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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Nov 10, 2011 - 04:53pm PT
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There are exceptions to the general rule Especially with respect to child abuse. It all comes down to Pennysylvania law.
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blahblah
Gym climber
Boulder
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Nov 10, 2011 - 06:21pm PT
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Janitors had seen the assaults and reported to supervisors, before the grad assistant was involved. No doubt all feared for their jobs. Finally, in 2009, off campus police get serious, after a victim reports to them.
I don't think so: if they feared for their jobs but wanted to stop child abuse, they may not report it their supervisors but WOULD make an anonymous complaint to the police.
I have no idea what goes through poeple's minds regarding reporting crimes. A secretary in my office allegedly was flashed by someone in a downtown Denver parking lot; she called the company that "managed" (collects from the payboxes) to report it and not the police--seemed very odd.
I recall the alleged victim of the DSK rape reported it to her supervisor or hotel security or whoever, who then reported it to police. Seemed weird too.
It wouldn't occur me to report a serious crime to anyone other than the police--would just seem whacky to go to my boss (I don't really have one, but assuming I did) to tell him I saw a sex crime occurring in a bathroom, whether it was at work or elsewhere.
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Nov 10, 2011 - 07:36pm PT
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It's often company policy that any criminal activity be reported to a supervisor So the company has a chance to hush it up? Which is obviously what happened somewhere up the chain at Penn State.
In a case of child molestation, one has a moral obligation to see that police are notified. Suppose you report it to your supervisor and the police don't interview you. Now you have good reason to believe the police weren't notified and you'd better go to them. You can be almost certain the child won't report it to anybody. Suppose you witness a woman being raped at work?
Moral imperatives trump "company policy", period.
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Mighty Hiker
climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Nov 10, 2011 - 07:53pm PT
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The big concern is that the establishment, and many vested interests, will vigorously argue that it was just a few individuals who are responsible, not the university. (Morally responsible, that is - legally, it's likely that this will cost the university a lot.) They'll do their best to deflect responsibility, up to and including a blame the victim routine, or scapegoating. Entrenched bureaucracies are good at diffusing blame, and in this case they would rather not that legal or judicial authority had a good look at the bigger picture.
The NCAA will also do all it can to distance itself from the abuses, knowing that many of its activities wouldn't stand up to close scrutiny, however much popular support they have. Essentially, that it's a law unto itself, and that the athletes, and higher education, often don't benefit from its decisions. Ultimately, the NCAA is an abusive monopoly, especially when it comes to professional sports (football, basketball, baseball, hockey, etc) at colleges. And it begs the question as to whether such activities with such an emphasis belong in an academic context at all.
Ultimately, it's the athletes, and higher education, that suffer.
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Nov 10, 2011 - 07:59pm PT
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Not sure but what I'm hearing is that Joe - who was in his mid-70s at the time - went straight to the University athletic director and the pres. and reported what he saw. Trusting them to follow up and do well by Joe was Joe's fault but maybe not his crime. I think on these cases it's all about the follow up.
JL
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sandstone conglomerate
climber
sharon conglomerate central
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Nov 10, 2011 - 09:11pm PT
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How long before Sandusky hangs himself in a closet?
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
mammoth lakes ca
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Nov 10, 2011 - 09:16pm PT
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My older brother got married in State College Pennseltucky...As i remember that place was whacked out about Penn State football...Must have been the radioactive water in the local river?
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Ricky D
Trad climber
Sierra Westside
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Nov 10, 2011 - 09:30pm PT
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There is a term used in the home A/V biz to describe those clients who are "passionate" about sports.
We call them "Jock Sniffers".
Expose yourself to enough of these people and you will get an education in the world of sports hero worship and all that such implies.
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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Nov 10, 2011 - 09:46pm PT
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Whether or not it's felonious is not clear to me.
The felony might have been lying under oath to the grand jury. Not certain, thats just the way it reads to me. I am not a lawyer, I only play one on the taco.
I find it hard to understand how many different adults witnessed this man having sex with children and only notified their supervisor. They didn't put a stop to it immediately, and they didn't tell the police. It is mind boggling. They just went to their supervisor, who covered it up.
We aren't talking about children witnessing this guy. We are talking about grown adults who witnessed these acts and did virtually nothing.
Joe Paterno deserves to rot in some terrible place.
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nick d
Trad climber
nm
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Nov 10, 2011 - 09:51pm PT
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Largo, tell me you did not just come to the defense of Paterno?
He knowingly harbored a child rapist for a decade, and when he was fired today, his reaction was,"I am dissapointed with the regents decision".
Everyone involved should go to prison, and that includes Paterno himself. I don't care if he is 85.
Perhaps I am sensitized to this issue by being raised Catholic. Take the example of Cardinal Law, who ran an ongoing conspiracy to shelter pedophile priests. The Pope, in order to protect him, got him out of the country and created a special office for him in the Vatican. Tell me that motherfuker shouldn't be doing hard time in Federal prison.
That bastard dumped all those guys in my state, and when it finally broke and the lawsuits started coming, our local priests in their weekly sermons told us we needed to give more so the Church could pay.
The Church has trillions of dollars in art and real estate holdings, and those fukers had the gall to ask some of the poorest people in the country to pay more. If I had the Hitler Youth Pope and Cardinal Law in front of me it would be very hard not to administer a little street justice to them.
The assistant coach who witnessed the rape and walked away from that poor kid and everyone else up the chain of command deserve just the same.
Send those rats to prison and let em get a taste of their own medicine.
