Child-protection laws under scrutiny in wake of scandals

(CNN) -- Experts said Thursday that the alleged child sexual abuse scandals at Penn State University and another at The Citadel in South Carolina underscore the frailty and inconsistency of the legal system intended to protect children, while some lawmakers called for changes in reporting such crimes.

"As parents, as members of the community, as leaders of organizations, we need to ask ourselves what we can do to prevent the next Penn State," said Stop It Now!, a group that seeks to end child sexual abuse, in a commentary on its website. "Because, unfortunately, it will happen again, unless something fundamental changes."

In the Citadel case, a former cadet-turned-camp counselor faces a series of charges, including three counts of criminal sexual conduct with a minor and three counts of lewd act on a minor, according to Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, police. The school's president said this week that the university is "profoundly sorry" for not reporting allegations against the counselor in 2007.

In the Penn State case, Pennsylvania's attorney general has charged a former Penn State football coach, Jerry Sandusky, with 40 counts in what authorities allege was the sexual abuse of eight boys. In addition, two Penn State officials are charged with failing to inform police of the allegations, and questions have been raised about the university's response.

Child-welfare advocates are not alone in their calls for reform. The senior Democrat on the House Education and the Workforce Committee asked Thursday that the chairman call a hearing to determine whether federal laws intended to protect children and students should be changed.

"Potential weaknesses in specific laws designed to keep children safe have come to light in the wake of the alleged sexual crimes committed on the campuses of the Pennsylvania State University and the Citadel," wrote Rep. George Miller, D-California in his letter to Chairman John Kline, R-Minnesota. "Our inquiry should not seek to parallel, replicate, or interfere with those efforts; rather, we must examine the ongoing operation of the underlying federal laws to identify any vulnerabilities and better ensure against future risks to children."

Miller cited two federal laws: The Clery Act requires higher educational institutions to collect information about and report on crimes that occur on campus. The Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act requires states to develop laws mandating that child abuse be reported.

In a statement, Education and the Workforce Committee communications director Alexandra Sollberger said, "The committee is monitoring the situation at Penn State carefully and will assess the need for congressional action after the Department of Education concludes its investigation into the matter."

One state has already moved to tighten reporting requirements. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal on Thursday issued an executive order requiring "all public or vocational school, community college, college or university professors, administrators, coaches and other school employees to report child abuse or neglect within 24 hours of observing an incident of child abuse or neglect." The report must be made to child welfare authorities and police.

Changes should include tightening requirements among the states about who must report suspicions that a child is being sexually abused, said Lisa Fontes, a lecturer at University Without Walls at the University of Massachusetts - Amherst and author of "Child Abuse and Culture -- Working with Diverse Families."

For example, Pennsylvania has an unusually narrow category of mandated reporters. The Department of Health and Human Services' website says that, in Pennsylvania, professionals "required to report include, but are not limited to: licensed physicians, osteopaths, medical examiners, coroners, funeral directors, dentists, optometrists, chiropractors, podiatrists, interns, nurses, or hospital personnel, Christian Science practitioners or members of the clergy; school administrators, teachers, school nurses, social services workers, daycare center workers, or any other child care or foster care workers; mental health professionals; peace officers or law enforcement officials."

"It doesn't include many people who have regular contact with children, such as school bus drivers, children's barbers, athletic coaches," said Fontes, who has a doctorate in psychology.

Under "Reporting by other persons," the law appears to leave it up to the individual: "Any person who has reason to suspect that a child is abused or neglected may report," it says.

And the requirements of professionals are limited to what they learn on the job, and do not apply to cases where a professional learns about suspected child abuse outside of his or her work, Fontes told CNN in a telephone interview.

Some states, like Indiana, are stricter. Professionals required to report include "any staff member of a medical or other public or private institution, school, facility, or agency."

And the onus in Indiana also falls on non-professionals. "Any person who has reason to believe that a child is a victim of abuse or neglect must report," the law says.

Such variation "makes no sense to me," said Fontes. "Mandatory reporting is not the be all, end all of preventing child abuse, but it certainly is an important part of making authorities aware of children at risk," she said.

Variation also extends to laws covering other behaviors, such as age of consent, which ranges from 16 to 18 in the United States, with some states having age-gap provisions under which sexual relations are legal as long as both parties are within a certain age range.

Children from poor families tend to be particularly vulnerable to child predators, said Fontes, who noted that the alleged victims were from The Second Mile, a program founded by Sandusky for at-risk youths.

