting procedures; such that sexual abuse towards a minor can persist on a college campus for a period of over ten years in this particular case.

And in the case of the charity organization, an owner of such an organization can be considered to be either above the law and regulation, or simply that whatever regulations are in place for such a charity are insufficient in addressing that one issue. Some believe that no amount of regulation is going to stop some pedophiles, and that is true. But having better systems in place is certainly going to prevent more opportunities for this type of abuse than doing nothing at all.

I’m not of the opinion that this is an isolated case. I’m of the opinion that criminally inclined pedophiles tend to seek out situations where they can work with vulnerable minors with no accountability and no questions asked. Being the head of a charity towards such vulnerable dependents would be an ideal situation for a criminally inclined pedophile that has the means. We need to stop whatever trend may prove to be the case if we were to study such trends in any meaningful way. There are ways of stopping future Jerry Sanduskys and it is my assessment that we haven’t done enough in stopping them.

I believe that law enforcement and other governmental authorities are going to be focused on this case as a trend for a very long time. They will no doubt introduce new regulations. They will be looking at the charity and at Penn State and it’s summer sports camp program, and they will be very diligent. Their diligence will have some effect, but what will have the largest effect is that these institutions themselves make it a point of learning and enforcing more than the government regulators know and enforce, and put into place more efficient and cost-effective programs than what the bureaucrats demand. In my experience, institutions that know the game better than the government are well ahead of the game; and they are just the type of institutions that get recognized as setting the standards.

Penn State can rise above this by making it their focus, and by hiring sensible people who know all the ins and outs. In my experience it is the standard bearers rather than the bleeding-hearts that are the most effective.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 5:08 am
:/
Dustin (330eed) — 6/25/2012 @ 5:17 am
“it is the standard bearers rather than the bleeding-hearts that are the most effective.”

It’s because government regulators and bureaucrats are more likely to be the bleeding-hearts, full of suggestions, but without much thought to how to solve the problem efficiently.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/25/2012 @ 5:39 am
132-I agree with your coworker in one aspect. Very few of us have a sexual attraction towards children. I do not have this affliction, so am I to be commended for my “restraint”? No.

I do not agree with your coworker in that I believe pedophiliacs who act on those urges should absolutely be punished. I may be a pessimist but I tend to believe that most individuals with those urges act on them.
tye (122e60) — 6/25/2012 @ 7:09 am
There was other discussion about the jurisdiction issue in recent comments above, not sure if you read through all of them.

My discussion wasn’t intended to make excuses for anybody, but to want things to be clear. For example, in specific, if Joe Paterno told what he knew to the approprite law enforcement authorities I want people to understand that. Whatever else people may think, it is good to be clear about who did act “responsibly”, who acted responsibly in their immediate duties but did not “go the extra mile”, and who failed at being responsible at even the minimal requirements of their position.
There is enough blame to go around, might as well apportion it correctly.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/25/2012 @ 7:16 am
In the best of worlds, a person who has sexual desires for children would realize how inappropriate and damaging carrying out those actions would be, and would cooperate with any necessary measures to control such urges.

Such measures, even if incarceration, would not be looked at as punitive but as protective, for society and the person as well.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/25/2012 @ 7:21 am
143-agreed. It is very difficult to study how often individuals deny such urges. The stigma associated with those urges is such that those who have been able to deny them aren’t likely to admit that they have them.
tye (122e60) — 6/25/2012 @ 7:58 am
I suspect that even today many have such urges and don’t act on them. I know that I did (and didn’t), and that almost all of my classmates did (and didn’t), too. When we got to high school, our tastes changed … no, the ages of the girls we were interested in changed. As did our ages. By the time I was twenty I wasn’t much interested in sixteen-year-old girls (even though some of them were visually stimulating.)

There was a time, though, when I was interested in young ladies of an age that was definitely illegal. (So were they interested in me, of course, and I was just as illegal to them.)

It seems to me that pedophiles get “stuck” on a particular age group — a group that all of us were once attracted to — and don’t move on, and the “cure”, if any, is to get them unstuck. Why we move on, and they don’t, I haven’t a clue.

Ah, youth, wasted on the young.
htom (412a17) — 6/25/2012 @ 9:50 am
tye

“I may be a pessimist but I tend to believe that most individuals with those urges act on them.”

That belief is certainly supported by whatever data is available, but I doubt that the date is accurate. That’s all I’m saying.

I doubt the data because it only deals with the statistics that arise from people actually getting caught. And even after that, they’re still in denial that they have a problem. Also, those who don’t get caught aren’t likely to talk openly about their urges.

