The last time I heard Avg, 25% of persons in this country still JoePa was also directly abusing children.
thank you Tom, Frank, Kelly and BOT
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Louis Freeh is a Pedophile Enabler
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The last time I heard Avg, 25% of persons in this country still JoePa was also directly abusing children.
thank you Tom, Frank, Kelly and BOT
Wrong again, Paterno did exactly what he was supposed to do, even according the attorney general. Even if you assume there was a failure in the PSU chain of reporting that ended with TSM… if someone failed after Paterno, that doesn’t mean Paterno failed. Your bias blinds you.
How many alleged victims, specifically were abused after Joe got involved in 2001? Just one, one of the least credible, who was abused at a local high school. How many alleged victims were abused after the state professionals failed in 1998? ALL OF THEM.
I’m rubber you’re glue????
Seriously, you people are acting like children. Freaking children. "Textbook deflecting" "no THAT'S textbook deflecting" "no YOU'RE stupid" "nuh uh... YOU'RE stupid"
Regardless of my opinion on the whole Sandusky thing, I’m glad Wendy posted this because it gives me more intel on the current issues, how this is being compared (or not) to PSU and by whom. Knowledge is power. Thank you
Seriously, you people are acting like children. Freaking children. "Textbook deflecting" "no THAT'S textbook deflecting" "no YOU'RE stupid" "nuh uh... YOU'RE stupid"
Regardless of my opinion on the whole Sandusky thing, I’m glad Wendy posted this because it gives me more intel on the current issues, how this is being compared (or not) to PSU and by whom. Knowledge is power. Thank you
I still haven't heard a real response on how Freeh's report & news conference contributed in any way to the Nassar case.
It's a serious question that if answered sincerely would change my view.
It's a serious question that if answered sincerely would change my view.
It's been answered.
tough to hear anything with your ears clipped, and pinned back.
People have explained it to you, but they can’t understand it for you.
Hearing "slapping sounds" from a shower don't really compare to Nassar's offenses.
- The Freeh report ignores everything we know about child sexual victimization. Consequently, the Freeh investigation failed to properly consider the behavioral dynamics of the offender, the victims and potential witnesses.
- This case is a textbook example of how people in the general public misinterpret the behavior of child sex offenders. And, Jerry Sandusky is a textbook example of a preferential child sex offender and a “nice-guy” acquaintance offender. He effectively groomed most of the people who came in contact with him, including child care experts, psychologists, professionals, celebrities, athletes, coaches, friends and family. The sad truth is people do not recognize the “grooming” behavior of “nice-guy” acquaintance offenders, especially when they know or are close to that person.
- Unfortunately for the ordinary layman, these type of grooming techniques, as employed by Sandusky, create a huge obstacle to identifying actual offenders. In order to identify and stop child molesters, we must understand how grooming works and the complicated, counter-intuitive dynamics of child sexual victimization.
- There is no evidence to support the conclusion that Paterno engaged in “an active agreement to conceal.” It is clear from the evidence that Paterno never made any attempt to hide any information, hinder or impede any investigation, silence any witnesses or limit the number of people former assistant coach Mike McQueary reported an incident to in 2001.
- Each one of the Freeh report’s main conclusions about Joe Paterno is wrong due to a lack of evidence, a failure to consider alternative evidence or is directly contradicted by the evidence.
- The Freeh report missed an opportunity to educate the public about “nice-guy” acquaintance offenders. Indeed, this case has nothing to do with Penn State football or Joe Paterno, and if the public continues to believe that, it will unwittingly cancel out everything we have learned about child sexual victimization.
- Finally, Freeh’s investigators got it wrong because they investigated the case in the wrong way. The Freeh report ignored decades of expert research and analysis regarding child sex offender cases. They investigated this case as if it were a “stranger danger” or “monster predator” offender, instead of the very different and insidious “nice-guy” acquaintance offender. It is a common mistake, but it led them to draw erroneous conclusions. Clemente’s report is an effort to set the record straight.
I agree 100% with the above. And thank you.