Poor families tend to have fewer options for after-school care; poor communities tend to lack public libraries and safe parks; and their schools are less likely to be staffed with adequate guidance counselors and school psychologists who might notice if a child's behavior has changed, Fontes said.

In addition, children from poor families may be more vulnerable to offers of gifts, as Sandusky is alleged to have made, she said.

In the Penn State case, the grand jury report led to the firing last week of head football coach Joe Paterno and President Graham Spanier. Assistant coach Mike McQueary -- who, according to the grand jury report, witnessed Sandusky raping a child in 2002 -- has been placed on administrative leave.

Gary Schultz, who was the university's senior vice president for finance and business at the time of the alleged assault, and former Penn State Athletic Director Tim Curley are charged with lying to the grand jury and failing to alert police.

Curley requested and was granted administrative leave, while Schultz -- whose responsibilities also included oversight of Penn State campus police -- has retired.

Sandusky told NBC's Bob Costas on Monday that he has been falsely accused, saying that he only "horsed around" with kids in the shower after workouts.

The Sandusky scandal: Who knew what? Sandusky denied being sexually attracted to boys, and his lawyer, Joe Amendola, told CNN Monday night that showering with children does not equate automatically to sexual assault.

In the NBC interview, Sandusky denied one of the charges in the grand jury report, i.e., that McQueary had walked in on him in the school's locker room raping a boy about 10 years of age.

Sandusky was arrested on November 5 after the release of the grand jury report detailing crimes that he allegedly committed between 1994 and 2009. He is free on $100,000 bail.

Authorities have said they are checking into more than a dozen calls from people who have said they were victimized by Sandusky.

Several other alleged victims are considering coming forward after seeing Sandusky's Monday interview, two State College attorneys told the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Patriot-News.

"I spent about half the day in kitchens and living rooms, speaking with victims of Sandusky's molestation and processing with them the effects of Jerry Sandusky being on television and Jerry Sandusky denying wrongdoing," attorney Andy Shubin told the newspaper. "And what I found was that these folks are being re-traumatized."

He said many of the alleged victims weren't sure whether they would contact police, as some cases may be too old to prosecute. One case dates back to the 1970s, the newspaper reported.

Lawyer Jeff Anderson told CNN he is representing one alleged victim and has received calls from more than 10 other people who said they, too, were victimized.

"In every instance, Sandusky used his position of trust and power and his caring ways as a coach and mentor to groom the families and the children," Anderson said. "And after he did, he would in some way act out on them -- either at the schools, at the events, on trips, at a variety of locations. And in some instances, he raped or assaulted them."

He added, "This is about an institutional failure by many over decades to heed the warning signs and to protect the kids and, instead of protecting the kids, many, many adults chose to protect the reputation."

Attorney Ben Andreozzi, who represents one of Sandusky's alleged victims, said in a statement issued after Sandusky's television interview that his client "fully intends to testify that he was severely sexually assaulted by Mr. Sandusky."

The lawyer said more information would be forthcoming.

Washington civil rights law firm Katz, Marshall and Banks issued a statement Thursday saying it is working with Shubin and Seth Kreimer, a law professor, to formulate a civil case against Penn State.

Earlier this week, Sandusky's attorney told CNN he was expecting other people hoping to take advantage of the situation to come forward with claims.

During an investigation into the allegations, authorities found that Second Mile records, including travel and expense reports, were missing from about 2000 to about 2003, The New York Times reported Thursday, citing two sources with knowledge of the case. The records were supposed to be stored at an off-site facility, it said.

Records from one of the years were later found after apparently having been misfiled, the Times said.

"It could be that they were just lost, but under the circumstances it is suspicious," one law enforcement official told the newspaper.

The alleged rape witnessed by McQueary, who was then a graduate assistant, was detailed in the grand jury report.

According to the report, McQueary told Paterno; Paterno then alerted his boss, Curley.

The grand jury report also indicates that McQueary talked to Schultz and that Schultz never presented the information to university police.

Preliminary hearings for Curley and Schultz were set for December 6 in Dauphin County Magistrate Court.

CNN's Mary Snow, Jason Carroll and Sarah Hoye contributed from State College. CNN's Ashley Hayes reported from Atlanta.

Source http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/17/us/pennsylvania-sandusky-case/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

Elected Officials Involved In Coverup Penn State Alleged Sexual Abuse Of Young Boys?

Information in this TMZ video suggests that more than university officials may have been involved the coverup at Penn State. It runs until about 21 minutes before it goes off onto another topic.