I think it more likely that pedophilia is much more common than we currently know, and most people who have the urge do not act on it because of the social and legal consequences. If we were to do what the psychologist I mentioned suggests, and that became the new common way of dealing with pedophiles, then we would have more criminal incidents involving pedophiles. In fact, the NAMBLA people would win their case for more “openness” about pedophilia. So I agree that they should absolutely be punished and actually shamed. Shame is good for the safety of those who don’t know well enough to say “no.”

But shaming obviously is not enough. We need to come up with programs that help criminally inclined pedophiles to move on from their urges. In that kind of setting they shouldn’t necessarily be rewarded for making the right choices; rather they should be led to understand the rewards already that come with making such choices. That’s one concept in behavior mod. that is not so easily understood. Many people think that if you give somebody some kind of goodie for being good that they’ll be good, but in many cases, people learn rather to be manipulative in order to get the goodie. So it doesn’t work. You teach people to be responsible, then they will learn that there are benefits already in place without the need for someone to give them a goodie.

But Sandusky’s going to go to jail where there’s no programs like that. However, I understand he’ll be locked up for a very long time. That’s a good thing. No program needed in that respect.

I appreciate your input.

But I’m onto the more recent threads on SWATting. Important stuff there.
Brandon (d777af) — 6/26/2012 @ 2:49 am
117. Steven57 — But if you’re in denial, then you must know or suspect whatever it is you’re denying. Otherwise you would have nothing to deny.

You’re playing on the word “deny”. Denial as manipulation. Yes, that can be done, but that does not mean that all denial is.

Comment by htom — 6/24/2012 @ 8:10 pm

First of all, it’s not been proven that Mrs. Sandusky was in any form of denial. It’s just been assumed.

Second, I think if you reread the article you’ll see that denial as manipulation is a tactic offenders use to avoid consequences for their actions. The doctor who wrote the piece used example of a school bully knocking another kid’s books to the floor, and the hall monitor saw it and confronted him. And the bully denies what she saw him do as a “long-shot tactic” to avoid consequences. In this case, Jerry Sandusky would have been the one consciously denying what he knows is true, and what she at least suspects is true otherwise he wouldn’t need to resort to that tactic, in an effort to manipulate her.

So the question would be, what did she see or hear that caused her to suspect him of something untoward that in turn prompted him to resort to “denial as manipulation” to evade responsibility? People, particularly manipulative people, don’t resort to the tactic unless they’ve been given a reason to think they’re under suspicion for what they now have to deny. Just blurting out denials out of the blue causes suspicions. If Sandusky hadn’t yet been suspected of raping the little boys he brought home for weekend stays in the basement, if he just blurted out for no reason that he that he was offended she could think such a thing then he should have been suspected of just that from that point forward.

So, she can answer to the victims why that wasn’t the case in the Sandusky household. If indeed denial as manipulation is alleged as a defense, and there’s no reason yet to think it will be.

Then there’s this part of the the concluding paragraph at your link, which concludes the discussion of the various forms of denial:

Often, when a person denies, it’s simply assumed that their denial is a “defense” against the unbearable. In my experience, the term “in denial” is widely overused. Disturbed characters of all sorts frequently engage in denial. It’s extremely rare, however, that they do so because they are in such inner distress over their behavior that they simply can’t consciously accept what they’re doing.

I submit that if a professional psychologist says it’s extremely rare that denial manifests itself as the inability to consciously accept what they’re doing, then it would also be extremely rare for Dottie Sandusky to fall in that category.

If it’s extremely rare for denial to take that form, then it’s far more likely that Dottie Sandusky’s was one of the far more common form; that at some level she was consciously aware of what it was she was denying. I don’t see why the default assumption should be that her denial was the extremely rare sort, instead of the far more common sort.

I believe this link corroborates my position, in that I simply can’t default to the assumption that everyone else is making; that if Dottie Sandusky was in denial, it’s the kind of denial even professional psychologists very, very rarely see. My default position has to be the other way around. That if she was in any kind of denial as so many people are asserting then it’s the kind they see all the time in the vast majority of cases; at some level a conscious choice.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/26/2012 @ 3:32 pm
All I can say, Steve57, is that someday I hope you find yourself coming out of denial, and among the memories that re-emerge is this conversation. My therapist said it was common, but very rarely something important.
htom (412a17) — 6/26/2012 @ 4:27 pm
1) what I said at: 6/24/2012 @ 8:10 pm

2) the assumption that everyone else is making
– I am not making the assumption that she was consciously unaware of the situation, I am assuming that I have little reason to think I know what is going on in the psyche of someone I don’t know (except through media reports- which are probably more misleading and in error than dependable).
Since I do not know, in this situation I will defer in second guessing the disaster that is the life of Mrs. Sandusky.

