Jerry Sandusky emerged into familiar surroundings when he stepped out of the backseat of a police car in handcuffs on November 5, 2011. The car was in a courthouse parking lot off West College Avenue, one of the main routes to Penn State University. Just across the street was the university’s eighteen-hole Blue Course, one of two golf courses on the 17,000-acre campus. For three decades Sandusky had used the Penn State courses for his charity golf tournaments, which attracted big-name athletes and celebrities who participated in order to raise money for The Second Mile. During those tournaments Sandusky had ridden the fairways in a golf cart and always had a boy or two from The Second Mile with him. But golf and good times were the farthest things from his mind that Saturday morning. Escorted by two troopers and filmed by TV cameras, Sandusky was led into the courthouse to a district judge’s office to be booked on criminal charges of sexually assaulting eight boys from The Second Mile over a thirteen-year period. Charges from two more accusers would be added later. Once the charges were officially filed, Happy Valley would never be the same.
Sandusky was brought before Magisterial Judge Leslie Dutchcot, a contributor to and a volunteer at The Second Mile, whom he knew well. The night before, he had been with family in Ohio. His son Jon was the director of player personnel for the Cleveland Browns, and he had gone for a visit. Now the heart and soul of the charity was standing in front of Judge Dutchcot, charged with forty criminal counts ranging from involuntary deviate sexual intercourse to unlawful contact with a minor, endangering the welfare of a child, corruption of minors, and indecent assault. The weighty charges carried a maximum sentence of 565 years in prison and $600,000 in fines. Sandusky stood glum and silent during the ten o’clock proceedings. He entered a plea of “not guilty” through his attorney, Joseph Amendola of State College. Prosecutors had sought bail of $500,000. They assumed if he made bail, he would be given an electronic ankle bracelet that would alert authorities if he left his house. To their dismay, Sandusky was released on $100,000 unsecured bond, which essentially meant he had to sign a piece of paper to say that he would not flee and would show up for future proceedings. No electronic monitoring device was ordered.
The reaction generated by Sandusky’s arrest exploded beyond the sensational. The biggest scandal in the history of college sports had cracked open.
At the time of Sandusky’s arraignment, the Pennsylvania attorney general’s office in Harrisburg issued charges against two high-ranking Penn State officials, Athletic Director Tim Curley and Senior Vice President for Finance Gary Schultz. They each faced one count of perjury for making false statements to a grand jury and for failing to abide by the Child Protective Services Law, which compels school officials to report suspected abuse of children within forty-eight hours. They were to surrender in two days for booking. If convicted, Curley and Schultz faced a maximum punishment of seven years in prison and a $15,000 fine. Through their attorneys, both men maintained their innocence.
A statement by Pennsylvania Attorney General Linda Kelly was posted on the office’s official website. The arrest confirmed the small-town rumors that had been circulating for years and tore away the veil of secrecy that had concealed Sandusky’s alleged dark side. Not only did Kelly lay out the criminal case for newspaper and media outlets; she alluded to a culture of silence that had covered it up: “This is a case about a sexual predator who used his position within the university and community to prey on young boys. It is also about high ranking university officials who allegedly failed to report the sexual assault of a young boy after it was brought to their attention, and later made false statements to a grand jury that was investigating a series of assaults on young boys.”
Prosecutors emphasized the two incidents that had occurred on campus: the inappropriate behavior involving Sandusky and the eleven-year-old boy in the locker room shower in 1998, and the sexual assault of a ten-year-old boy in the locker room shower witnessed by Mike McQueary in 2002. The first investigation had been dropped without prosecution. In the 2002 incident, McQueary hadn’t gone to police with his account, but he had contacted Coach Joe Paterno, who in turn had alerted the university officials Curley and Schultz. Prosecutors said there was no indication that anyone from the university had ever attempted to learn the identity of the ten-year-old boy in the 2002 case, or get his version of what had happened. But John Raykovitz, The Second Mile’s CEO, had been notified of the 2002 incident. “The failure of top university officials to act on reports of Sandusky’s alleged sexual misconduct, even after it was reported to them in graphic detail by an eyewitness, allowed a predator to walk free for years, continuing to target new victims,” the attorney general added in her statement. “Equally disturbing is the lack of action and apparent lack of concern among those same officials, and others who received information about this case, who either avoided asking difficult questions or chose to look the other way.”
Featured on the attorney general’s website was the case of the Central Mountain High School student, whose allegations against Sandusky had sparked the in-depth investigation of the former coach by state police three years earlier. Even though the mother had complained that school officials were slow to act, the attorney general said they had immediately barred Sandusky from the school and reported the matter to authorities as required by state law: “The quick action by high school staff members in Clinton County in response to reports of a possible sexual assault by Sandusky is in marked contrast to the reaction of top officials at Penn State University, who had actually received a first-hand report of a sexual attack by Sandusky seven years earlier.”
