(KTLA 5) The former president of Penn State University and two other former administrators were sentenced to jail terms Friday for failing to report a 2001 allegation that assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was molesting young boys.
Jerry Sandusky (Fox 29)
The sentence of two months in jail plus another two under house arrest against a once-leading figure in American higher education marks a low point in the largely distinguished career of Graham Spanier, who was Penn State’s president from 1995 to 2011. He was found guilty in March of one misdemeanor count of endangering the welfare of a child.
Spanier, whose total sentence was four to 12 months incarceration, will be on probation for two years and must pay a $7,500 fine, according to Joe Grace, a spokesman for the Pennsylvania’s attorney general’s office.
Spanier, 69, was convicted one week after guilty pleas from former Athletic Director Tim Curley and former Senior Vice President for Finance and Business Gary Schultz on misdemeanor charges of child endangerment.
Curley was sentenced to seven to 23 months’ incarceration and two years’ probation, Grace said. He will serve three months in jail followed by house arrest and pay a $5,000 fine.
Schultz was sentenced to six to 23 months’ incarceration and two years’ probation. He will serve two months in jail, followed by house arrest and also pay a $5,000 fine, according to Grace.
The scandal raised questions about how ranking officials handled multiple reports that Sandusky acted inappropriately with young boys at Penn State facilities. Some reports alleged rape, some alleged nothing more than strange behavior.
Sandusky, the football team’s disgraced former defensive coordinator, was convicted and sent to prison nearly five years ago for molesting 10 boys, many of them on Penn State’s campus.
“Today’s sentencings, which landed all three defendants behind bars, leaves no doubt that there are consequences for failing to protect children in Pennsylvania,” state Attorney General Josh Shapiro said in a statement.
Attorneys for the three former administrators have not returned calls seeking comment.
In a sentencing memo filed in Dauphin County court, prosecutors said Spanier has “shown a stunning lack of remorse of his victims” and called for him to be punished for “choosing to protect his personal reputation and that of the university instead of the welfare of children…”
My Comment: Unfortunately for the victims the psychological damage is SEVERE and lasts a lifetime. Thank you to these courageous ones for testifying against their abusers and getting a semblance of justice. Still, I don’t think it is justice when the abused ones pay a lifetime sentence and these criminals only serve a few months. Sandusky was allegedly pimping his wards.