3) All I can say, Steve57, is that someday I hope you find yourself coming out of denial, and among the memories that re-emerge is this conversation. Comment by htom — 6/26/2012 @ 4:27 pm
– And we hope that mercifully you will not remember anything more distressing than this dialogue.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/26/2012 @ 5:21 pm
MD, I was and still am taking issue with the belief that if she was in denial, that it is an unconscious act.

It sounds like you are speaking of a conscious process, “I don’t want to deal with X so I will pretend I don’t know about it.” I don’t think it is that conscious and volitional.

I’ve said several times that in my experience the person who’s in denial is aware on some conscious level what it is they are denying. And now a psychologist confirms that’s almost always the case:

Disturbed characters of all sorts frequently engage in denial. It’s extremely rare, however, that they do so because they are in such inner distress over their behavior that they simply can’t consciously accept what they’re doing.

As far as second-guessing the disaster that is Mrs. Sandusky’s life, I believe that her husbands victims have every right to do exactly that. And I hope they do. You are correct when you conclude that I don’t believe his wife didn’t know what going on. That’s based on the testimony I’ve heard of or read of. I’m free to believe that. The concept of “innocent until proven guilty” is an evidentiary assumption, and it’s really only binding on the judge and jury. I’ll never serve on a jury of her peers, so like a lot of other people I’m not bound to simply assume she’s innocent.

The prosecutor, for instance, is not bound to believe in the innocence of the defendant. In fact, since the prosecutor’s first duty is to see justice done, really a prosecutor is obligated not to charge someone with a crime unless they do believe they are guilty of it before proving it to a jury.

As Brandon pointed out, we don’t send people to prison based purely on incredulity or speculation. And I’m not proposing anything of the sort. There may not be enough hard evidence, as Brandon went on to point out, to the point where a prosecutor would be willing to take her to trial. But the burden of proof is higher in a criminal case than in a civil case. I think it is likely that her victims’ lawyers may be able to prove by the preponderance of the evidence what a prosecutor may not be able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.

I look forward to her husband’s victims getting that chance. I’m convinced that justice demands they get their chance. Once they do and the dust settles then none of this will be speculation from afar.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/26/2012 @ 6:23 pm
Just to be clear, I’m not contending that Dottie Sandusky is or was ever in denial. But people have been speculating about it since this thread started. It’s this sort of contention, that htom made in post #32, that I’m taking issue with when on the subject of denial:

The whole point of denial, delusion, repression, … is that they are not conscious choices, they are psychological ego defenses that prevent you from knowing the hidden events, and neither the defenses nor the events are available to the normal mental reviewing process.

I don’t believe that at all. And I found it interesting that he linked to an article that actually refutes the notion that these are normally unconscious defense mechanisms. In fact, the authority went on to note in a later comment:

It’s precisely because the concept of unconscious denial as a defense mechanism is so familiar to most of us and so generally well-accepted that denial the conscious manipulation tactic works so well. And denial the tactic goes right along with the other responsibility-avoidance and manipulation tactics such as blaming others and making excuses.

I’m skeptical of claims of denial precisely because people wrongly assume denial is an unconscious defense mechanism. It’s popularly perceived as being the case, when this psychologist he linked to states it almost never is the case. That it is an unconscious defense mechanism is simply a widespread misconception.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/26/2012 @ 6:51 pm
Some other links, perhaps not quite as much to your taste:
Psychological Defense 101 ;
In Denial; and
Mayo Clinic, denial:

…
Understanding denial and its purpose

Refusing to acknowledge that something’s wrong is a way of coping with emotional conflict, stress, painful thoughts, threatening information and anxiety.

When you’re in denial, you:

Refuse to acknowledge a stressful problem or situation
Avoid facing the facts of the situation
Minimize the consequences of the situation

In its strictest sense, denial is an unconscious process. You don’t generally decide to be in denial about something. But some research suggests that denial might have a conscious component — on some level, you might choose to be in denial.
…

Dueling experts are such fun.
htom (412a17) — 6/26/2012 @ 8:43 pm
In its strictest sense, denial is an unconscious process. You don’t generally decide to be in denial about something. But some research suggests that denial might have a conscious component — on some level, you might choose to be in denial.