Although a news conference was scheduled for the Monday following the arraignment, the attorney general’s office released an unnervingly detailed twenty-three-page report. In the presentment, the prosecutor itemized the reasons why a statewide grand jury recommended charges of twenty-one felonies and nineteen misdemeanors against Sandusky. Citing the sworn accounts of young men who said they had been sexually assaulted by Sandusky, the report outlined how Sandusky had drawn the vulnerable boys into personal relationships with expensive gifts, clothing, and money and taken them to Penn State and National Football League games. Given the heinous nature of the charges, authorities had taken great pains to protect the identities of the accusers. In the presentment, the boys were referred to by number, from “Victim 1” through “Victim 8.” Most damning was the allegation that Sandusky had run his charity to target his prey. “It was within The Second Mile program that Sandusky found his victims,” the presentment said. “Through The Second Mile, Sandusky had access to hundreds of boys, many of whom were vulnerable due to their social situations.”
Each young man who had opened up when an investigator knocked on his door believed he was the only one who had been abused by Sandusky. Only when the young men read the presentment did they realize that what had happened to them had happened to others. The lawyer for one of the young men, identified as Victim 6, would later seemingly speak for all of them when he described his client’s reaction to the presentment: “He cried. He didn’t cry for what happened to him. He cried for the others.” The pattern of Sandusky’s activities had finally come to light.
The document also cited an “uncooperative atmosphere” at Penn State during the investigation. The last sentence, placed in parentheses, pointed out that Sandusky was presumed innocent until proven guilty. Little attention, if any, was paid to that detail.
When the news story broke, the shockwaves were unstoppable. Jerry Sandusky, known as a male Mother Theresa, charged as a sexual predator assaulting boys in his charity? Rapes of boys in the showers of the Penn State football locker room? Penn State officials covering it up charged with perjury? Penn State, the hallowed domain of the deified Joe Paterno and his “Success with Honor,” besmirched by scandal?
What set this story apart from other media firestorms was how it crossed from news shows to the sports channels. Every channel seemed to be playing a continuous loop of Sandusky entering the district court in handcuffs. Newspapers posted accounts on their websites hours before the story could get into their Sunday editions. The social networks also spread the story. Smartphones programmed to receive updates on Penn State football were beeping with alerts. It was the kind of story nobody wanted to hear but everyone wanted to share.
The Penn State administration knew the arrests were coming. The investigation of Sandusky had first been reported in March by the Harrisburg Patriot-News, even though the story then didn’t gain much traction beyond central Pennsylvania. Starting in May the thirty-two members of the Penn State board of trustees were briefed about the investigation. Besides Paterno, Curley, Schultz, and Spanier, as many as twenty other university personnel had been called to testify before the grand jury. Some were asked to describe Sandusky’s actions, others to explain why they didn’t take definitive action after they twice heard specific accusations against him dating back to 1998. Still, when the arrests came, the Penn State administration seemed to be caught off guard.
Inside the president’s office in Old Main, Spanier spent hours trying to figure out what to say to the public, his staff, and everyone in the athletic program. He wrote and rewrote his statement as a few of his trusted aides peeked over his shoulder. After he had gone over it ten times or so, he called a meeting for four o’clock with his staff. He told them there was virtually nothing he could say about the charges against Sandusky, other than that he felt pain for the young men. As for Curley and Schultz, he told his staff one option would be to take a strict public relations stand, distancing the university and himself from them. Then he read them the statement he had crafted, which voiced unconditional support for both men. He told his staff that Curley and Schultz had believed Sandusky’s actions were inappropriate horseplay, not sexual molestation. Therefore the right thing for him to do was to support them, even if that approach cost him his job. Spanier said he would rather lose his job and live with the belief that he had done what he thought was right than refuse to support two loyal employees. In what Spanier considered a “teachable moment,” he told his staff that under similar circumstances, he would remain loyal to all of them too.
The statement Spanier eventually released to the media was this: “The allegations about a former coach are troubling, and it is appropriate that they be investigated thoroughly. Protecting children requires the utmost vigilance. I have known and worked daily with Tim and Gary for more than sixteen years. I have complete confidence in how they have handled the allegations about a former university employee. Tim Curley and Gary Schultz operate at the highest levels of honesty, integrity and compassion. I am confident the record will show that these charges are groundless and they conducted themselves professionally and appropriately.”
