1
260 page full report:
http://thefreehreportonpsu.com/
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
REMARKS OF LOUIS FREEH IN CONJUNCTION WITH ANNOUNCEMENT OF
PUBLICATION OF REPORT REGARDING THE PENNSYLVANIA STATE
UNIVERSITY
Philadelphia, PA, July 12, 2012 ? Louis Freeh today issued prepared remarks in
conjunction with today's publication of his report of the investigation into the facts and
circumstances of the actions of The Pennsylvania State University surrounding the child
abuse committed by a former employee, Gerald A. Sandusky. Mr. Freeh will summarize
these remarks during his press conference at 10 a.m. today.
Mr. Freeh and his law firm, Freeh Sporkin & Sullivan, LLP, were retained in November
2011 on behalf of the Special Investigations Task Force of the Board of Trustees of The
Pennsylvania State University to conduct the independent investigation.
The full text of the remarks follows:
I. Introduction
Good Morning.
We are here today because a terrible tragedy was allowed to occur over many
years at Penn State University, one in which many children were repeatedly victimized
and gravely harmed. Our hearts and prayers are with the many children ? now young
men ? who were the victims of a now convicted serial pedophile.
I want to remind everyone here, and those watching this press conference, of the
need to report child sexual abuse to the authorities. In Pennsylvania you can report
child sexual abuse to the Department of Public Welfare's ChildLine. That number ?
which is on the screen before you ? is (800) 932-0313. It is our hope that this report and
subsequent actions by Penn State will help to bring every victim some relief and
support.
Penn State University is an outstanding educational institution, which is rightly
proud of its students, alumni, faculty and staff, who, in turn, hold the institution in very
high esteem. We understand and respect their support and loyalty, and the spirit of
community surrounding the University, which we witnessed first-hand during our seven
and one half months of work on the Penn State campus. We also fully appreciate the
strong emotions which surround these tragic matters and our work.
All of us here today understand that it is the duty of adults to protect children and
to immediately report any suspected child sexual abuse to law enforcement authorities.
Our team was reminded of this on a daily basis because Henderson South, our base at
Penn State, was the former Child Care Center at State College, with some of the
children's art work still in the space.
2
On November 21, 2011, the Special Investigations Task Force established by the
Board of Trustees of The Pennsylvania State University retained my firm, Freeh Sporkin
& Sullivan, to conduct a full, fair and completely independent investigation into the facts
and circumstances raised by the Grand Jury report and the criminal charges against
former Assistant Coach Gerald Sandusky.
I commend Ken Frazier, Chairman of the Task Force, and Ron Tomalis, Vice
Chairman of the Task Force, and their colleagues for the steps they took to ensure the
independence and thoroughness of our investigation. We would also like to
acknowledge, in particular, the three Task Force members who are not members of the
Board of Trustees ? a faculty member, a student and a distinguished alumnus.
To conduct this independent investigation, we assembled an outstanding team of
former law enforcement, lawyers (one of whom is a former Navy SEAL) and officials,
including former prosecutors, FBI Agents and Pennsylvania and Delaware State Police
Officers, with many decades of experience conducting sensitive investigations. I am
pleased to be joined this morning by some members of our team.
Working exceptionally hard in a very short amount of time for an investigation of
this magnitude, my team conducted over 430 interviews of various individuals that
included current and former University employees from various departments across the
University, as well as current and past Trustees, former coaches, athletes and others in
the community. We also analyzed over 3.5 million emails and other documents. The
evidence found by our investigators included critical, contemporaneous correspondence
from the times of these events. Our investigative team made independent discovery of
critical 1998 and 2001 emails ? the most important evidence in this investigation. We
also confirmed, through our separate forensic review, that the correct year of the
Sandusky sexual assault witnessed by Michael McQueary was 2001, and not 2002 as
set forth in the original Grand Jury presentment.