Yes, dueling experts are fun. But they’re both your experts htom. I didn’t pick Dr. Simon who emphatically states that while their are different kinds of denial, denial almost never is an unconscious defense mechanism. You did. Just as you’ve now done a web search and came up with another expert that, when you come down to it, felt it important to note that your first expert could be right.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/26/2012 @ 9:10 pm
I’ve said several times that in my experience the person who’s in denial is aware on some conscious level what it is they are denying. And now a psychologist confirms that’s almost always the case

Your experience, a psychologist; I find neither to be a compelling argument to make me doubt my experience and the multiple psychiatrists and PhD level psychologists who I have counted as colleagues.

Not only dueling experts, but dueling highlighting of quoted material.

Steve57, you go on believing what you want to believe. As long as you don’t try to be a professional counselor or expert witness I don’t care if you think there is no such think as mental illness and that people who say they hear voices are faking it, and that depression really doesn’t exist but is only an attempt at manipulation for secondary gain.
MD in Philly (f0e1bd) — 6/26/2012 @ 9:43 pm
“There are none so blind as those who will not see.” — English proverb, attr. Matthew Henry
htom (412a17) — 6/26/2012 @ 10:46 pm
This could be bad news for JoPa’s legacy:

Penn State officials almost exposed Jerry Sandusky’s child abuse – but decided against it after talking to legendary coach Joe Paterno, it has been claimed.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/30/2012 @ 8:23 am
Plus this from the same link:

Mr McQueary saw Sandusky abusing the boy in the shower in 1998 but only reported it to university authorities in 2001 – when the email exchange took place.

I thought McQueary told his father and Paterno what he saw within a day or two. Was that wrong or do they not consider Paterno to be a “university authority”?
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/30/2012 @ 8:25 am
Late to the discussion. You can’t go on thinking nothing’s wrong without profound loss of judgment and cognition — neurological damage from trauma, degeneration of the brain (precocious dementia), schizophrenia. Otherwise, denial is an aspect of avoidance, sometimes helped with alcohol and other psychotropic/anxiolytic chemicals. A personality disorder, which lends itself very well to pedophilia and other paraphilias, and to addictiion.
nk (875f57) — 6/30/2012 @ 8:43 am
I only have a BA in Psychology, but I have had practical experience with psychogenic fugue state, dissociative state from intoxication, dementia, and addiction. I was, also, co-counsel once for a schizophrenic child molester. He knew what he was doing.
nk (875f57) — 6/30/2012 @ 8:48 am
Actually, the cover up interests me more than the crime. I’m not excusing Sandusky — he should be punished — but he never could have hurt so many without institutional cover.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/30/2012 @ 8:51 am
DRJ,

Sandusky’s weapon was trust. If he could get the children to trust him to the point that they let him rape them, getting the University to trust him was a no-brainer.
nk (875f57) — 6/30/2012 @ 8:56 am
That makes sense, but I hoped adults — especially adults in charge of an institution that educates teens — would have better judgment.
DRJ (a83b8b) — 6/30/2012 @ 9:12 am
DRJ–

The Daily Mail article you linked is devastating to Penn State and to JoPa. I did always believe that Paterno enabled Sandusky’s actions through misplaced loyalty. But, I felt sort of glad that Paterno’s disease killed him before, as an old man, he had to go through the worst of the press coverage and the court appearances and testimony related to Sandusky’s trial. I no longer feel that way. I am very sorry he did not live long enough to be forced to fully explain himself.
elissa (73bddc) — 6/30/2012 @ 9:13 am
Steve57, you go on believing what you want to believe. As long as you don’t try to be a professional counselor or expert witness I don’t care if you think there is no such think as mental illness and that people who say they hear voices are faking it, and that depression really doesn’t exist but is only an attempt at manipulation for secondary gain.

Oh, cut it out, MD. Seriously.

Since when are denial and mental illness interchangeable terms?

I wasn’t talking about depression, schizophrenia, or anything else.

And since when does it necessarily follow that if denial has some sort of conscious component, that denial doesn’t exist?

As far as my experience goes, you’ll be pleased to know I was never a professional counselor nor do I plan to be one. I was somewhat involved in several people’s lives when I was in the Navy as when you’re an officer in charge of people you often have your nose in their business more than they or even you would like under normal circumstances. I’ve seen people go to great lengths to refuse to admit they had a problem, while going to great lengths to hide their problem, and that’s the contradiction I’m talking about. And when they denied they had a problem they weren’t really lying. But when the dust cleared, yeah, deep down even then they knew on some level they had a problem at that time. And even before anyone else noticed they might have a problem.