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adatesman
climber
philadelphia, pa
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Nov 10, 2011 - 09:56pm PT
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Penn State's kinda a big thing here around Philly and I have to say every time I see the stickers/logos on the back of someone's car I feel an overwhelming twinge of pain and embarrassment for my state's biggest public university. That this was allowed to happen is all sorts of wrong and the backlash on main campus in response to Joe's firing is at best misguided.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Nov 10, 2011 - 10:44pm PT
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Not sure but what I'm hearing is that Joe - who was in his mid-70s at the time - went straight to the University athletic director and the pres. and reported what he saw. Trusting them to follow up and do well by Joe was Joe's fault but maybe not his crime.
dude. not how it works. obviously not legally.
best guess is that a huge chunk of the university and trustees has been hoping to push him out for years, but he has a political constituency in the alumni and students base. that made him and his political base (sandusky obviously one) harder to touch.
any big power structure in a big bureaucratic setting builds power by building constituencies who have both grassroots (popular) and financial clout. over a period of years, a single program builds up institutional loyalties and investments that help to shore it up against internal enemies. enemies are always chipping away, hoping for some bit of weakness to supply an angle of attack. there is a lot of money at stake in big-time football, big-time football is penn state's claim to fame (quick, name a top research scientist at penn state), and joepa is the face of the franchise with stacks of key allies in the donor base.
legally, he was absolutely responsible for reporting to the police. don't think for a minute that penn state would or could hire an ad who wasn't personally approved by paterno and his patrons/clients.
the trustees took this opportunity to do what they wanted to do-- they ousted not just joepa and his ad, but also the president who was presumably also the choice of paterno and the ad's patron/client/donor circle.
that the prez went so quickly, w/o even an internal investigation, tells you everything you want to know: the prez, the ad, and joepa were a power triangle bound to a wealthy donor base, that the trustees and huge chunks of the upper uni admin saw that the program was distorting other parts of the uni's missions, and that this was a package deal.
so to speak.
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Gary
climber
From the City That Dreams
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 10, 2011 - 10:50pm PT
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How long before Sandusky hangs himself in a closet?
It would be the decent thing to do.
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Ezra Ellis
Trad climber
WA, & NC & Idaho
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Nov 10, 2011 - 11:01pm PT
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Dingus is right on, it all goes back to hero worship and covering your a$#$, JoePa deserves jail but won't probably get it.
There was a university of Nebraska football player who was accused of forcible rape, they waited until after the football season to try the case,
I guess the judge was a fan of the Corn Huskers.
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Gary
climber
From the City That Dreams
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Topic Author's Reply - Nov 11, 2011 - 12:05am PT
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klk: legally, he was absolutely responsible for reporting to the police.
That's the grand jury's finding. The incident in the shower should have been reported to police by law.
The grand jury report is ugly as sin.
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Patrick Sawyer
climber
Originally California now Ireland
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Nov 11, 2011 - 06:48am PT
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FortMental, I do not want to start a flame war, but don't dis LEB for what she wrote, which was very sensible. You obviously have an agenda that shouldn't be on this forum. Don't be so mental. You wouldn't be a Penn State grad would you?
Abusing children is one of the lowest forms of humanity... or should that be inhumanity.
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tradmanclimbs
Ice climber
Pomfert VT
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Nov 11, 2011 - 09:11am PT
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I don’t understand why the grad assistant didn’t immediately call the cops as mandated by law and common decency. He saw the rape in progress, called his father, left the gym and contacted Paterno the next day. He left the 10 year old and rapist alone in the gym!
The grad assistant is now an assistant coach at PSU and will be working Saturday’s game.
That is a quote from upthread. I believe it brings up the very human response that most normal citizens with a load of bills to pay have to deal with. I have to report this to someone but I do not want to lose my job.. that is what the grad student was most likly dealing with. he reports to the head coach and nothing happens but at least he can tell himself he did the right thing even if he has guilt and wishes he had done more...
Paterno on the other hand had almost god like power on that campus and obviously should have at the very least banished the creep from campus.
Obviously a cover up to protect his own status and the football program.
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bookworm
Social climber
Falls Church, VA
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Nov 11, 2011 - 09:22am PT
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worth reading from a guy who's writing paterno's biography:
http://joeposnanski.si.com/2011/11/10/the-end-of-paterno/?sct=hp_wr_a5&eref=sihp
1) IF paterno covered up anything, he deserves to be punished to the fullest extent of the law
2) paterno should have retired at least 10 years ago, and that's a purely football opinion
3) paterno made penn state and not simply as a football school but, more importantly, an academic school...the only building on campus that bears his name is the library, which he built--he raised ALL the funds; he majored in english and actually teaches classes...english classes
4) what if...a man you have known for decades, trusted and admired for decades, considered your friend for decades, was suddenly ACCUSED of the most heinous crime? would your initial reaction be to shun him? or would you stand by him until the accusations were PROVEN true (let's say with a grand jury indictment)? perhaps, paterno's only sin is trusting a friend, refusing to believe the worst about his friend, judging his friend based on what he knew rather than what others said; he certainly wouldn't be the first to commit that sin
5) i'm a teacher, and i know the school system tries its best to keep cases like this out of the media until/unless there's simply too much evidence...because a false accusation can ruin a career and life, and there have been false accusations
6) sandusky's alleged crimes were actually made public 6 months ago by a reporter; in the meantime, the da was building his case and finally got an indictment last week...there have been no charges against paterno, for anything
7) sandusky was originally accused in '98 but charges were never filed; i assume they simply didn't have the evidence; a lot of people, now, are saying he should have been ostracized then...really? without proof?
8) paterno should have lost his job because everybody agrees he was the most powerful man on that campus and he owns the football program; but he should have been allowed to resign immediately for all the good he has done over the last 60 years...at least would have avoided the riot
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