In performing this work, we adhered faithfully to our original mandate: to
investigate this matter fully, fairly, and completely, without fear or favor. We have
shown no favoritism toward any of the parties, including the Board of Trustees itself, our
client. I can tell you that at all times we felt that our demand for total independence ?
the primary condition of our engagement ? was respected.
We took the unusual step of not providing any draft of the report to the Board of
Trustees or to the Task Force prior to its posting this morning. They are seeing it at the
same time and in the same manner as everyone else, namely by accessing the
independent website we established for this purpose,
www.TheFreehReportonPSU.com. To be absolutely clear, this public release is the first
time anyone outside of our investigative team has seen this report.
In our investigation, we sought to clarify what occurred, including who knew what
and when events happened, and to examine the University's policies, procedures,
compliance and internal controls relating to identifying and reporting sexual abuse of
children. Specifically, we worked to identify any failures or gaps in the University's
3
control environment, compliance programs and culture which may have enabled these
crimes against children to occur on the Penn State campus, and go undetected and
unreported for at least these past 14 years. As you will read in our report, Penn State
failed to implement the provisions of the Clery Act, a 1990 federal law that requires the
collecting and reporting of the crimes such as Sandusky committed on campus in 2001.
Indeed, on the day Sandusky was arrested, Penn State's Clery Act implementation plan
was still in draft form. Mr. Spanier said that he and the Board never even had a
discussion about the Clery Act until November 2011.
While independent, our work was done in parallel with several other active
investigations by agencies and governmental authorities, including the Pennsylvania
Attorney General, Pennsylvania State Police, United States Attorney, Federal Bureau of
Investigation, and U.S. Department of Education. We continuously interfaced and
cooperated with those agencies and authorities. We also received assistance from the
National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC). As promised, we
immediately turned over any relevant evidence we found to these authorities, such as
the critical February 27, 2001 emails between Messrs. Spanier, Schultz and Curley.
The complete emails are now available on our website.
Unfortunately, portions of these emails have been leaked to the media. We
strongly condemn and deplore those leaks. Let me assure you that none of these leaks
came from the Special Investigative Counsel team. As you will see by reading our
report this morning, not one conclusion, phrase, or any content of our report has been
published or quoted prior to today.
Last month Sandusky was found guilty after trial on 45 of 48 counts. He awaits
sentencing. We were exceedingly careful not to do anything that would have impeded
that investigation and trial. Criminal proceedings are still pending against Mr. Schultz
and Mr. Curley. We respect the criminal justice process and their rights to a fair trial.
Some individuals declined to be interviewed. For example, on the advice of
counsel, both Mr. Curley and Mr. Schultz declined to be interviewed. Also, the
Pennsylvania Attorney General requested that we not interview certain potential
witnesses. We honored those requests. Mr. Paterno passed away before we had the
opportunity to speak with him, although we did speak with some of his representatives.
We believe that he was willing to speak with us and would have done so, but for his
serious, deteriorating health. We were able to review and evaluate his grand jury
testimony, his public statements, and notes and papers from his files that were provided
to us by his attorney.
4
II. Findings
Our most saddening and sobering finding is the total disregard for the safety and
welfare of Sandusky's child victims by the most senior leaders at Penn State. The most
powerful men at Penn State failed to take any steps for 14 years to protect the children
who Sandusky victimized. Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley never
demonstrated, through actions or words, any concern for the safety and well-being of
Sandusky's victims until after Sandusky's arrest.
In critical written correspondence that we uncovered on March 20th of this year,
we see evidence of their proposed plan of action in February 2001 that included
reporting allegations about Sandusky to the authorities. After Mr. Curley consulted with
Mr. Paterno, however, they changed the plan and decided not to make a report to the
authorities. Their failure to protect the February 9, 2001 child victim, or make attempts
to identify him, created a dangerous situation for other unknown, unsuspecting young
boys who were lured to the Penn State campus and football games by Sandusky and
victimized repeatedly by him.