Judge who freed Jerry Sandusky was Second Mile volunteer

Meanwhile, CEO of former coach Sandusky's youth charity resigns

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

It should be noted that "conflicts of interest," such as in this case are common when it comes to CPS and the courts. It happens all across America, to the benefit of CPS. Many of these judges are not just too tight with CPS and their reps but many of them donate time and / or money to agencies involved in foster and adoption placements. The same goes for some Gaurdian Ad Litems and CASA workers.

Even suspicion of sex abuse must be reported, Florida experts say in wake of Penn State scandal

By Jane Musgrave and Ana M. Valdes

As federal officials this week continue to investigate whether Penn State University failed to report incidents of alleged sexual abuse on campus as mandated by federal law, many child advocates in Florida are hailing a state statute that requires professionals such as school personnel, to report any suspicion of child abuse or neglect to law enforcement.

But the law, which specifies teachers, doctors, child care workers and other professionals must report abuse, has let to few penalties for those who don't follow it in Palm Beach County, according to records from the State Attorney's Office.

Only two people have been charged for failing to report abuse since 1999, while 37 have been prosecuted for falsely reporting abuse, records show.

Statewide, the Florida Department of Children and Families doesn't keep track of cases where people were penalized for failing to report abuse, "but we are not aware of great numbers of prosecutions," DCF spokesman Joe Follick said.

"Obviously, (the law) is not a heavy-handed effort by the state to penalize anyone who might accidentally not have the judgment to report (abuse), but I think it is an indication of how seriously the Florida legislature and Floridians understand the responsibility of everyone to make sure that children are safe," Follick said.

Some of the law's supporters, however, agree that regardless of few prosecutions for potential violators, Florida Statute 39.205 holds many professionals accountable for keeping children safe. And had such a state law been in force in Pennsylvania -- something state officials there now are considering -- it could have averted crimes and brought offenders to justice sooner, Florida expertsay.

Former prosecutor Scott Cupp, who ran the Crimes Against Children Unit in the Palm Beach County State Attorney's Office, said such a law could could been used to charge all the Penn State officials who knew about former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky's alleged sex abuse of boys.

While federal law ultimately was brought to bear on Sandusky, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services specifies that primary responsibility for child welfare services rests with the states.

"McQueary, McQueary's father, Paterno, Spanier, Curley," Cupp said, ticking off the names of the high-level Penn State officials who were alerted, according to a grand jury report that accused Sandusky of sexually abusing eight boys over a 15-year period.

Since the release of the report, Penn State's head football coach Joe Paterno was criticized for not doing more to stop the alleged abuse. He was particularly scolded for how he handled an alleged 2002 incident at the university's football complex, in which then-graduate assistant and current assistant coach Mike McQueary told Paterno that he saw Sandusky assaulting a boy in the showers.

Paterno notified the athletic director, Tim Curley, and a vice president, Gary Schultz, who in turn notified university President Graham Spanier. Paterno and Spanier were fired Wednesday, and Curley and Schultz have been charged with perjury and failing to report the incident to authorities.

Although Paterno is not a target of the criminal investigation, Pennsylvania's police commissioner called his failure to contact police himself a lapse in "moral responsibility."

Cupp, who often spoke to local health care workers and educators about their responsibilities under Florida law, said he would always specify they should not just report abuse to a superior, but call the Department of Children and Familes' Child Abuse Hotline.

"You both call it in," he said. "What's the worst that could happen? We spent two dimes."

In addition, he said, using a teacher as an example, there's no way of knowing what's going on behind the scenes. "For all you know, the assistance principal and the perp are drinking buddies."

Lake Worth attorney Betty Resch, who also led the Crimes Against Children unit in the 1990s, agreed that Paterno had a legal obligation to call police when told Sandusky had been seen having sex with a young boy in a university shower.

"I think he did the right thing by going to his superiors," she said. "But he should have followed up. It should have been so disturbing to him that he should have followed up, to want to find out what was happening and how the school was handling it."

In Florida, all residents, not just "professionally mandated reporters" such as teachers and hospital workers -- are required to report any suspicion of abuse or neglect to the Department of Children and Families' Florida Abuse Hotline, said department spokesperson Joe Follick. (The hotline number is 800-962-2873.)

In fiscal year 2010-2011, the hotline received 313,307 calls, according to DCF records. The slightest suspicion warrants a call, even if the reporter did not hear about the alleged abuse directly from the victim, Follick said. "It can be anyone who has knowledge or suspicion of this," he said. "You can say, 'well that creates more work,' but we would always rather err on the side of having too many calls come in than not enough."

