HARRISBURG — Former Pennsylvania State University President Graham B. Spanier and two key administrators failed to stop the “Jerry Sandusky problem” and, for that, Mr. Spanier should be found guilty of child endangerment and conspiracy, a state prosecutor told jurors Tuesday.
“The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for men to do nothing,” said Patrick Schulte, a deputy attorney general, in opening arguments at Mr. Spanier's trial in Dauphin County Common Pleas Court. “Evil thrives when men do nothing.”
But Sam Silver, a lawyer for Mr. Spanier, argued that the former Penn State president did do something — he took steps he thought were appropriate based on the information he had at the time. The state’s case, Mr. Silver said, is an unfair attempt to “criminalize a judgment call.”
The arguments opened the prosecution of Mr. Spanier, Penn State's once renowned president. Testimony before the jury of seven women and five men could last the week.
With most of the scandal’s turns having been aired and many of its participants having been questioned in other cases over the years, the first trial witnesses Tuesday amounted to familiar figures describing familiar accounts.
Former university police chief Tom Harmon and detective Ron Schreffler testified about their 1998 investigation of an allegation that Sandusky had showered with a young boy. Mr. Harmon acknowledged on cross-examination that he never discussed the incident with Mr. Spanier, and that no one from the university interfered with the investigation, which ultimately ended without charges.
Later, former assistant coach Mike McQueary described for jurors his now infamous account of walking into a locker room in 2001 and seeing Sandusky sexually assaulting a boy in a shower. Mr. McQueary also described telling head coach Joe Paterno what he saw, and how awkward that was.
“It’s coach. He’s like a grandpa. He’s revered. You just don’t talk about that with Coach Paterno,” Mr. McQueary testified.
Mr. McQueary’s father, John J. McQueary, told jurors that university vice president Gary Schultz promised him Penn State officials would look into the matter. John McQueary also said Mr. Schultz told him “we’ve heard rumblings” about similar encounters involving Sandusky but that “each time, we came up empty-handed.”
In his opening, the prosecutor had argued that Mr. Spanier, Mr. Schultz and ex-athletic director Tim Curley chose not to report Mike McQueary's claim to child welfare authorities. Both Mr. Schultz and Mr. Curley pleaded guilty to misdemeanor child endangerment charges last week, leaving Mr. Spanier as the sole defendant.
Mr. Schultz, Mr. Schulte said, will testify that he is “very regretful” of the decision not to report Mr. McQueary’s claim to the Department of Public Welfare, which the three men in an email exchange had originally planned to do.
“We messed up,” is what Mr. Schultz is going to say, according to Mr. Schulte.
That plan changed, the prosecutor said, after Mr. Curley discussed it with Paterno, Mr. Schulte said.
The men decided they would bar Sandusky from bringing youths on campus, but that never happened, Mr. Schulte said. And, he said, Sandusky continued to sexually assault boys in Penn State’s showers, including a “John Doe” who will testify later in the week. “The showers at Penn State continued to be Jerry Sandusky’s sanctuary for child molestation,” Mr. Schulte said.
He also said the three men never bothered to find out the identity of the boy that Mike McQueary said he saw in the shower. “Those three men failed to protect the most vulnerable among us,” Mr. Schulte said, slamming his hand on the podium. “Those kids.”
But Mr. Silver countered that Mr. Spanier had no direct contact with Mike McQueary and relied on information that the others gave him. No one told Mr. Spanier they saw Sandusky having sex with a child, Mr. Silver told jurors, and there’s no evidence he attempted to stop anyone from reporting Sandusky or that he conspired to cover up his crimes.
“This was far from criminal conspiracy,” he said.
First Published: March 21, 2017, 5:09 p.m.
Updated: March 21, 2017, 5:42 p.m.