Further, they exposed this child to additional harm by alerting Sandusky, who
was the only one who knew the child's identity, about what McQueary saw in the
shower on the night of February 9, 2001.
The stated reasons by Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley for not
taking action to identify the victim and for not reporting Sandusky to the police or Child
Welfare are:
(1) Through counsel, Messrs. Curley and Schultz have stated that the "humane"
thing to do in 2001 was to carefully and responsibly assess the best way to handle
vague but troubling allegations.
(2) Mr. Paterno said that "I didn't know exactly how to handle it and I was afraid
to do something that might jeopardize what the university procedure was. So I backed
away and turned it over to some other people, people I thought would have a little more
expertise than I did. It didn't work out that way."
(3) Mr. Spanier told the Special Investigative Counsel that he was never told by
anyone that the February 2001 incident in the shower involved the sexual abuse of a
child but only "horsing around." He further stated that he never asked what "horsing
around" by Sandusky entailed.
Taking into account the available witness statements and evidence, it is more
reasonable to conclude that, in order to avoid the consequences of bad publicity, the
most powerful leaders at Penn State University ? Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and
Curley ? repeatedly concealed critical facts relating to Sandusky's child abuse from the
authorities, the Board of Trustees, Penn State community, and the public at large.
Although concern to treat the child abuser humanely was expressly stated, no such
sentiments were ever expressed by them for Sandusky's victims.
5
The evidence shows that these four men also knew about a 1998 criminal
investigation of Sandusky relating to suspected sexual misconduct with a young boy in
a Penn State football locker room shower. Again, they showed no concern about that
victim. The evidence shows that Mr. Paterno was made aware of the 1998 investigation
of Sandusky, followed it closely, but failed to take any action, even though Sandusky
had been a key member of his coaching staff for almost 30 years, and had an office just
steps away from Mr. Paterno's. At the very least, Mr. Paterno could have alerted the
entire football staff, in order to prevent Sandusky from bringing another child into the
Lasch Building. Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley also failed to alert the
Board of Trustees about the 1998 investigation or take any further action against Mr.
Sandusky. None of them even spoke to Sandusky about his conduct. In short, nothing
was done and Sandusky was allowed to continue with impunity.
Based on the evidence, the only known, intervening factor between the decision
made on February 25, 2001 by Messrs. Spanier, Curley and Schulz to report the
incident to the Department of Public Welfare, and then agreeing not to do so on
February 27th, was Mr. Paterno's February 26th conversation with Mr. Curley.
We never had the opportunity to talk with Mr. Paterno, but he did say what he
told McQueary on February 10, 2011 when McQueary reported what he saw Sandusky
doing in the shower the night before: "You did what you had to do. It is my job now to
figure out what we want to do." Why would anyone have to figure out what had to be
done in these circumstances? We also know that he delayed reporting Sandusky's
sexual conduct because Mr. Paterno did not "want to interfere" with people's weekend.
To his credit, Mr. Paterno stated on November 9, 2011, "With the benefit of hindsight, I
wish I had done more."
Their callous and shocking disregard for child victims was underscored by the
Grand Jury, which noted in its November 4, 2011 presentment that there was no
"attempt to investigate, to identify Victim 2 or to protect that child or others from similar
conduct, except as related to preventing its reoccurrence on University property."
None of these four men took any responsible action after February 2001 other
than Mr. Curley informing the Second Mile that Mr. Sandusky had showered with a boy.
Even though they all knew about the 1998 incident, the best they could muster to
protect Sandusky's victims was to ask Sandusky not to bring his "guests" into the Penn
State facilities.
Although we found no evidence that the Penn State Board of Trustees was
aware of the allegations regarding Sandusky in 1998 and 2001, that does not shield the
Board from criticism. In this matter, the Board ? despite its duties of care and oversight
of the University and its Officers ? failed to create an environment which held the
University's most senior leaders accountable to it. Mr. Spanier resisted the Board's
attempt to have more transparency. In fact, around the time that Mr. Sandusky, Mr.
