firing JoePa

[PAfisher76]

I am from PA but was never a fan of Penn State. I believe firing JoePa was best for the school and it was the right decision. I was wondering what everybody else thinks of this.

[pro reel]

I think that every single person who had any knowledge of what was going on and didn't report it to the police, should be held responsible. I know they say that Joe reported it to his supervisors, who then didn't do anything about it, but that doesn't mean that it was then acceptable for him to not go further up the ladder. He should have just called the police and reported it. He should have done that just as soon as the person who came to him told him what they had seen. Not reporting child abuse is alowing it to continue.

[Jrob78]

I think every single one of them, Joe Pa included, should be gang raped by prison inmates and then shot. One call to the police would have taken care of the problem 15 years ago. Too many people knew too much and did nothing about it.

[Bubba_Bruiser]

How accomodating this falls out the week after he passed Eddie Robinson's record. I am with Kevin though put the sorry bassturd in the land of the sodomites that committed it and the rest involved for failing to act accordingly. The person reported it ought to be pistol whipped too. How would any of you like to find out a person witnessed your child being molested and went and told some one about? Too many wrongs in this story. And the saddest thing of all is that this kind of stuff happens everyday.

[geoffreys7]

Like a reporter said today this happened in 1999 and he wasn't a nice old man then, he was much younger. They also said what would he have done it the 10 year old boy was his grandson! I agree they all needed to go! It was the good old boys covering for one another.

[nofearengineer]

Originally Posted by geoffreys7

Like a reporter said today this happened in 1999 and he wasn't a nice old man then, he was much younger.

Yeah...he was 70 instead of 80. Not old at all.

First thing...you know I am not a sports fan in general, and definitely not a fan of Paterno or any other team.

Just remember, someone came to Paterno with an allegation. Paterno wasn't a witness to it. God knows people never lie. Paterno did what he was supposed to do. It looks like his superiors might have covered it up, but not him.

Examine the timeline closely:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/1...n_1084204.html

This is not a case of Paterno's assistant coach doing this. This is his ex-assistant coach. He had no power over him other than to go to those who did.

Sandusky is a POS who I hope burns forever, but don't jump on the witch-hunt bandwagon against Paterno.

[kennethdaysale]

My take on this: The Grad student who witnessed this, if he had any balls at all, should have immediately walked up to Sandowsky and punched his lights out. Picked up the phone called Police and an Ambulance. What did he do? witness a small boy being sodomized.... slip quietly away....go tell on him.....go on his merry way?..........weak. As far as Paterno..as soon as the student told him he should have gone to the shower with a ball bat etc etc

[Jrob78]

Paterno is just as guilty as the grad student and everyone else who did nothing about it. When you see or hear of a young boy being raped, you call the police, period.

[nofearengineer]

Originally Posted by kennethdaysale

My take on this: The Grad student who witnessed this, if he had any balls at all, should have immediately walked up to Sandowsky and punched his lights out. Picked up the phone called Police and an Ambulance. What did he do? witness a small boy being sodomized.... slip quietly away....go tell on him.....go on his merry way?..........weak.

I'm with you on this. Sandusky would have never lived to need a trial if I had stumbled upon that.

As far as Paterno..as soon as the student told him he should have gone to the shower with a ball bat etc etc

Unfortunately, Paterno wasn't told about it until the next day.

I have been put in the same sort of position as Paterno. When I was about 25, I managed a pizza place in a mall. Now I had a whole bunch of obnoxious teen boys working for me, like any other fast food joint.

Apparently one of them was dating one of the girls who worked at the next door place, and the other boys would "harass" her through the thick glass window which separated our two restaurants. This probably consisted of crude gestures, since you couldn't hear through the glass. What happened after hours out of the store, I can't imagine.

I never knew anything about any of it. I didn't even know the girl's name. Never had a single word of conversation with her in nearly 3 years. Yet, 3 months later, the mall manager called me down to the office to address sexual harassment accusations against me. As if I had somehow allowed this to happen, or been part of it. I basically told them to go to heII, and if they pursued it further, they would have no proof of anything (since it never happened ). Yet, I'm sure in their minds, bad guy Bryce was probably guilty.

It isn't fun being held responsible for everyone around you. You should try it sometime before you lynch someone else.

[joedog]

It's all about MONEY!
HANG THEM ALL!

[kennethdaysale]

@ NFE I am clueless on the timeline, but waiting a day to speak is even weaker than weak. If the most manly and right thing you can do is be a tattle-tale, at least be a good one.

[bassboogieman]

I have to agree with Bryce. The situation is abominal, but Paterno received the allegation and passed, what amounts to hearsay evidence, up to his superiors. It is not Paterno's responsibility to consider the truth of the allegation or if the reported purpetrator was GUILTY, that's the job of the adminstration and the justice system. Nor is it the responsibilty of Paterno to follow up on his report, he was a third party in this transaction.