A lawyer for Schultz, the ousted Penn State vice president, said he will seek to have the reporting charge dismissed because the mandated reporting rules only apply to those who come into direct contact with children.

On the heels of the Penn State sex scandal, legislators in Pennsylvania have said they would introduce legislation to strengthen mandatory reporting laws in child abuse cases. State Rep. Kevin Boyle says he will introduce a bill that would require mandated reporters to notify police themselves rather than pass their information on to superiors at work.

"It is clear that a loophole exists in our law," Boyle told The Associated Press. "My legislation would close that loophole, by requiring those who are aware of the abuse to report it to law enforcement authorities, rather than simply following an in-house chain of command."

For Cupp, the former Palm Beach County prosecutor, Florida's law offers a safety net for young victims of abuse by specifically identifying mandatory reporters. "The statute in Florida accepts, anticipates and encourages redundant reporting," Cupp said.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

Source http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/crime/even-suspicion-of-sex-abuse-must-be-reported-1963465.html?page=2

Investigation of Sandusky in 1998 Raises Questions

By NATE SCHWEBER

In 1998, the Penn State campus police and local law enforcement authorities investigated an allegation that Jerry Sandusky, then a prominent coach with the university’s football team, had engaged in inappropriate and perhaps sexual conduct with a boy in the football facility’s showers.

A lengthy police report was generated, state prosecutors said. The boy was interviewed. A second potential victim was identified. Child welfare authorities were brought in. Sandusky confessed to showering with one or both of the children. The local district attorney was given material to consider prosecution.

In the end, no prosecution was undertaken. The child welfare agency did not take action. And, according to prosecutors, the commander of the university’s campus police force told his detective, Ronald Schreffler, to close the case.

“Sandusky admitted showering naked with Victim 6, admitted to hugging Victim 6 while in the shower and admitted that it was wrong,” said the report issued last weekend by the Pennsylvania attorney general. “Detective Schreffler advised Sandusky not to shower with any child again and Sandusky said that he would not.”

Questions about that investigation abound: Who was interviewed? Who received the report? If the case was shut down, was Sandusky sanctioned in some way?

The New York Times has reached three of the principals involved in the investigation: the two men identified by prosecutors as the police officers who worked on the case, Schreffler and Ralph Ralston, and the investigator with the state welfare department, Gerald Lauro, who was charged with determining if a child had been harmed.

Schreffler — who appears to have been the lead detective, and who interviewed Sandusky — refused to comment when reached at his home in Bellefonte, Pa. He has retired from the campus police force and works at least part time for a security firm in Baltimore, according to his former wife.

“I’ve got nothing to say,” Schreffler said Tuesday night.

Schreffler’s current wife, Laurel, reached Wednesday, said, “I’m sorry, I’m not allowed to talk.”

In an interview this week, Ralston, who said he worked for the local State College police force, insisted he played only a peripheral role in the investigation. He said his role was merely to make sure that campus police had access to the boy, who Ralston said lived in his jurisdiction.

“I can’t even remember anything about it,” Ralston said.

He said he never followed up with campus police or child welfare authorities to find out the conclusion of their investigations.

“I didn’t think any more of it until I read the report over the weekend,” he said of the attorney general’s charges against Sandusky and other university officials. “There was stuff in there I never heard before.”

Lauro, the investigator for the state welfare department in 1998, said he was aware during the investigation that Sandusky was a prominent local figure, but that it did not affect his work.

“Was he a high-profile person?” Lauro asked. “I’d have to be stupid to tell you no. Everybody knew him.”

At the time of his investigation, Lauro said, all the child said was that Sandusky showered with him, and it made him uncomfortable. Lauro said he didn’t feel that was enough to substantiate a sexual-abuse complaint.

Lauro suggested that the child, now grown, had told the grand jury convened by the attorney general a much more explicit account.

Lauro said he has felt worse and worse as the scandal has unfolded, particularly when he read quotations in a newspaper from a victim’s mother blaming him and other officials for not doing more to stop Sandusky.

“I feel bad that there was not more information so I could have done something,” he said. “I feel bad that the mom thinks I should’ve done more. I just didn’t have all the information back then.”

In 1998, though, Lauro said his judgment was that the allegation fell under the category of what he termed “boundary issues,” not sexual assault.

“It was definitely boundary issues, and I worked with boundary issues a lot,” Lauro said. “But if I believed it was more than boundary issues, I would’ve gone to the mat.”