Curley and Mr. Schultz were arrested, Mr. Spanier was unwilling to give the Board any
more information about what was going on than what he was providing to the public.
6
After a media report on March 31, 2011, the Board was put on notice about
serious allegations that Sandusky was sexually assaulting children on the Penn State
campus. The Board failed in its duty to make reasonable inquiry into these serious
matters and to demand action by the President.
The President, a Senior Vice President, and General Counsel did not perform
their duty to make timely, thorough and forthright reports of these 1998 and 2001
allegations to the Board. This was a failure of governance for which the Board must also
bear responsibility.
We also found that:
? The Board did not have regular reporting procedures or committee structures
to ensure disclosure of major risks to the University;
? Some Trustees felt their meetings were a "rubber stamp" process for Mr.
Spanier's actions;
? The Board did not independently ask for more information or assess the
underreporting by Spanier about the Sandusky investigation after May 2011
and thereby failed to oversee properly his executive management of the worst
crisis in Penn State's history;
? The Board was over-confident in Spanier's abilities to handle crises and was
unprepared to deal with:
o the filing of criminal charges against senior University leaders and a
prominent former football coach in November, 2011; and,
o the firing of Coach Paterno.
From 1998?2011, Penn State's "Tone at the Top" for transparency, compliance,
police reporting and child protection was completely wrong, as shown by the inaction
and concealment on the part of its most senior leaders, and followed by those at the
bottom of the University's pyramid of power. This is best reflected by the janitors'
decision not to report Sandusky's horrific 2000 sexual assault of a young boy in the
Lasch Building shower. The janitors were afraid of being fired for reporting a powerful
football coach.
III. Recommendations
The other important part of our charge was to make recommendations to prevent
such catastrophic failures to report from ever again occurring at Penn State. The Board
of Trustees had requested recommendations as soon as possible, in order to improve
policies and procedures regarding the protection of children on its campuses. Just this
summer alone, over 20,000 non-student minors are participating in sports camps on the
University Park campus. To ensure that these children would be better protected, we
7
gave the Board of Trustees 14 of our preliminary recommendations in January, almost
all of which have now been implemented.
Further, we suggested some longer term changes, including the creation of a
comprehensive and stringent Compliance Program, including Board oversight through a
Compliance Committee. That committee would have oversight responsibility for all
regulatory obligations, including the Clery Act, and the Chief Compliance Officer would
have a direct reporting line to the committee. The University has commenced a national
search for a highly qualified Chief Compliance Officer and adopted two new policies for
the protection of children: one provides for annual training on child abuse and
mandatory reporting for all employees; the other revises and strengthens the
University's background check process.
In addition to our interim recommendations, we have added 119
recommendations set forth in today's report. One of the most important of our
recommendations is for Penn State itself to study, evaluate and make any needed
additional changes. The goal should be to create a more open and compliant culture,
which protects children and not adults who abuse them.
IV. Conclusion
With the presentation of this Report to the Special Investigations Task Force and
the Board of Trustees, our work is largely completed. We will make ourselves available
to the Task Force and Board to answer any questions they may have, but we will not
have an ongoing role with the University. We will also make ourselves available to the
students, faculty and staff of the University at the appropriate time at State College. We
hope such an interaction might assist the Penn State community in moving forward.
The release of our report today marks the beginning of a process for Penn State,
and not the end. It is critical that Old Main, the Board and the Penn State community
never forget these failures and commit themselves to strengthening an open, compliant
and victim sensitive environment ? where everyone has the duty to "blow the whistle" on
anyone who breaks this trust, no matter how powerful or prominent they may appear to
be.
