Penn State officials quit after abuse scandal

STATE COLLEGE, Pennsylvania - Reuters

Former Penn State athletic director Tim Curley (L) and his wife, Melinda, enter the courtroom in Harrisburg. Curley and Gary Schultz have surrendered for an arraignment on charges of perjury and failure to report abuse surrounding claims on a former coach.
Two top Penn State officials quit their posts and were charged on Nov. 7 with covering up a sexual abuse scandal that has tarnished the reputation of revered football coach Joe Paterno.
Athletic Director Tim Curley and top finance official Gary Schultz appeared in court, charged with failing to tell police about the alleged sexual abuse of young boys by an assistant football coach even though they knew about it for years. They also are accused of perjury before a grand jury probing the scandal.
“The charges at face value are disturbing to say the least,” District Judge William Wenner said at the brief hearing in Harrisburg.
The charges involve alleged abuse by Jerry Sandusky, a longtime assistant football coach at Penn State, who is accused of having inappropriate sexual contact with eight boys over a period of more than a decade.
The charges shocked the university and threaten to ruin the legacy of Penn State’s celebrated head coach Joe Paterno, who authorities said is not a target of investigation at this time. “Nothing happened (reporting the alleged abuse) and nothing stopped and that’s very unusual,” Pennsylvania Police Commissioner Frank Noonan told a conference.
Some details of the case are similar to the accusations that the Catholic Church swept sexual abuse by priests under the rug for decades.
Sandusky’s attorney Joe Amendola has said his client, who left Penn State coaching in 1999, was shaken by the charges but knew they were coming. “He’s maintained his innocence,” Amendola said.
In one of the incidents, Sandusky, 67, is alleged to have forced a boy as young a 10 to have sex with him in the shower at the football complex on campus in 2002, investigators said.
A graduate assistant saw the encounter and reported it to Paterno, who relayed the information to Athletic Director Curley.
“He (Paterno) had a responsibility to report the incident to school authorities and he did it,” said Pennsylvania Attorney General Linda Kelly.
Sandusky, who continued to have access to Penn State facilities after leaving Paterno’s staff, is alleged to have recruited his victims from a charity he founded to help underprivileged children, called “The Second Mile,” authorities said.
The charity moved quickly Nov. 7 to disassociate itself from Sandusky, saying in a statement that once the former coach informed them in 2008 that he was under investigation, they barred him from contact with children. “From 2008 to present, Mr. Sandusky has had no involvement with Second Mile programs involving children,” the charity said. But the abuse by Sandusky took place as far back as 1996, according to a statement from investigators, and the charity did not say what access he had before 2008.