I don't see the link to Nassar, though. Those incidents were ongoing prior to all of the PSU news in 2011 & the report in 2012. I just don't see how it can be claimed that Freeh's actions & statements had any effect or could have had one on the M SU situation.
What people should have thought after reading Freeh's report if he had done his job:Wow that Sandusky guy fooled a lot of very smart people. I wonder if there is anybody like that around here fooling me?
What people actually thought after reading Freeh's report: Penn State is a bad place full of bad people. Thank goodness nothing like that could ever happen here.
What people actually thought after reading Freeh's report: Penn State is a bad place full of bad people. Thank goodness nothing like that could ever happen here.
Great post but I think it ignores another important item:
- As part of his “investigation”, Freeh never talked to any of the 10-15 most important participants other than Spanier and that was after the report was written and days before it was released. In fact it wasn’t an investigation to find the truth pertaining to PSU at all. Witch hunt and hatchet job come to mind.
Don't forget, "No way I'm sticking my neck out after they just crucified someone who did exactly what he was supposed to."
Attempting to understanding the OP...
Can you help me understand what Freeh said or didn’t say in 2012 that would’ve stopped Nassar? The guy had been committing sexual assault against girls and young women for 15 years prior to then, and it is now documented that both USAG and MSU dismissed complaints about Nassar prior to and following the time of Freeh’s Sandusky/PSU report.
I don’t understand how Freeh could’ve stopped Nassar if the people who employed and empowered him refused to do so.
Can you help me understand what Freeh said or didn’t say in 2012 that would’ve stopped Nassar? The guy had been committing sexual assault against girls and young women for 15 years prior to then, and it is now documented that both USAG and MSU dismissed complaints about Nassar prior to and following the time of Freeh’s Sandusky/PSU report.
I don’t understand how Freeh could’ve stopped Nassar if the people who employed and empowered him refused to do so.
That doesn’t really answer my question. Let me try again...Nassar had been sexually abusing girls and young women for years prior to the Freeh report. In fact, USAG and MSU has received complaints about Nassar prior to the Freeh report. I’m not arguing whether Freeh should’ve spent more time on the “nice guy offended” topic (he should have), I’m asking how doing so would’ve stopped Nassar - a man who was known to USAG/MSU at the time as having multiple complaints which they dismissed and covered up anyway.
Or in plainer terms...
Is your position that USAG and MSU would’ve stopped the dismissals and cover ups if Freeh had spent more time talking about “nice guy offenders”?
Had Freeh taken the opportunity to explain why people missed the signals, imagine the boost that would have given the victims and their families in their quest to push for what the KNEW to be true vs the dismissals.
These world renowned gymnasts, some of the most determined and disciplined young women on EARTH, were treated like whiny head cases. Suppose they had had a video of the former director of the FBI saying, "these guys hide in plain sight."
Suppose those trainers, who feared repercussion from their bosses if they pressed this, got reinforced by an FBI guy saying, if you know you are right, DOCUMENT EVERYTHING. Writing, pics. Videos.
As Frehh was blasting us, those Olympic medalists were being abused.
That could have been stopped.
Honestly, it really isn’t though. I’ve seen several explanations that implicate Freeh for assaults Nassar committed at the 2012 Olympic Games; which would make some sense if not for the fact he had been known to have these complaints prior to the 2012 games. I’m asking for someone to give it to me in the full context of Nassar’s crimes and USAG/MSU’s knowledge going back to ‘97.
The apparent contention ITT is that Freeh in 2012 enabled Nassar to commit these crimes without being discovered. Intellectually, that doesn’t jive with the timeline of Nassar’s crimes, the complaints about them, and the enabling of them by USAG/MSU. Can anyone address this is full context of the timeline? I’m asking because so many of you seem to agree with the OP, and I’d like to understand why.
Got it. Thank you for that explanation. That begins to make much more sense to me.