###
Contacts:
Thomas Davies/Jeremy Fielding/Stef Goodsell
Kekst and Company
212-521-4800
TheFreehReportonPSU@kekst.com
260 page full report:
http://thefreehreportonpsu.com/
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
REMARKS OF LOUIS FREEH IN CONJUNCTION WITH ANNOUNCEMENT OF
PUBLICATION OF REPORT REGARDING THE PENNSYLVANIA STATE
UNIVERSITY
Philadelphia, PA, July 12, 2012 ? Louis Freeh today issued prepared remarks in
conjunction with today's publication of his report of the investigation into the facts and
circumstances of the actions of The Pennsylvania State University surrounding the child
abuse committed by a former employee, Gerald A. Sandusky. Mr. Freeh will summarize
these remarks during his press conference at 10 a.m. today.
Mr. Freeh and his law firm, Freeh Sporkin & Sullivan, LLP, were retained in November
2011 on behalf of the Special Investigations Task Force of the Board of Trustees of The
Pennsylvania State University to conduct the independent investigation.
The full text of the remarks follows:
I. Introduction
Good Morning.
We are here today because a terrible tragedy was allowed to occur over many
years at Penn State University, one in which many children were repeatedly victimized
and gravely harmed. Our hearts and prayers are with the many children ? now young
men ? who were the victims of a now convicted serial pedophile.
I want to remind everyone here, and those watching this press conference, of the
need to report child sexual abuse to the authorities. In Pennsylvania you can report
child sexual abuse to the Department of Public Welfare's ChildLine. That number ?
which is on the screen before you ? is (800) 932-0313. It is our hope that this report and
subsequent actions by Penn State will help to bring every victim some relief and
support.
Penn State University is an outstanding educational institution, which is rightly
proud of its students, alumni, faculty and staff, who, in turn, hold the institution in very
high esteem. We understand and respect their support and loyalty, and the spirit of
community surrounding the University, which we witnessed first-hand during our seven
and one half months of work on the Penn State campus. We also fully appreciate the
strong emotions which surround these tragic matters and our work.
All of us here today understand that it is the duty of adults to protect children and
to immediately report any suspected child sexual abuse to law enforcement authorities.
Our team was reminded of this on a daily basis because Henderson South, our base at
Penn State, was the former Child Care Center at State College, with some of the
children's art work still in the space.
2
On November 21, 2011, the Special Investigations Task Force established by the
Board of Trustees of The Pennsylvania State University retained my firm, Freeh Sporkin
& Sullivan, to conduct a full, fair and completely independent investigation into the facts
and circumstances raised by the Grand Jury report and the criminal charges against
former Assistant Coach Gerald Sandusky.
I commend Ken Frazier, Chairman of the Task Force, and Ron Tomalis, Vice
Chairman of the Task Force, and their colleagues for the steps they took to ensure the
independence and thoroughness of our investigation. We would also like to
acknowledge, in particular, the three Task Force members who are not members of the
Board of Trustees ? a faculty member, a student and a distinguished alumnus.
To conduct this independent investigation, we assembled an outstanding team of
former law enforcement, lawyers (one of whom is a former Navy SEAL) and officials,
including former prosecutors, FBI Agents and Pennsylvania and Delaware State Police
Officers, with many decades of experience conducting sensitive investigations. I am
pleased to be joined this morning by some members of our team.
Working exceptionally hard in a very short amount of time for an investigation of
this magnitude, my team conducted over 430 interviews of various individuals that
included current and former University employees from various departments across the
University, as well as current and past Trustees, former coaches, athletes and others in
the community. We also analyzed over 3.5 million emails and other documents. The
evidence found by our investigators included critical, contemporaneous correspondence
from the times of these events. Our investigative team made independent discovery of
critical 1998 and 2001 emails ? the most important evidence in this investigation. We
also confirmed, through our separate forensic review, that the correct year of the
Sandusky sexual assault witnessed by Michael McQueary was 2001, and not 2002 as
set forth in the original Grand Jury presentment.