Meanwhile a statement was released by the CEO of The Second Mile, John Raykovitz, who had been told by Sandusky three years earlier that he was the target of a molestation probe. “All of us at The Second Mile are shaken,” the statement said. “This clearly is a difficult time for Jerry and his family, for all other involved parties, and for The Second Mile. However, The Second Mile clearly understands our highest priority must continue to be the safety and well-being of the children participating in our programs.” It concluded with the sentence, “At no time was The Second Mile made aware of the very serious allegations contained in the grand jury report,” distinctly ignoring the fact that top officials of The Second Mile had been told about the troubling 1998 and 2002 Sandusky incidents shortly after they were reported. .
On Sunday, with no officials speaking publicly, media outlets sharpened their focus on the unfolding scandal by delving into the twenty-three-page grand jury report. Some reporters had already made their way to the campus, while assignment editors for national press organizations dispatched cameras, crews, and satellite trucks to State College. Once the media beast had found this juicy scandal, its appetite was insatiable.
At his home on McKee Street, Joe Paterno was besieged with media requests for comments. He issued a brief statement: “If true, the nature and amount of charges made are very shocking to me and all Penn Staters. . . . The fact that someone we thought we knew might have harmed young people to this extent is deeply troubling. If this is true, we were all fooled, along with scores of professionals trained in such things, and we grieve for the victims and their families. They are in our prayers.”
Paterno also tried to explain his own role in the case laid out by prosecutors. In 2002, when he was told that a naked Sandusky was spotted in the football showers with a boy, Paterno said, he did what the law required: he reported it up the Penn State chain of command. In his statement he said, “As my grand jury testimony stated, I was informed in 2002 by an assistant coach that he had witnessed an incident in the shower of our locker room facility. It was obvious the witness was distraught over what he saw, but he at no time related to me the very specific actions contained in the grand jury report. . . . I understand that people are upset and angry, but let’s be fair and let the legal process unfold. In the meantime I would ask all Penn Staters to continue to trust in what that name represents, continue to pursue their lives every day with high ideals and not let these events shake their beliefs in who they are.”
The Penn State Board of Trustees, sensing the gravity of the rapidly unfolding developments, held the first of several emergency meetings Sunday night, most members attending by conference call. Sandusky was banned from campus altogether. Curley was placed on administrative leave. Schultz, who had retired from the university in 2009 and emerged from retirement on an as-needed basis, returned to retirement. The university announced it would be paying the legal fees for Curley and Schultz.
Students awoke Monday morning to find the streets lined with TV satellite trucks. News organizations from ABC to CNN to ESPN were plumbing Penn State for details. However, the big news event was in Harrisburg. The attorney general’s office held its news conference on its investigation and the arrests. Prosecutors emphasized that Paterno had followed the letter of the law by reporting what he knew to his nominal superiors, but the investigation was continuing.
State Police Commissioner Frank Noonan, who had seen combat as a Marine Corps officer in Vietnam, talked about the fallout just beginning to damage the university. Of McQueary’s allegations, the state’s top cop said, “I don’t think I’ve ever been associated with a case with this type of eyewitness identification of sex acts taking place where the police weren’t called.” Noonan emphasized that all citizens, including big-name football coaches, have a moral responsibility to protect children. “This is not a case about football. It’s not a case about universities. It’s a case about children who have had their innocence stolen from them and a culture that did nothing to stop it or prevent it from happening to others.”
Jennifer Storm, the executive director of the Victim/Witness Assistance Program in Harrisburg, who herself was a Penn State alumna, used a meeting with the media to urge other young men who might be out there to come for counseling. Storm is the author of three books about the emotional demons that have plagued her since she was raped at the age of twelve. “The totality of the charges made the biggest impact,” she said in a later interview. “It’s easy to refute one or two people, but the number of those talking about sexual abuse continued to build. From the time I read the presentment, it was black and white. I was physically sick to my stomach. The Penn State administration knew about it and failed to do anything except to protect themselves and their institution. They created a grooming playground. But I also sobbed hysterically for all the alumni and all those who bleed Blue and White. They didn’t ask for any of this.”
Meanwhile Curley and Schultz surrendered and were arraigned before Magisterial District Judge Marsha Stewart. Bail was set at $75,000 each, which they posted before they were released. Caroline Roberto, the attorney representing Curley, said the charge of failing to report Sandusky under the Child Protective Services Law was a “summary offense” that was the legal equivalent of a traffic ticket. “It’s unconscionable that the attorney general would level such a weak case against a man of integrity like Tim Curley,” she said. “A perjury charge is a red flag that the charges against him are weak. . . . Tim Curley is innocent of all charges against him. We will vigorously challenge the charges in court, and we are confident he will be exonerated.”
At the Atherton Street offices of The Second Mile in State College, messages intended for the media were taped to the locked front door. One statement read, “We do not feel an interview would be appropriate, since this matter involves a criminal investigation, and we do not want to do anything that might interfere with law enforcement officials or the legal process.”
