Sex Abuse Charges Rock Penn State
RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: You're looking at a live picture from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania where the state's attorney general and police commissioner are holding a news conference on what could be one of the biggest scandals to rock college sports. That is Penn State. The shocking sexual abuse allegations against one of its famed former coaches, Jerry Sandusky and the alleged cover up that followed. That's where a Grand Jury says Penn State athletic director, Timothy Curly, and Gary Schultz, the university's senior vice president for finance and business come into play. Both resigned late last night and are about to appear in court to face charges. Again, any moment now -- actually right now, we're hearing from the state attorney general and the Police Commissioner. But we really cannot forget in all of this the eight alleges victims, boys as young as 7 or 8 years old. And we do have to warn you that the details revealed by the Grand Jury report and, quite frankly, hard to stomach. Let's listen in here just for a short time to this press conference.</s>LINDA KELLY, ATTORNEY GENERAL, PENNSYLVANIA (live): -- many news articles and opinion pieces have already been written about this and many of you are very familiar with the allegations contained in the presentment, as well as the defendants that have been charged and the institutions and organizations that have been mentioned in this case. I also understand that many of you have questions concerning the allegations, the criminal charges, and other issues related to the case. Commissioner Noonan and I will attempt to address many of those questions -- as many of those questions as possible, but I need to qualify that statement by making it clear that this is an ongoing investigation, and it's also a grand jury investigation, which means that there are going to be some details that we will not be able to discuss. As we noted earlier, this is a case about a sexual predator accused of using his position within the community and the university to prey on numerous young boys for more than a decade. A large part of this case, as you know, revolves around the actions of Jerry Sandusky and the criminal charges that have been filed against him for the allege sexual assaults he committed on eight young boys who were victimized over a period that stretch from -- stretched from the late 1990s until 2009. Equally significant, however, is the role that several top Penn State University administrators, athletic director, Tim Curly, and vice president of business and finance, Gary Schultz, who also oversaw the university police -- the roles that they played in this matter by allegedly failing to report suspected child abuse and later providing false testimony, false statements to a grand jury that was investigating this case. I suspect that many of you, based on what I know, have already read the presentment which, as you know, details a disturbing pattern of sexual assaults on young boys all of whom Sandusky met through his involvement in the charitable organization known as The Second Mile which is an organization that Sandusky himself founded. Some of those assaults allegedly occurred while Sandusky was a coach at Penn State, while others happened on the Penn State campus and elsewhere after Sandusky had retired from his coaching position, including the showers in the locker room of the Penn State football team at Lash Hall on the University campus, which Sandusky apparently had unrestricted access to as part of his retirement agreement with Penn State. It was the activity in those football locker rooms first reported by a victim in 1998 and again by a witness in 2002 that are particularly disturbing. The incident which occurred in 2002 at Lash Hall where Sandusky was seen committing a sexual assault on a young boy of about 10 years of age was reported to University officials by a graduate assistant who happened to be in the building late one Friday evening. Those officials and administrators to whom it was reported did not report that incident to law enforcement or to any child protective agency. And their inaction likely allowed a child predator to continue to victimize children for many, many years. The Grand Jury heard some very graphic and compelling testimony from key witnesses during their investigation of this case. Including, of course, the graduate assistant who told them what he saw in the shower that night in Lash Hall, and they also heard testimony from Joe Paterno who is the football coach at Penn State. Men who saw or heard about the sexual assault of that young boy in the football locker room and who reported the incident to those top administrators at the University. The Grand Jury also heard testimony from others at the University, including the defendants in this case, athletic director Tim Curley and senior vice president, Gary Schultz, who are now charged with making false statements about what they knew, failing to recall key details and making statement that the jury -- Grand Jury found not to be credible, and failing to report suspected child abuse. I'd like to emphasize that one of the basic principles of our legal system is that witnesses are required under the law to tell the truth when