In performing this work, we adhered faithfully to our original mandate: to
investigate this matter fully, fairly, and completely, without fear or favor. We have
shown no favoritism toward any of the parties, including the Board of Trustees itself, our
client. I can tell you that at all times we felt that our demand for total independence ?
the primary condition of our engagement ? was respected.
We took the unusual step of not providing any draft of the report to the Board of
Trustees or to the Task Force prior to its posting this morning. They are seeing it at the
same time and in the same manner as everyone else, namely by accessing the
independent website we established for this purpose,
www.TheFreehReportonPSU.com. To be absolutely clear, this public release is the first
time anyone outside of our investigative team has seen this report.
In our investigation, we sought to clarify what occurred, including who knew what
and when events happened, and to examine the University's policies, procedures,
compliance and internal controls relating to identifying and reporting sexual abuse of
children. Specifically, we worked to identify any failures or gaps in the University's
3
control environment, compliance programs and culture which may have enabled these
crimes against children to occur on the Penn State campus, and go undetected and
unreported for at least these past 14 years. As you will read in our report, Penn State
failed to implement the provisions of the Clery Act, a 1990 federal law that requires the
collecting and reporting of the crimes such as Sandusky committed on campus in 2001.
Indeed, on the day Sandusky was arrested, Penn State's Clery Act implementation plan
was still in draft form. Mr. Spanier said that he and the Board never even had a
discussion about the Clery Act until November 2011.
While independent, our work was done in parallel with several other active
investigations by agencies and governmental authorities, including the Pennsylvania
Attorney General, Pennsylvania State Police, United States Attorney, Federal Bureau of
Investigation, and U.S. Department of Education. We continuously interfaced and
cooperated with those agencies and authorities. We also received assistance from the
National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC). As promised, we
immediately turned over any relevant evidence we found to these authorities, such as
the critical February 27, 2001 emails between Messrs. Spanier, Schultz and Curley.
The complete emails are now available on our website.
Unfortunately, portions of these emails have been leaked to the media. We
strongly condemn and deplore those leaks. Let me assure you that none of these leaks
came from the Special Investigative Counsel team. As you will see by reading our
report this morning, not one conclusion, phrase, or any content of our report has been
published or quoted prior to today.
Last month Sandusky was found guilty after trial on 45 of 48 counts. He awaits
sentencing. We were exceedingly careful not to do anything that would have impeded
that investigation and trial. Criminal proceedings are still pending against Mr. Schultz
and Mr. Curley. We respect the criminal justice process and their rights to a fair trial.
Some individuals declined to be interviewed. For example, on the advice of
counsel, both Mr. Curley and Mr. Schultz declined to be interviewed. Also, the
Pennsylvania Attorney General requested that we not interview certain potential
witnesses. We honored those requests. Mr. Paterno passed away before we had the
opportunity to speak with him, although we did speak with some of his representatives.
We believe that he was willing to speak with us and would have done so, but for his
serious, deteriorating health. We were able to review and evaluate his grand jury
testimony, his public statements, and notes and papers from his files that were provided
to us by his attorney.
4
II. Findings
Our most saddening and sobering finding is the total disregard for the safety and
welfare of Sandusky's child victims by the most senior leaders at Penn State. The most
powerful men at Penn State failed to take any steps for 14 years to protect the children
who Sandusky victimized. Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley never
demonstrated, through actions or words, any concern for the safety and well-being of
Sandusky's victims until after Sandusky's arrest.
In critical written correspondence that we uncovered on March 20th of this year,
we see evidence of their proposed plan of action in February 2001 that included
reporting allegations about Sandusky to the authorities. After Mr. Curley consulted with
Mr. Paterno, however, they changed the plan and decided not to make a report to the
authorities. Their failure to protect the February 9, 2001 child victim, or make attempts
to identify him, created a dangerous situation for other unknown, unsuspecting young
boys who were lured to the Penn State campus and football games by Sandusky and
victimized repeatedly by him.