Everyone crying for his balls has the benifit of 20/20 hindsight concering Sandusky and what occured. Paterno was dealing in real time, probably with an allegation he did not believe, but (to his credit) did not ignore and brought it to the attention of his superiors to deal with - there his responsibility ended.

It's a sad end to an illustrious career and a serious wound to the University. Paterno will be paying a price for the rest of his life and the University also, long after he's gone.

[pro reel]

I guess we will have to agree to disagree on this. I agree with Jrob. I do not care one bit for or against penn state. I'm not a sports fan of anything other than bass fishing, Hockey and womens mud wrestling. I don't care at all how good of a man any of these folks were for most of their lives. I only care about how they handled themselves when it was all on the line. I just read a very detailed article about this on another site. They had all the psyco babble about how folks can look the other way at just about anything when they think it's someone elses responsibility. The young man that witnesed the act went to his father and then to Joe. Joe was his mentor and he trusted Joe completly. At this time he thought he had fulfilled his obligation without sticking his neck out to far. The psyco babble is that he didn't know if others already knew about this and were ok with it and that he was justified in being fearful. Hogwash!!!!!!! Call the police. you saw what you saw, he should have stoped it and called the police. It was not 2 grown men buggering each other, it was a little boy. Now for Joepa, he did the same thing. He went to his superiors and reported it. Now, he could wash his hands of it and let them deal with it. No one wants to be involved in something like that. But we all have a responsibility that many would be more than willing to pass the buck on. Thats what Joepa did, he passed the buck. Now what happens, the next 3 in line decide that the best thing to do is protect the school and the sports team reputation. They think that now that the dude has been caught, he will surley not do it anymore, so they simply tell him he is not allowed to bring young boys on the school grounds anymore. Besides the sicko that did it, these guys hold the ultimate responsibility for not calling the cops, but so does everyone else that saw or knew anything. When joe saw that the dept heads had handled it, he knew full well that there would be repurcusions if he took it further, that would then make them look bad for not taking it further, so he went along. When the witness saw that nothing had really been done, he probably felt like everyone wished he had just kept quite in the first place. he probably felt like there was no way he could do anything else without making his hero coach and mentor and the entire sports program look bad or harm it in some way, so he looked the other way and never mentioned it again. Now, this same coward will be the new coach. each one of these people had the oportunity and the moral obligation to put society and innocent children ahead of every thing else that was important to them, but they all took the cowards path to make sure that they didn't rock any boats or bring any shame to penn state. that my friends is shamefull indeed.

[Abbeysdad]

Back in the day I was a CB hound and we were trying to get a local REACT going to monitor channel 9 for emergencies. One day on the radio a guy said there had been a really bad accident on the highway, that a car had flipped and they needed help.
I called the police and they sent a car out. I listened on the monitor and learned there had been no accident. Did I feel like a fool...grateful I wasn't accused of falsely reporting an incident.
We gotta be careful when we make judgments based on "he said...she said". If you don't see it....did it really happen? If you didn't see it, are you responsible to report it to authorities?

[Tavery5]

Originally Posted by Abbeysdad

Back in the day I was a CB hound and we were trying to get a local REACT going to monitor channel 9 for emergencies. One day on the radio a guy said there had been a really bad accident on the highway, that a car had flipped and they needed help.
I called the police and they sent a car out. I listened on the monitor and learned there had been no accident. Did I feel like a fool...grateful I wasn't accused of falsely reporting an incident.
We gotta be careful when we make judgments based on "he said...she said". If you don't see it....did it really happen? If you didn't see it, are you responsible to report it to authorities?

I feel like you did the right thing, and I believe most other would agree. I don't know and will not try to figure out who is to blame, but someone most certainly let that young boy down in the other case.

[bamabassman]

ok, i USED to respect joe paterno and the penn state program. BUT, even if it was ALAGATIONS and there was only ONE eyewitness other than the young boy being raped, IT STILL SHOULD HAVE BEEN REPORTED TO THE AUTHORITIES. THEN!! not 15 yrs later. if joe reported it to his bosses, and they did nothing as it seems they did, JOE should have h=taken it further. he should have investaged the matter HIMSELF. i know i would. if i am the head coach who is as well known as he is, respected as he is/or was. i would NOT let a thing like this upset MY career and what i built go this route. nor would i if i were the president of the school. so i am inclined to agree with taves and others in saying GUILTY by association. if it were investa gated like it SHOULD have been THEN, this would NOT be a subject to discuss NOW. joe would be cleared of ANY wrong doing THEN. and the program would be clean joe would be revered even MORE now. just by investagating it then. whether it was true or false accusations. yes hindsight is 20/20, but i would rather be wrong to begin with than wrong later no matter what. how is this going to look on his record or epithapth? will his football legacy be forever be overshadowed by this? YES. no matter what he is proved of doing, right or wrong.......his legacy is now ruined because of this. sad thing to hap[pen to such a good coach. but i feel he thought of himself first now. very selfish of him in my opion.

so abbeysdad, even if joe didn't 'see" it happen, it was reported to him that it did. yes he did report it to his bosses. yes they shut it down and covered it up. "for the program", joe didn't do enough though, he should have taken it further as should the person who FIRST reported it and anyone he told. so i still say guilty by association, ALL of them. even the eyewitness.