they're called before a Grand Jury. The truth, pure and simple, nothing more, nothing less. And that principle applies to everyone from the ordinary man on the street, as well as to those who occupy positions of power and influence, men like the defendants in this case. And if we're to enforce the law and protect our citizens, and in this case, protect our children, we cannot condone under the law the actions of those who make false and perjurous (ph) statements to a Grand Jury, regardless of the positions that they hold, particularly when they involve serious matters of great importance. The sexual abuse of a child is a horrific offense and that understandably arouses strong emotions within all of us and can cause scars that last a lifetime for its victims and failing to report sexual abuse of children is a serious offense and a crime. In this case, it's alleged that top administration officials at Penn State University, Curley and Schultz, after receiving a report of the sexual assault of a young boy at Lash Hall in the shower by Sandusky, from both a graduate assistant and the coach of the Penn State football team, not only did not report that incident as required by law, but they also never made any attempt to identify that child. So today, as we stand here, we encourage that person who is now likely to be a young adult, to contact investigators from the Attorney General's office at telephone number 814-863-1053, or the Pennsylvania State Police at 814-470-2238. We also encourage anyone else who has any information related to this case to please contact those same numbers. This is an ongoing and active investigation, and commissioner Noonan and I have both made it abundantly clear to everyone at both of our agencies that we're determined to quickly respond to any new witnesses or to any additional information that may appear. As you all know, or should know, Sandusky was taken into custody this past Saturday in Centre County, Pennsylvania and is currently awaiting a preliminary hearing. The defendant's Curley and Schultz are both scheduled to appear for their preliminary arraignment at 2:00 this afternoon here in Harrisburg. The case against Sandusky is being prosecuted in Centre County, because that's where the sexual assaults allegedly took place. The case against Curley and Schultz is being prosecuted in Harrisburg, Dauphin County, because that's where they allegedly made false statements to the investigating Grand Jury. With that, I believe that commissioner Noonan has a brief statement before we attempt to answer some of your questions. Commissioner Noonan.</s>FRANK NOONAN, COMMISSIONER, PENNSYLVANIA STATE POLICE: Thank you, Linda. Good afternoon. For those of you who don't know, I was the chief of investigations at the attorney general's office before I became commissioner of the Pennsylvania State Police. So, I've been involved with this investigation for several years, and it's unique in many respects. The first thing I'd like to say is that this is not a case about football, it's not a case about universities, it's a case about children who had their innocence stolen from them, and a culture that did nothing to stop it or prevent it from happening to others. Now, if you read the presentment, what you saw there was something we that do the investigations like this would call grooming. What happened here was grooming, where these predators identify a child, become mentors, they're usually children that have had -- they're having a little difficulty, they're at-risk children. Through The Second Mile program, he was able to identify these children, then give them gifts, establish a trust, initiate physical contact which eventually leads to sexual contact and that is very common in these type of investigations. What is unusual though in this particular investigation is that in 1998 there was a police investigation in which he made admissions about inappropriate contact in the shower room, Jerry Sandusky did, and nothing happened and nothing stopped. In 2000 -- the year 2000, janitors at the University -- at Penn State University observed a sex act in the shower room and because they were afraid of their jobs, didn't report it. So, nothing changed and nothing stopped. And then in 2002, the graduate assistant saw another sex act being committed in the locker room in the shower by Jerry Sandusky. He did report it but nothing happened and nothing stopped, and that's very unusual. I don't think I've ever been associated with a case where that type of eyewitness identification of sex acts taking place where the police weren't called. I don't think I've ever seen something like that before. Now, as you go through this case as I have, there aren't many heroes involved. But if I were to identify some heroes, it would be the men and women standing on this stage, the investigators, the troopers, that have worked on this case for over two years and the prosecutors. You got to understand --</s>KAYE: You've been listening there to the allegations against Jerry Sandusky there from Penn State, along with two other top administrators. A lot to process there, some very disturbing details. We're going to break it all down with our senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin right after this very quick break. So, keep it here on CNN.