Further, they exposed this child to additional harm by alerting Sandusky, who
was the only one who knew the child's identity, about what McQueary saw in the
shower on the night of February 9, 2001.
The stated reasons by Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley for not
taking action to identify the victim and for not reporting Sandusky to the police or Child
Welfare are:
(1) Through counsel, Messrs. Curley and Schultz have stated that the "humane"
thing to do in 2001 was to carefully and responsibly assess the best way to handle
vague but troubling allegations.
(2) Mr. Paterno said that "I didn't know exactly how to handle it and I was afraid
to do something that might jeopardize what the university procedure was. So I backed
away and turned it over to some other people, people I thought would have a little more
expertise than I did. It didn't work out that way."
(3) Mr. Spanier told the Special Investigative Counsel that he was never told by
anyone that the February 2001 incident in the shower involved the sexual abuse of a
child but only "horsing around." He further stated that he never asked what "horsing
around" by Sandusky entailed.
Taking into account the available witness statements and evidence, it is more
reasonable to conclude that, in order to avoid the consequences of bad publicity, the
most powerful leaders at Penn State University ? Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and
Curley ? repeatedly concealed critical facts relating to Sandusky's child abuse from the
authorities, the Board of Trustees, Penn State community, and the public at large.
Although concern to treat the child abuser humanely was expressly stated, no such
sentiments were ever expressed by them for Sandusky's victims.
5
The evidence shows that these four men also knew about a 1998 criminal
investigation of Sandusky relating to suspected sexual misconduct with a young boy in
a Penn State football locker room shower. Again, they showed no concern about that
victim. The evidence shows that Mr. Paterno was made aware of the 1998 investigation
of Sandusky, followed it closely, but failed to take any action, even though Sandusky
had been a key member of his coaching staff for almost 30 years, and had an office just
steps away from Mr. Paterno's. At the very least, Mr. Paterno could have alerted the
entire football staff, in order to prevent Sandusky from bringing another child into the
Lasch Building. Messrs. Spanier, Schultz, Paterno and Curley also failed to alert the
Board of Trustees about the 1998 investigation or take any further action against Mr.
Sandusky. None of them even spoke to Sandusky about his conduct. In short, nothing
was done and Sandusky was allowed to continue with impunity.
Based on the evidence, the only known, intervening factor between the decision
made on February 25, 2001 by Messrs. Spanier, Curley and Schulz to report the
incident to the Department of Public Welfare, and then agreeing not to do so on
February 27th, was Mr. Paterno's February 26th conversation with Mr. Curley.
We never had the opportunity to talk with Mr. Paterno, but he did say what he
told McQueary on February 10, 2011 when McQueary reported what he saw Sandusky
doing in the shower the night before: "You did what you had to do. It is my job now to
figure out what we want to do." Why would anyone have to figure out what had to be
done in these circumstances? We also know that he delayed reporting Sandusky's
sexual conduct because Mr. Paterno did not "want to interfere" with people's weekend.
To his credit, Mr. Paterno stated on November 9, 2011, "With the benefit of hindsight, I
wish I had done more."
Their callous and shocking disregard for child victims was underscored by the
Grand Jury, which noted in its November 4, 2011 presentment that there was no
"attempt to investigate, to identify Victim 2 or to protect that child or others from similar
conduct, except as related to preventing its reoccurrence on University property."
None of these four men took any responsible action after February 2001 other
than Mr. Curley informing the Second Mile that Mr. Sandusky had showered with a boy.
Even though they all knew about the 1998 incident, the best they could muster to
protect Sandusky's victims was to ask Sandusky not to bring his "guests" into the Penn
State facilities.
Although we found no evidence that the Penn State Board of Trustees was
aware of the allegations regarding Sandusky in 1998 and 2001, that does not shield the
Board from criticism. In this matter, the Board ? despite its duties of care and oversight
of the University and its Officers ? failed to create an environment which held the
University's most senior leaders accountable to it. Mr. Spanier resisted the Board's
attempt to have more transparency. In fact, around the time that Mr. Sandusky, Mr.