Lauro said he met Schreffler, the campus detective, twice during the investigation. Lauro said he was surprised to learn that the detective would not talk about the investigation of 1998.

“Wow,” he said. “That’s really saying something.”

A version of this article appeared in print on November 10, 2011, on page B16 of the New York edition with the headline: Investigation of Sandusky in 1998 Raises Questions.

Source http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/10/sports/ncaafootball/aftermath-of-1998-sandusky-investigation-raises-additional-questions.html?_r=1

Accusations of child sex, cover-up rock Penn State

Associated Press

STATE COLLEGE, Pa.—An explosive sex abuse scandal and allegations of a cover-up rocked Happy Valley after former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky, once considered Joe Paterno's heir apparent, was charged with sexually assaulting eight boys over 15 years. Among the allegations was that a graduate assistant saw Sandusky assault a boy in the shower at the team's practice center in 2002.

Sandusky retired in 1999 but continued to use the school's facilities for his work with The Second Mile, a foundation he established to help at-risk kids, where authorities say he encountered the boys. The case took on added dimension Saturday when perjury charges were announced against Tim Curley, Penn State's athletic director, and Gary Schultz, vice president for finance and business. They were also accused of failing to alert police and other agencies -- as required by state law -- of their investigation of the allegations.

"This is a case about a sexual predator who used his position within the university and community to repeatedly prey on young boys," state Attorney General Linda Kelly said Saturday in a statement.

Paterno, who last week became the coach with the most wins in Division I football history, wasn't charged, and the grand jury report didn't appear to implicate him in wrongdoing.

"Joe Paterno was a witness who cooperated and testified before the grand jury," said Nils Frederiksen, a spokesman for the state attorney general's office. "He's not a suspect."

Frederiksen called questions about whether Paterno might testify premature and speculation.

"That's putting the cart way ahead of the horse," he said. "We're certainly not going to be discussing the lineup of potential witnesses."

Under Paterno's four-decades-and-counting stewardship, the Nittany Lions became a bedrock in the college game, and fans packed the stadium in State College, a campus town routinely ranked among America's best places to live and nicknamed Happy Valley. Paterno's teams were revered both for winning games -- including two national championships -- and largely steering clear of trouble. Sandusky, whose defenses were usually anchored by tough-guy linebackers -- hence the moniker "Linebacker U" -- spent three decades at the school. The charges against him cover the period from 1994 to 2009.

Sandusky, 67, was arrested Saturday and released on $100,000 bail after being arraigned on 40 criminal counts. Curley, 57, and Schultz, 62, were expected to turn themselves in on Monday in Harrisburg.

The school said Sunday that it would bar Sandusky from campus.

The allegations against Sandusky, who started The Second Mile in 1977, range from sexual advances to touching to oral and anal sex. The young men testified before a state grand jury that they were in their early teens when some of the abuse occurred; there is evidence even younger children may have been victimized. Sandusky's attorney Joe Amendola said his client has been aware of the accusations for about three years and has maintained his innocence.

"He's shaky, as you can expect," Amendola told WJAC-TV after Sandusky was arraigned on Saturday. "Being 67 years old, never having faced criminal charges in his life and having the distinguished career that he's had, these are very serious allegations."

A preliminary hearing scheduled for Wednesday would likely be delayed, Amendola said. Sandusky is charged with multiple counts of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, corruption of minors, endangering the welfare of a child, indecent assault and unlawful contact with a minor, as well as single counts of aggravated indecent assault and attempted indecent assault.

No one answered a knock at the door at Sandusky's modest, two-story brick home at the end of a dead-end road in State College. A man who answered the door at The Second Mile office in State College declined to give his name and said the organization had no comment.

The grand jury said eight boys were targets of sexual advances or assaults by Sandusky. None was named, and in at least one case, the jury said the child's identity remains unknown to authorities.

One accuser, now 27, testified that Sandusky initiated contact with a "soap battle" in the shower that led to multiple instances of involuntary sexual intercourse and indecent assault at Sandusky's hands, the grand jury report said.

He said he traveled to charity functions and Penn State games with Sandusky, even being listed as a member of the Sandusky family party for the 1998 Outback Bowl and 1999 Alamo Bowl. But when the boy resisted his advances, Sandusky threatened to send him home from the Alamo Bowl, the report said.

Sandusky also gave him clothes, shoes, a snowboard, golf clubs, hockey gear and football jerseys, and even guaranteed that he could walk on to the football team, the grand jury said, and the boy also appeared with Sandusky in a photo in Sports Illustrated. He testified that Sandusky once gave him $50 to buy marijuana, drove him to purchase it and then drove him home as the boy smoked the drug.