[carolina-rig-01]

Joe Paterno is just as guilty as everyone else in this mess. I think that when it comes to things of this nature you have to error on the side of caution, and the police should have been notified by Paterno as soon as he heard of it. He did what he was "legally obligated" to do by telling the guy on the next rung up the ladder, but when he swept it under the rug it was up to Paterno to make sure the authorities were notified. Whether the guy was guilty or not was not for Paterno to decide, that is what investigations are for and Paterno took it upon himself to decide that the accusations were false and not persue it any further.........and now it comes out that he was wrong. Rot in hell Paterno!

[nobass]

i am with bruce and bryce with this . also as anyone ask why paterno was fire and the assiant who reported it is still a coach.

[nofearengineer]

Originally Posted by nobass

i am with bruce and bryce with this . also as anyone ask why paterno was fire and the assiant who reported it is still a coach.

Great point, Don. Just this morning I found out that the new head coach was the graduate student that first reported it to Paterno. WTH?!?!

That really destroys any argument by Penn St. for firing Paterno.

Regardless of what one thinks of Paterno, I think it's logical to say the guy who actually saw the crime taking place had a greater responsibility to report it to the police than the guy he told about it.

At this point, I am pretty sure there are other reasons Paterno was let go, political and economic. Like Garey said, odd that they waited until he broke Eddie Robinson's record.

[bamabassman]

like the commentater said this morning on ESPN, the school will need to CLEAN house. get rid of everyone all the way down to the janitors. this is the ONLY way to do it in my opion.

[carolina-rig-01]

Originally Posted by Abbeysdad

Back in the day I was a CB hound and we were trying to get a local REACT going to monitor channel 9 for emergencies. One day on the radio a guy said there had been a really bad accident on the highway, that a car had flipped and they needed help.
I called the police and they sent a car out. I listened on the monitor and learned there had been no accident. Did I feel like a fool...grateful I wasn't accused of falsely reporting an incident.
We gotta be careful when we make judgments based on "he said...she said". If you don't see it....did it really happen? If you didn't see it, are you responsible to report it to authorities?

I agree that you did the right thing. But I am not sure you can really compare the two cases. One case was a car accident and the other case involved raping a child and I would assume giving him a lifetime of horror as a result. How would you have felt if you didn't report the accident because it was all "he said...she said" and it turned out that there was an accident that claimed someones life who might have been saved if someone just called it in? That to me is more of a fair comparision to the Penn State case.

[nofearengineer]

Well, now you guys are all honor bound to report to the police every crime you even hear about, whether you know for sure it really happened, or if you think anyone else already reported it or not. If you don't you'll be hypocrites. You guys are going to use up a lot of your minutes. Flame on...

[PAfisher76]

Another rediculous aspect of this is that Sandusky retired in 1999 after being interviewed by police for molesting a child in 1998 and until recently he still had an office on the Penn State campus. Just because someone is a good athlete or coach does not make them a good person, but to many people put them on pedestals and disregard their actions away from sports. Being a good human being is way more important than any sport.

[carolina-rig-01]

Originally Posted by nofearengineer

Well, now you guys are all honor bound to report to the police every crime you even hear about, whether you know for sure it really happened, or if you think anyone else already reported it or not. If you don't you'll be hypocrites. You guys are going to use up a lot of your minutes. Flame on...

You cannot be serious. This wasn't just a case of "I over heard someone say that this guy was molesting kids". Paterno was notified of it by a guy that he obviously trusted because if he didn't trust him he wouldn't have had the job or access that he had. You bet your *** that if someone I trust told me that they saw something like this I would be doing a hell of a lot more than just telling someone else and then forgetting it.

[nofearengineer]

Kory...not all allegations are true. We can't just go around wrecking people and destroying lives over hearsay or false accusations.

Particularly, when accusations of a sexual nature are made, many of us are conditioned to believe the accuser first. Human nature, sure... but it's not always true, and things can get way out of hand before the truth is found. By then, the damage is usually irreparable, and a career or life is destroyed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roscoe_Arbuckle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMartin_preschool_trial

There are plenty of reasons McCreary would lie. With his allegations, he basically took out the guy who was slated to take over for Paterno. Lo and behold, he's now an assistant coach on the team. I'm not saying he lied, but it's at least plausible.

I don't know if Sandusky is guilty or not. My instincts say he is guilty, but instincts are often wrong. I imagine the justice system will find the truth. However, he had been questioned by the police before and nothing happened. Is Paterno more culpable than the police?

I guess I can add "persecute everyone the police have failed to convict" to the list of honor bound duties.