On Tuesday, November 8, the Patriot-News ran an editorial that took up the entire front page. In type normally reserved for headlines, the editorial declared, “There are obligations we all have to uphold the law. There are then the obligations we all have to do what is right.” The Daily Collegian, a student-run newspaper on the Penn State campus, also editorialized, “The moral failure of every single person involved is appalling. No one did anything more than try to sweep this problem off-campus. . . . The university has brought shame upon itself.”
No Penn State official had yet faced the media since Sandusky’s arrest. Paterno was being blasted in the media and throughout the nation because he passed the damning allegations against Sandusky by McQueary off to Curley and did nothing after it was hushed up without a formal investigation. Some were calling for his scalp. Behind the scenes, Graham Spanier asked the board to give him the authority to be the crisis manager and the voice of the university, even though there was mounting outrage over his support of Curley and Schultz. Spanier also argued against the sentiment of a few board members to cancel the upcoming Nebraska game, and possibly the rest of the football season. Having urged the trustees to spare Paterno’s job, Spanier also asked for a vote of confidence that would show a united front. The trustees refused all of Spanier’s requests.
Throughout his career Joe Paterno held weekly meetings with the media on Tuesdays, so on November 8, the Tuesday following Sandusky’s arrest, the media horde, larger than ever, assembled in the interview room at Beaver Stadium. Less than an hour before the news conference was to start, Spanier canceled it. Paterno walked past the assembled reporters while making his way to the regularly scheduled football practice. “I know you guys have a lot of questions,” he remarked. “I was hoping I could answer them today. We’ll try to do it as soon as we can.”
The board of trustees issued its own statement, saying it was outraged by the horrifying details laid out by prosecutors. It said a special committee had been appointed to ensure that a scandal like the one unfolding would never happen at Penn State again. The board was acknowledging that the university had lost its most precious asset: trust. The statement continued, “We cannot begin to express the combination of sorrow and anger that we feel. . . . We are dedicated to protecting those who are placed in our care. We promise you that we are committed to restoring public trust in the university.”
As evening fell, some students gathered at Old Main, home to the university’s administrative offices. Others, agitated by all the media attention, congregated at various spots on campus and in State College. Some maintained a vigil at the Paterno house on McKee Street. Sue Paterno came to the door and blew a kiss to the well-wishers. Her son Scott asked the students to pray for the victims, saying, “No matter how this works out, there is a horrible story involving a lot of kids getting hurt. . . . Let’s remember to show support for the victims first.” The students in the yard formed a circle of unity and observed a minute of silence.
A short time later Paterno came to the window to thank his supporters. “I feel sorry for the victims,” he said. “We are Penn State. We are family. . . . I lived for this place. I’ve lived for people like you guys and girls. It’s hard for me to say how much this means. Beat Nebraska!”
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 9, WAS A DAY of inevitability for Joe Paterno. For decades he had talked about stepping down as coach but had always found a reason to stay on. Now, in the final year of his latest contract, with an uproar too loud to control, Paterno attempted to leave on his own terms. He announced his resignation after forty-six years as head coach and sixty-one seasons at Penn State. He was the most acclaimed coach in the history of college football. He had piled up more victories, more winning seasons, and more bowl victories than any other coach. He had won two National Championships, fielded five undefeated teams, and won three Big Ten championships. He had been named “Coach of the Year” five times by the American Football Coaches Association, and he had stayed with one school longer than had any other coach. Some 350 of his players had played professionally in the National Football League, thirty-three of them first-round draft choices. JoePa had produced seventy-eight first-team All-Americans and coached one Heisman Trophy winner. What’s more, under his watch Penn State had forty-seven Academic All-Americans, including sixteen honored as scholar-athletes by the National Football Foundation. During his time at Penn State twelve different men had occupied the White House, starting with Harry Truman in 1950. JoePa was the face of Penn State, the central figure in its money-raising machine. In the college bookstore life-size figures of Paterno, called “Stand-up Joes,” were sold along with all manner of items bearing his likeness. Now his reign was coming to an end.
Paterno intended to coach through the rest of the season, three more regular season games. By so doing he could break Amos Alonzo Stagg’s mark for most games coached in a career. The Nittany Lions were still in contention for the Big Ten championship, and they would surely be invited to a bowl game. At that point there could be a grand farewell for the beloved coach.
“I am absolutely devastated by the developments in this case. I grieve for the children and their families, and I pray for their comfort and relief,” Paterno said in a statement. “At this moment, the board of trustees should not spend a single minute discussing my status. They have far more important matters to address. I want to make this as easy for them as I possibly can. This is a tragedy. It is one of the great sorrows of my life. With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more. My goals are to keep my commitments to my players and staff and to finish the season with dignity and determination. And then I will spend the rest of my life doing everything I can to help this university.”