Curley and Mr. Schultz were arrested, Mr. Spanier was unwilling to give the Board any
more information about what was going on than what he was providing to the public.
6
After a media report on March 31, 2011, the Board was put on notice about
serious allegations that Sandusky was sexually assaulting children on the Penn State
campus. The Board failed in its duty to make reasonable inquiry into these serious
matters and to demand action by the President.
The President, a Senior Vice President, and General Counsel did not perform
their duty to make timely, thorough and forthright reports of these 1998 and 2001
allegations to the Board. This was a failure of governance for which the Board must also
bear responsibility.
We also found that:
? The Board did not have regular reporting procedures or committee structures
to ensure disclosure of major risks to the University;
? Some Trustees felt their meetings were a "rubber stamp" process for Mr.
Spanier's actions;
? The Board did not independently ask for more information or assess the
underreporting by Spanier about the Sandusky investigation after May 2011
and thereby failed to oversee properly his executive management of the worst
crisis in Penn State's history;
? The Board was over-confident in Spanier's abilities to handle crises and was
unprepared to deal with:
o the filing of criminal charges against senior University leaders and a
prominent former football coach in November, 2011; and,
o the firing of Coach Paterno.
From 1998?2011, Penn State's "Tone at the Top" for transparency, compliance,
police reporting and child protection was completely wrong, as shown by the inaction
and concealment on the part of its most senior leaders, and followed by those at the
bottom of the University's pyramid of power. This is best reflected by the janitors'
decision not to report Sandusky's horrific 2000 sexual assault of a young boy in the
Lasch Building shower. The janitors were afraid of being fired for reporting a powerful
football coach.
III. Recommendations
The other important part of our charge was to make recommendations to prevent
such catastrophic failures to report from ever again occurring at Penn State. The Board
of Trustees had requested recommendations as soon as possible, in order to improve
policies and procedures regarding the protection of children on its campuses. Just this
summer alone, over 20,000 non-student minors are participating in sports camps on the
University Park campus. To ensure that these children would be better protected, we
7
gave the Board of Trustees 14 of our preliminary recommendations in January, almost
all of which have now been implemented.
Further, we suggested some longer term changes, including the creation of a
comprehensive and stringent Compliance Program, including Board oversight through a
Compliance Committee. That committee would have oversight responsibility for all
regulatory obligations, including the Clery Act, and the Chief Compliance Officer would
have a direct reporting line to the committee. The University has commenced a national
search for a highly qualified Chief Compliance Officer and adopted two new policies for
the protection of children: one provides for annual training on child abuse and
mandatory reporting for all employees; the other revises and strengthens the
University's background check process.
In addition to our interim recommendations, we have added 119
recommendations set forth in today's report. One of the most important of our
recommendations is for Penn State itself to study, evaluate and make any needed
additional changes. The goal should be to create a more open and compliant culture,
which protects children and not adults who abuse them.
IV. Conclusion
With the presentation of this Report to the Special Investigations Task Force and
the Board of Trustees, our work is largely completed. We will make ourselves available
to the Task Force and Board to answer any questions they may have, but we will not
have an ongoing role with the University. We will also make ourselves available to the
students, faculty and staff of the University at the appropriate time at State College. We
hope such an interaction might assist the Penn State community in moving forward.
The release of our report today marks the beginning of a process for Penn State,
and not the end. It is critical that Old Main, the Board and the Penn State community
never forget these failures and commit themselves to strengthening an open, compliant
and victim sensitive environment ? where everyone has the duty to "blow the whistle" on
anyone who breaks this trust, no matter how powerful or prominent they may appear to
be.
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Contacts:
Thomas Davies/Jeremy Fielding/Stef Goodsell
Kekst and Company
212-521-4800
TheFreehReportonPSU@kekst.com
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