If I were on a jury in a civil case Mrs. Sandusky would have a pretty high bar to clear with me. Let’s face it, an extremely high bar to clear with me, before I’d believe that her level of denial was due to something so truly horrifying her unconscious buried it so deeply that she wasn’t aware of it on some conscious level.

There undoubtedly will be such a jury, unless these sorts of things are just heard before a judge. You and I may not know what the circumstances where between Jerry and Dottie Sandusky were and how frequently she was in the vicinity when he was engaged in his sordid activities, but one thing’s for sure. The boys who were abused do.

I’m engaged in a lot of speculation, true. But what else do you do on an internet discussion thread? We don’t know if the boys will even go after Mrs. Sandusky in a suit. But if they do I’ll take that as a hint that they think she’s partly responsible this went on so long.

Then it’s not important I get answers to my questions but they do. One thing I gleaned from the testimony is Jerry would prey on underprivileged boys. And they seemed to believe that no one would take their word over a football coach at Penn State. Which may be true. It sure looks to me that a lot of people went to great lengths to avoid knowing. If Mrs. Sandusky is one, and it appears to me she is, then I hope she’s held to account.

And we still don’t know yet if denial is ever even going to come up in the future.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/30/2012 @ 9:14 am
156. This could be bad news for JoPa’s legacy:

Penn State officials almost exposed Jerry Sandusky’s child abuse – but decided against it after talking to legendary coach Joe Paterno, it has been claimed.

Comment by DRJ — 6/30/2012 @ 8:23 am

It’s pretty ambiguous.

One day later an email from Curley to Schultz reads: ‘After giving it more thought and talking it over with Joe (Paterno) yesterday, I am uncomfortable with what we agreed were the next steps.

‘I am having trouble with going to everyone, but the person involved (Sandusky).’

He’s talking about an conversation he had with Paterno. And we don’t know what they talked about.

It seems to me at this point nothing more than a game of trash the dead guy’s reputation through selective leaks and innuendo to save the live defendant’s skin.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/30/2012 @ 9:21 am
There are certain sins that you look the other way on for a friend; drinking one too many, shoplifting a candy bar, going 40 in a 25.

JoePa looked the other way for little boy f**king. Maybe I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, but we’re left with only 2 options for him: he’s a foul disgusting monster who didn’t think little boy f**king was a big deal; OR he was a foul disgusting monster who thought little boy f**king is just the best thing in the world and I can’t believe not everyone has tried it, like me and my buddy Jerry here.

Yes, that last part is an insinuation of Paterno’s boy f**king habits. He didn’t think it was a big deal, either because he’s a foul disgusting monster, or a foul disgusting monster who f**ks little boys.
Ghost (6f9de7) — 6/30/2012 @ 9:25 am
‘I am having trouble with going to everyone, but the person involved (Sandusky).’

That’s what I keyed on earlier. If this guy had trouble going to everyone involved except Sandusky, I believe everyone includes Paterno.

I never saw anything to indicate during the trial that anyone ever told Paterno what exactly Sandusky was doing with the kid in the shower. McQueary it seems had trouble talking about the subject with Paterno, which is undoubtedly an understatement as he avoided doing so for three years. Curley may have had the same reluctance to broach the subject.

Then.

But now that he’s been indicted for perjury all bets are off.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/30/2012 @ 9:30 am
but he never could have hurt so many without institutional cover.

Yes, but institutional cover is nothing more than a collective of weak adults valuing reputation more than the individual.

Mrs. Sandusky was not part of that institution. She was an individual with – it would logically seem – a bird’s eye view and ear for what was going on.

As well as McQueary and Paterno.

The bottom line for me is, at a certain point in time, each of these people made their individual decision to physically, mentally and emotionally look the other way. And went on merrily with their lives.

It’s still shocking how powerful the sickness of such molestation and abuse against children is: it’s not just the physical tormentor that is guilty, but often spreads to those closest who are weak of character and afraid of losing something (reputation, station in life, position, money, etc)they value more than the child being hurt.

Can you imagine: an historical college football program is that thing more valuable than a child being harmed?
Dana (292dcf) — 6/30/2012 @ 9:52 am
Content from the recent email exchanges CNN revealed from Penn State,

The messages indicate former Penn State President Graham Spanier and two other former university officials knew they had a problem with Sandusky after a 2001 shower incident, but apparently first decided to handle it using a “humane” approach before contacting outside authorities whose job it is to investigate suspected abuse.