For several days, however, the board of trustees had been contemplating what to do about Paterno and his future. It considered Paterno’s ongoing status important enough to address later that day.
At the Lasch Building, where the Nittany Lions had gathered for practice, Paterno met privately for ten minutes with his team to tell them of his decision to leave his coaching post. He broke down as he spoke the words. Players witnessed their coach crying for the first time in sixty-one years. After the emotional announcement, Paterno watched practice from his golf cart before heading home. He had no idea that this Wednesday practice would be his final act as a coach.
Meanwhile an artist named Michael Pilato was making alterations to his massive mural Inspiration, which adorns the side of a building half a block long on Heister Street near the campus bookstore. He had been working on the mural for ten years, and it features many of the personalities from Penn State and State College, including Jerry Sandusky. The mother of one of Sandusky’s accusers had emailed him that morning to suggest that he remove Sandusky’s image, and now Pilato climbed a ladder with paintbrush in hand. He proceeded to paint Sandusky out, telling reporters, “It saddens me to do this. He fooled me like he fooled everyone.” Painting over the damage wrought by Sandusky would not be that easy. The artist painted a blue ribbon, the symbol used in campaigns against child abuse, on the mural where Sandusky had been portrayed sitting in a chair. He also painted a blue ribbon on the shirt of a smiling Joe Paterno, the central figure of the grand masterpiece.
By the time the Penn State Board of Trustees met in another emergency session that Wednesday night, its vice chairman, John Surma, chief executive officer of U.S. Steel, had been chosen to speak for the university in place of Spanier. Instead of following the university president’s suggestions on crisis management, the board chose to retain the services of a national public relations firm, Ketchum, based in New York City. The sixteen-year president realized his time had come. He stepped down, effective immediately. Joe Paterno was not even allowed to dictate the terms of his retirement, and was fired on the spot, after six decades of unflinching devoted service.
Word that the board of trustees had taken action against JoePa reached the Paterno household in a note delivered by Fran Ganter, associate athletic director for football, at 10:15 p.m. The note carried a telephone number, nothing more. There was urgency. The board had scheduled a press conference at the Penn Stater Hotel for 10:30 that evening, fifteen minutes away. According to reports, Paterno called the phone number and talked with Surma, who gave him the news of his dismissal. He hung up without saying a word.
In addressing the media that night, Surma said, “We thought that because of the difficulties that engulfed our university—and they are great—it was necessary for us to make a change in the leadership and set a course for a new direction. The university is much larger than its athletic programs.”
About twenty minutes after he was given the axe, Joe Paterno came to his front door to address a group of about forty students who had gathered to support him. With his wife at his side, Paterno said, “Right now, I’m not the coach, and I have to get used to that. I didn’t think it was going to happen this way.”
The news conference was televised in the student union. Some students reacted angrily to what had happened to Paterno, shouting, “Fuck Graham Spanier. Fuck Sandusky.” Facebook posts called for immediate demonstrations. About 2,000 students funneled their way into town through Beaver Canyon, the core of the student apartment area that stretches between McAllister and Garner Streets, leading to Beaver Avenue. They were chanting, “Fuck the trustees! Fuck the media!” and setting off fireworks. On College Avenue nearby, rioting students in range of surveillance cameras tore down a lamppost and street signs. They also flipped over the news truck of WTAJ-TV, a CBS affiliate from Altoona. The damage that night was estimated to be in the range of $200,000. State College police, reinforced by state troopers on horseback, donned riot gear and had tear gas at the ready in case the demonstrations got further out of hand.
Outside Old Main some students voiced quieter messages. One held a sign that said, “Kids before Football.” Another’s placard read, “Paterno’s Not a Victim.”
A week or so before Sandusky’s arrest, Governor Tom Corbett had alerted Penn State officials that he would attend the regularly scheduled meeting of the board of trustees on November 10. One of the duties of the governor is to serve on the board that has oversight of the university. Corbett had also been the state’s attorney general when the investigation into Sandusky had begun three years earlier. While there is no evidence to indicate that the governor had inside information that the arrests of Sandusky, Curly, and Schultz were coming down, his timing was impeccable: he was present to hold a news conference on Thursday, November 10. He used the occasion to express his disappointment in Joe Paterno and Graham Spanier and to support the board’s decision made the night before to fire Paterno and accept Spanier’s resignation. “Their actions cause me to not have confidence in their ability to lead. . . . When it comes to the safety of children, there can be no margin for error, no hesitation to act,” Corbett said.