The first case to come to light was a boy who met Sandusky when he was 11 or 12, the grand jury said. The boy received expensive gifts and trips to sports events from Sandusky, and physical contact began during his overnight stays at Sandusky's home, jurors said. Eventually, the boy's mother reported the allegations of sexual assault to his high school, and Sandusky was banned from the child's school district in Clinton County in 2009. That triggered the state investigation that culminated in charges Saturday.

But the report also alleges much earlier instances of abuse and details failed efforts to stop it by some who became aware of what was happening.

Another child, known only as a boy about 11 to 13, was seen by a janitor pinned against a wall while Sandusky performed oral sex on him in fall 2000, the grand jury said.

And in 2002, Kelly said, a graduate assistant saw Sandusky sexually assault a naked boy, estimated to be about 10 years old, in a team locker room shower. The grad student and his father reported what he saw to Paterno, who immediately told Curley, prosecutors said.

The Patriot-News of Harrisburg identified the assistant as Mike McQueary, now a Penn State wide receivers coach and the team's recruiting coordinator. McQueary was out of town on a recruiting trip Sunday, according to his father, John McQueary, who declined to comment about the case or say whether they were the two named in the grand jury report.

"I know it's online, and I know it's available," John McQueary told The Associated Press. "I have gone out of my way not to read it for a number of reasons."

Curley and Schultz met with the graduate assistant about a week and a half after the alleged attack, Kelly said.

"Despite a powerful eyewitness statement about the sexual assault of a child, this incident was not reported to any law enforcement or child protective agency, as required by Pennsylvania law," Kelly said.

There's no indication that anyone at school attempted to find the boy or follow up with the witness, she said.

Pennsylvania's Child Protective Services Law requires certain people associated with schools and other institutions to report suspected abuse immediately to the ChildLine service, which makes referrals to police, and to follow up within two days with written reports to the county children and youth services agency and to the state Department of Public Welfare.

Curley denied that the assistant had reported anything of a sexual nature, calling it "merely `horsing around,'" the 23-page grand jury report said. But he also testified that he barred Sandusky from bringing children onto campus and that he advised Penn State President Graham Spanier of the matter.

The grand jury said Curley was lying, Kelly said, adding that it also deemed portions of Schultz's testimony not to be credible.

Schultz told the jurors he also knew of a 1998 investigation involving sexually inappropriate behavior by Sandusky with a boy in the showers the football team used.

But despite his job overseeing campus police, he never reported the 2002 allegations to any authorities, "never sought or received a police report on the 1998 incident and never attempted to learn the identity of the child in the shower in 2002," the jurors wrote. "No one from the university did so."

Lawyers for both Curley and Schultz issued statements saying they are innocent of all charges.

In response to a request for comment from Paterno, a spokesman for the athletic department said all such questions would be referred to university representatives, who released a statement from Spanier calling the allegations against Sandusky "troubling" and adding that Curley and Schultz had his unconditional support.

He predicted they will be exonerated.

"I have known and worked daily with Tim and Gary for more than 16 years," Spanier said. "I have complete confidence in how they handled the allegations about a former university employee."

The university is also paying legal costs for Curley and Schultz because the allegations against them concern how they fulfilled their responsibilities as employees, spokeswoman Lisa Powers said.

Sandusky, once considered a potential successor to Paterno, drew up the defenses for the Nittany Lions' national-title teams in 1982 and 1986. The team is enjoying another successful run this season; at 8-1, Penn State is ranked No. 16 in the AP Top 25 and is the last undefeated squad in Big Ten play.

The Nittany Lions were off Saturday, which Frederiksen, the prosecutors' spokesman, said had nothing to do with the timing of charges.

He said the attorney general's office and state police had agreed ahead of time to act quickly once a presentment was issued.

"If somebody months ago was able to foresee the Friday before an off weekend, the grand jury would issue a presentment, they should be counting cards in Las Vegas," he said.

As the head football coach, Paterno has spent years cultivating a reputation for putting integrity ahead of modern college-sports economics. It's a notion that has benefited Penn State's marketing and recruiting efforts over the decades and one that the Big Ten school's alumni proudly tout years after they leave.

"We're supposed to be one of the universities to follow after, someone to look up to," said sophomore Brian Prewitt of Poughkeepsie, N.Y. "Now that people on the top are involved, it's going to be bad."