“This is a more humane and upfront way to handle this,’ wrote Gary Schultz, then vice president at the university.

*and*

In an exchange of messages from February 26-28, 2001, Spanier allegedly acknowledges Penn State could be “vulnerable” for not reporting the incident, according to two sources with knowledge of the case.

“The only downside for us is if the message (to Sandusky) isn’t ‘heard’ and acted upon, and we then become vulnerable for not having reported it,” Spanier purportedly writes.

So, their concern for being humane (ie, ignoring it) superseded not only fulfilling their legal obligation to report it to officials, but it superseded showing any humanity to the young victims involved.

These individuals belief that their institution was so much more valuable than the lives of children reveals a disgraceful collective of bad character, which then makes me wonder what other ugliness were they involved with over the years, and what else have they covered up – because clearly, if victimized children aren’t worth stepping up for, nothing else would be.
Dana (292dcf) — 6/30/2012 @ 10:06 am
168. Mrs. Sandusky was not part of that institution. She was an individual with – it would logically seem – a bird’s eye view and ear for what was going on.

As well as McQueary and Paterno.

The bottom line for me is, at a certain point in time, each of these people made their individual decision to physically, mentally and emotionally look the other way. And went on merrily with their lives.

…Can you imagine: an historical college football program is that thing more valuable than a child being harmed?

Comment by Dana — 6/30/2012 @ 9:52 am

Dana, I agree with all your points. Particularly about the three principals you mentioned.

To me it’s a matter of proximity and intimacy. Both apply to Mrs. Sandusky. I really can’t believe that a woman who was married to the guy and lived with him throughout, and traveled with him on many of the occasions when the boys said they were abused, couldn’t have been entirely ignorant of the facts.

McQueary and Paterno were certainly in sufficient proximity to know. It would seem they should be on less intimate terms than Mrs. Sandusky, particularly since Jerry was no longer with the Penn State football program when this was going on.

McQueary, as far as I’m concerned his actions speak for themselves. He saw Sandusky in the shower with this kid, and apparently the only thing he did for three years was tell his dad. So much for the character building aspects of sports.

If I seem to go light on Paterno, though, that’s for two reasons. First, he’s dead and the only one who can’t defend himself.

The second has to do with the hagiography of him. I never was caught up in it. True, I venerated the Raiders growing up. Until Al Davis gave me a lesson in life and taught me it’s just another business. Then I found other ways to spend my weekends, particularly in the fall.

It seems possible that people insulated Paterno from what they saw Sandusky doing or suspected Sandusky of doing because of his living legend status. They talked about him like he was a saint.

McQueary didn’t go to him until 2001 to tell him what he saw back in 1998. And I’ve never heard what exactly he told him. Curley says he talked to Paterno, but doesn’t make it at all clear what sort of detail he went into in the same email in which he says he’s uncomfortable going to anyone except Sandusky.

So if I appear to be going light on Paterno, just to be clear, it isn’t because I ever believed he walked on water. Just that everyone around him seems to have thought so. Maybe that’s one of the problem with having sports icons.

And, like I said, he’s dead. Unlike Mrs. Sandusky, you can’t put any questions to him.

Well, you can. But unless you have a ouija board don’t expect any answers.

And it always seems to me that if a person accused of a crime can make the dead guy take the weight, they do.

Dead people don’t go to prison or pay out on judgements against them.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/30/2012 @ 10:30 am
So, their concern for being humane (ie, ignoring it) superseded not only fulfilling their legal obligation to report it to officials, but it superseded showing any humanity to the young victims involved.

These individuals belief that their institution was so much more valuable than the lives of children reveals a disgraceful collective of bad character…

A few lessons learned so far:

1. If you’re going to discuss being “humane” in a situation involving child sexual abuse, show that you know what the word means by hammering the abuser to a pulp (via the legal system).

2. If you’re concerned about your own reputation as well as that of the institution you represent, don’t cover up whatever child sexual abuse that’s being perpetrated on the premises.

3. Based upon some of the testimony about what may be a unique feature of the Sandusky basement, something for the ladies: if the man in your life ever decides to soundproof a room in the house and then starts storing 10 year old boys in there for the weekend, yes, it’s a cause for concern.

Just in case there was any question.
Steve57 (c441a6) — 6/30/2012 @ 10:42 am

6/22/2012

Sandusky Guilty

171 Responses to “Sandusky Guilty”

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