Just prior to the vote on the fate of Spanier and Paterno, Corbett said, he told the other trustees, “We must remember that ten-year-old child and those other children.” The governor applauded the Penn State student leaders for showing solidarity with the young men. As for the students who flipped over the TV truck and lashed out with destructive acts, Corbett called them “knuckleheads.”
The Daily Collegian published an editorial: “Wednesday night was an embarrassment for Penn State. . . . The way the students reacted set our university two steps back.”
On Thursday, November 10, an interim head football coach was introduced. Tom Bradley, a Johnstown native who played football as a defensive back under Paterno and was captain of the special teams unit, was the man. As a player, he was given the nickname “Scrap” because he was undersized but full of fight. Bradley had been a member of the coaching staff for thirty-three years. He had succeeded Sandusky as defensive coordinator in 1999, and he was often mentioned as Paterno’s heir-apparent.
Ordinarily the coach would be answering questions about the upcoming game with Nebraska. But when Bradley held his first news conference, in the same Beaver Stadium media room where JoePa sparred with reporters, football questions took a backseat. “Coach Paterno has meant more to me than anybody except my father. Coach Paterno will go down in history as one of the greatest men. . . . I’m proud to say I worked for him,” Bradley said. As for the job ahead, Bradley was optimistic. “We are obviously in a very unprecedented situation,” he said. “I just have to find a way to restore the confidence and to start a healing process with everybody.” It was noted that Mike McQueary would be on the sidelines for Saturday’s game. Bradley said it was the university’s decision.
On Friday, November 11, the university reversed itself and said Assistant Coach Mike McQueary would not be on the sidelines for Saturday’s game. McQueary was put on indefinite administrative leave with full pay after a number of threats on his life were received.
Rodney Erickson, a long-time Spanier underling who had worked in several administrative jobs at Penn State, was sworn in as Penn State’s interim president. In his first address to the public he said, “Healing cannot occur until we understand how responsibilities to these children failed and how we can prevent such tragedies in the future.” He also promised a new era of openness and transparency in conducting school business. “Never again should anyone at Penn State—regardless of their position—feel scared to do the right thing.”
After a week that had exhausted the emotions of just about everyone, calm descended on campus Friday evening. Jessica Sever, a senior majoring in public relations, helped organize a candlelight vigil to show support for the boys mentioned in the investigation. The vigil was held on the lawn in front of Old Main, where two nights earlier angry students had gathered before going on a destructive tear in State College. About 10,000 students attended the vigil—five times more than the number who rioted. At ten o’clock, when the bells in the Old Main tower rang, a moment of silence was observed for the alleged victims. Cheerleaders, who normally would be getting the student body pumped up for the big game against Nebraska, handed out blue placards that said “Stop Child Abuse” instead.
A funereal mood hung over the event. Survivors of sex abuse took the microphone. One said, “These allegations of abuse are horrifying. The people who need our support the most are being overlooked by the entire frenzy.” Sandusky’s accusers, the eight young men who had told their stories to investigators, received recognition in a solemn roll call, identified individually as Victim 1, Victim 2, and so on.
One speaker at the vigil was LaVar Arrington, a star linebacker on Sandusky’s final team, who had been chosen in 2000 with the second overall pick of the NFL draft by the Washington Redskins. “The biggest crime we can commit is to leave here and forget what happened,” Arrington told the crowd.
Meanwhile some Penn State alumni set up a fund independent of anything the university was doing. It was designed to raise $500,000 for the victims, roughly a dollar for each of the Penn State alums scattered around the country. The idea started with Jerry and Jaime Needel of Hoboken, New Jersey. Partly out of the shame they felt for what happened and the way some students had reacted on campus, the couple launched a website, proudtobeapennstater.com, with proceeds to be donated to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network. By Friday night more than $200,000 had already been pledged. Said Jerry Needel on the website, “We needed to get our pride back. I felt betrayed, and really disgusted. We want to bring attention back where it belongs, with the victims of abuse.”
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 12, DAWNED CLEAR and crisp over a campus that had a cloud hanging over it. Nebraska was in town for the final home game of the season. A bomb squad was called in to do a sweep of Beaver Stadium after a threat had been phoned in, but nothing was found. Nonetheless security was ramped up, and police in riot gear patrolled the outside of the stadium on horseback.
At the Paterno house at the end of McKee Street, white envelopes overflowed from the mailbox even as a mail carrier approached with a bin overloaded with more messages of support. One letter was different from all the others. It was hand-delivered by Jay Paterno, son of the fired coach and a member of the Penn State coaching staff. Jay told his parents not to open it until he had left for the game. He knew he would be too emotional otherwise. The letter, in part, addressed a son’s love for his father: “You and I through my life haven’t always seen eye-to-eye. But, generally, that’s because I had to grow up to catch up and make eye contact with you.”
