The level of ignorance on these message boards is truly astounding. Paterno IS a hero and anyone who doesn't understand that has not spent any time looking at all the good he has done. To answer an earlier question, no, Paterno did not witness Sandusky raping a child at any time, that was Mike McQueary, who reported it to Paterno. Paterno then reported it to his superior, Athletic Director Tim Curley, which is what he was supposed to do. It was then Curley's responsibility - and that's why Phil Knight criticizes the "investigation". Somewhere in the chain after Paterno reported it to Curley, it was buried, but it had been reported. Keep in mind that Paterno did not witness this himself, he was reporting hearsay evidence. Paterno was not an officer of the law and had no standing to arrest Sandusky or interrogate Sandusky (Sandusky no longer worked for Paterno at that time, he had resigned and had an office on campus in the Athletics building, so Sandusky's boss was Curley.)
If a subordinate came to you in your workplace, told you a story about seeing someone raping a boy in the workplace bathroom, you reported it to your boss, who was also the boss of the rapist in question, would you not feel like you had taken the right step? Would you continue to pursue the issue afterward, although you had no legal standing to do so? Would you really be that diligent about hearsay evidence if you thought the matter was in good hands? The fact of the matter is that most people would not, and for good reason - as Phil Knight said, after Joe Paterno reported the matter, it was in the hands of a "world-class university".
There is much more to this than the media firestorm that resulted after the issue went nuclear, but few in the media cared to dig deep. They just wanted scalps, the bigger the better, and the biggest scalp at PSU was Paterno. Paterno said he wished he had done more, because he is a decent man who recognizes the horror Sandusky caused. But at the time, he assumed the matter and the investigation were in good hands, an assumption that, given the previous record of integrity to that point exhibited by Curley and Spanier, is reasonable and one that nearly anyone would have come to.
Paterno positively impacted the lives of thousands of young men and donated millions to PSU, including funding the Paterno Library. His good works are well-documented for anyone who cares to see, and Phil Knight was right to praise him and criticize the investigation.
There are bound to be criticizers of this post, and go ahead, criticize this post all you like. I won't be posting on this particular thread again. I have nothing more to add and I won't spend any more time defending Paterno. His life was his defense and speaks louder than anything I could write here.
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I would encourage many of you bashers out there to read this as you seem to be fairly ignorant as to how to deal with legal issues of sexual misconduct at a large institution....
I think this is the only intelligent post on the matter I have seen here. It is highly likely that JP did what he was supposed to do and all the ignorant, uninformed Monday morning quarterbacks here make statements as if they were there and as if they know what to do from a legal perspective. My guess is that JP dealt with 10-20 problems of this magnitude every week. He must decide what to do. In this case it is his JOB and OBLIGATION and in his contract to report it to the University and not tackle it himself as he is not qualified to have anything to do with this issue.
The University has expert staff and lawyers to deal with these problems and the experience as well (sadly, it happens a lot). They are supposed to examine the issue quickly and determine whether law enforcement should be contacted and then DO IT if the situation demands it.
The true liars and cowards here are the administration who, without question, looked the other way and failed to do their jobs - But then that always happens in academia - coward finger pointers throwing anyone under a bus to escape exposure of being incompetant.. This was Penn State's job to do and I hope an investigation is on the way because the responsible heads should roll, not JP.
By the way, I don't like football or Penn State. JP was probably and egomaniac but that isn't a crime anymore than you all being ignorant, bashing, jerkoff posters on an anonymous message board is. Get the point?