Traffic was bumper-to-bumper coming into State College, just as it always was when Penn State played. In the parking lots, attendants collected $40 for each car and $80 for each recreational vehicle seeking a space. JoePa still had a presence in the form of life-size cutouts set up at tailgate parties. Footballs filled the air and food was served, but some regulars noted a pall that felt like a collective death. Penn State was wrestling for its soul.
Outside Beaver Stadium fans left flowers and messages at the Paterno statue. Ten students had camped out at Paternoville the night before, each with a letter painted on his bare chest. Instead of hyping the Nittany Lions, the letters spelled out “FOR THE KIDS.” Face-painting was still in vogue, only this time the blue ribbon symbolizing child abuse prevention adorned cheeks. Some fans held up signs that said “JoePa Got Screwed” and “Screw the Media.” One student held up a handmade placard reading, “To the Victims: I Apologize for Penn State.”
At the Lasch Building, Penn State players donned their football uniforms and boarded the four blue buses for the one-mile ride to Beaver Stadium. The only reserved seat on any of the buses was the front right seat on the first bus. Joe Paterno always sat there, smiling and waving from the window to the crowds lining the streets. On this day, for the first time, that seat was empty.
Before a home game Penn State players always entered through a tunnel and exploded onto the field. This time they walked out solemnly, arm-in-arm, four at a time, captains in front. Over three hundred former Penn State players were invited to stand on the sidelines for emotional support.
Prior to kickoff, members of both teams moved to the center of the field to join hands and kneel in prayer during a moment of silence. Penn State’s interim coach Tom Bradley sought out his counterpart, Nebraska’s Bo Pelini, to pray with him. A culture of silence had compounded the issues confronting Penn State, but the silence of 107,000 fans was more deafening than the noise normally generated.
On the field a prayer was offered by Nebraska’s running back coach Ron Brown, who had been approached by the Penn State chapter of Athletes in Action to say some appropriate words. Brown was a graduate of Brown University, where Paterno had played football six decades earlier. His words weren’t broadcast to the crowd, but the gist of what he said was picked up by TV microphones. Inside the circle of players, Brown walked back and forth like a preacher on the move as he prayed, “Lord, we know that we don’t have control of all the events that took place this week, but we do know that you are bigger than it all. Father, God, there are a lot of little boys around the country today who are watching this game, and they’re trying to figure out what the definition of manhood is all about. I pray that this game would be a training ground of what manhood looks like. That we would compete with fierce intensity, with the honor and gifts and talent that you’ve given us. May the truth be known, may justice be known, may you protect the victims.” Addressing the players, he continued, “Would you say grace and forgiveness for the lives of all of those involved? Now give us a great game, a game that honors you, and in Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.”
The start of the game restored a sense of normalcy. It had been a week since Sandusky’s arrest, and two weeks since Paterno left the stadium not knowing it was his final game. The Nebraska game was the first played without Paterno on staff since November 19, 1949, when Penn State lost to Pittsburgh 19–0. Today Penn State’s first play was a run up the middle, a subtle tribute to the style of football Paterno had installed at the school when he became the head coach in 1966. In a video shown on the electronic scoreboard during a break in the first quarter, Rodney Erickson, the school’s interim president, said, “This has been one of the saddest weeks in the history of Penn State and my heart goes out to those who have been victimized. I share your anger and sorrow. Although we can’t go back to business as usual, our university must move forward. We are a community.”
In the second quarter Nebraska jumped to a 17–0 lead as Penn State seemed out of rhythm. But starting midpoint in the third quarter, the Nittany Lions were fighting back. They scored a couple of touchdowns and had two possessions that could have either tied the game or put them ahead. However, it was not to be. Nebraska held on to eke out a 17–14 win. Tom Bradley lost in his coaching debut, but he felt a higher purpose had been served. “I felt today, just maybe, the healing process started to begin,” he said.
To play the game at all had been a hot topic on campus. There had been strong sentiment to forfeit, in light of the monumental situation unfolding. Penn State’s interim president defended his decision to play the game, saying, “I felt this was a time to play, but also was time we could recognize and bring national focus to the problem of sexual abuse. Our players and everyone involved, the way they conducted themselves today, proved that this was the right decision. This was the way to do it.”
On the opposing side, Bo Pelini was thankful for more than just a victory. “I’ll be honest with you. Before the game, I didn’t think it should have been played for a lot of different reasons,” he said in his postgame remarks. “I don’t know the specifics of the situation, and I’m not judging anybody. But the fact is, kids were hurt. And that’s a lot bigger than football. . . . I think both teams coming together was the right thing to do and hopefully that in itself made a statement.”
Joe Paterno’s son Jay, an assistant coach at Penn State for seventeen seasons, usually sat in the coaches’ box high above the field, but was invited to coach against Nebraska from the sidelines. He handled his duties wearing the style of black shoes his father preferred and the jacket his dad had worn during the game in which he broke Bear Bryant’s record for career victories. After the game Jay told reporters, “The world’s kind of turned upside down.” Then he walked to his parents’ house, where his mother always served a postgame dinner to forty or so family members and special guests.
Before, during, and after the Penn State-Nebraska showdown, Joe’s supporters mingled outside the Paterno home. A cop kept them off the lawn and allowed only family members and guests to approach the front door. Many people left signs or notes for JoePa. Cathy Taylor of Roanoke, Virginia, left this sign: “Despite everything, someone like you deserved to be treated with more dignity and respect than a phone call to your home. And for that, we are sorry. Thanks. Enjoy your retirement. You’ve earned it.”
In the gloaming, the descending autumn sun created long shadows through the leafless trees in Sunset Park, a public space adjacent to the Paterno home. Sue Paterno emerged from the house and spoke briefly to those who were still lingering on the sidewalk. She told them, “I’ve always felt Penn State was a family. We will be again. We’ll be back. We’re not going anywhere.”
FALLOUT EXTENDED BEYOND THE PENN State campus. On Sunday, November 13, The Second Mile announced that it had accepted the resignation of John Raykovitz, a practicing psychologist who had run the organization for twenty-eight years. His wife, the organization’s executive vice president, Katherine Genovese, tendered her resignation as well. The Second Mile said it was going to conduct an internal investigation to assess its policies and make recommendations regarding its future. It also said it had hired a new legal firm.
Meanwhile Governor Corbett made the rounds on the Sunday morning TV news shows. On Fox News Sunday he said that Paterno had met his legal obligation in the Sandusky scandal but didn’t go as far as he should have: “When you don’t follow through, when you don’t continue on to make sure that actions are taken, then I lose confidence in your ability to lead. That would be the case here.”
Because Penn State receives federal money for research, the U.S. Department of Education entered the case to determine if there had been any violations of the Clery Act, a federal law that mandates reporting of campus crime. The Act was named for a Lehigh University student who had been raped and murdered in 1986. “If it turns out that some people at the school knew of the abuse and did nothing or covered it up, that makes it even worse,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan said.
Among the sports analysts later weighing in on the breaking story was Matt Millen, a former Penn Stater who had played defense under Sandusky and who had been an executive with the Detroit Lions after a career in the National Football League. Now a football analyst on ESPN, Millen said in a voice cracking with emotion, “I get mad. . . . If we can’t protect our kids we, as a society, are pathetic.” Speaking about the events engulfing his alma mater, Millen added, “A horror picture screen writer couldn’t write this bad of a script.”
On Monday, November 14, during the annual meeting of Catholic bishops in Baltimore, Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York responded to a question about the Penn State scandal by saying, “Whenever this painful issue comes into public view again, as it has sadly recently with Penn State, it reopens a wound in the church. We once again hang our heads in shame as we recall with contrition those who have been suffering. . . . One of the things we learned the hard way, and Lord knows we earned our Ph.D. in the school of hard knocks on this one, is that education in this area is extraordinarily efficacious.”
The National Football Foundation announced it was withdrawing the award it had been planning to bestow on Tim Curley, its John F. Toner Award, presented annually to the athletic director who has shown “outstanding dedication to college athletics and particularly college football.”
Pennsylvania’s two U.S. senators, Bob Casey and Pat Toomey, announced that they had rescinded their support of Paterno for the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award. Casey, a Democrat, and Toomey, a Republican, had nominated Paterno for the award in September in a letter to President Obama.
The Big Ten Conference announced that it was removing Paterno’s name from its championship trophy. In explanation Commissioner Jim Delaney said, “The trophy and its namesake are intended to be celebratory and inspirational, not controversial.” The removal of Paterno’s name brought a sense of sad finality to Marino Parascenzo, a retired sports writer with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette who had covered Penn State football. “I told my wife that it was like the changing of the dynasties in ancient Egypt,” he said. “The new pharaoh would deface the monuments and erase the names of the old pharaoh, as if to show he never existed. Taking Joe’s name off that trophy was like taking an eraser to his legacy. It was the ultimate disgrace.”
On the Penn State campus, Mount Nittany stood undisturbed. But the festive culture of Happy Valley and Penn State football had crumbled. Joe Paterno and his Grand Experiment were over. But his legacy and demand for personal excellence, as demonstrated in so many of his players, will remain for generations.