Follow-up:
In this alternate scenario wherein Freeh makes the “good guy offender” comments, under what context would a video of them have been played for USA gymnasts? Are you assuming the media would’ve played those comments ad nauseam? That a sexual assault training or awareness curriculum would’ve necessarily included them? Or maybe I’ve missed some statements from officials indicating they would’ve been included/replayed?
In my lifetime, both the Catholic Church and PSU FB have been nearly destroyed by pillar of the community offenders. I never understood this stuff....i just thought there were an awful lot of bad people. Louis Freeh KNEW FOR A FACT I WAS WRONG. He also knew that the way this continues in so many organizations is not that no one cares about CSA--its that nobody can believe that evil is right next to them and they did not know.
He ignored that moment, on purpose, for profit.
He ignored that moment, on purpose, for profit.
I think when they saw that he'd spoken about it they would have hunted it down. Their Lives were being wrecked and nobody believed them.
Not a bad explanation. I can see your point.
I still have issue with guys like TenorHall on this thread, guys who post & tweet about Sandusky's innocence and bash his accusers/victims, often by name. It seems to me that victim bashing & shaming would tend to make future victims (like the gymnasts) keep quiet.
True, in fact he was likely abusing people back in his days at UM. But one person is too many, and that abuse could have been stopped earlier if Freeh did the right thing.
The main problem is the police reports.
According to the police reports, Michigan State first become aware of a sexual assault allegation against Nassar in May of 2014, when one of his female patients filed a Title IX complaint with the university.
That complaint led to two investigations: a Title IX investigation from the Michigan State Office of Inclusion and Intercultural Initiatives, and a criminal sexual conduct investigation from campus police. Nassar was suspended by the school during the Title IX investigation. However, he was allowed to return to work after it concluded and cleared him in July 2014, even though the police investigation was still ongoing.
From the documents, here is an email exchange from immediately after the Title IX investigation concluded—July 30, 2014. The correspondence is between Nassar and his boss, Dr. William Strampel, who stepped down as dean of the College of Osteopathic Medicine last week
There’s also a complaint to the MSU women’s gymnastics coach going back to 97, and corroborated claims of multiple undocumented complaints between 97 and 14.
The hierarchy of the Catholic Church was certainly not fooled by "nice-guy" offenders. They knew exactly what their priests were doing.
They preferred to handle it internally rather than involve outside law enforcement. That has consequences.
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Presupposing that’s what the media would have picked up on and played repeatedly as opposed to the salacious details and Paterno-blaming, I completely agree. My doubt, of course, lies in that presupposition.
I appreciate the insight into the OP’s comments in any event. Thanks.
But the ordinary parishioners had no ideas, and were repeatedly victimized. And were publicly shamed.
It' a fair point, but in any event the record would be there. Pretty sure there is video of the whole presser.
It's that Freeh concludes that because the email was sent after Curley knew of the investigation into Sandusky that Sandusky had to be the subject of their “touching base.” Even if this wasn’t a bit of an evidentiary leap (which it is), we have no idea what “touching base” really means and, again, Freeh has never even spoken to Curley to find out. The president didn’t even remember this email, which he referred to as a “vague reference with no individual named.”
The second email is just as problematic. In it Curley writes to the head of campus police, “anything new in this department? Coach is anxious to know where it stands.” Freeh writes, without any actual evidence that, “the reference to Coach is believed to be Paterno.” We are to assume that “is believed” really means “believed by Louis Freeh.
Imo, the explosiveness of that story even with Freeh doing the right thing would have caused a lot of news and even sports programming to air the conclusions about 'pillar of the community' offenders for some period of time, but for a far shorter time than the ongoing national conversation condemning JVP and PSU. That storyline came up with every game shown on TV, with every bit of recruiting news, etc., just on the sports side of the media.
Still, the key points of the lesson about nice guy predators would have had some positive impact. As you say, had Freeh done what he should have done, he would have taken the opportunity to use it as a teaching moment, and the resulting conversation would certainly have opened many eyes and minds. Instead, many people brushed it off as something that would not happen in their neighborhood or social circle or whatever, since it was not a football-first neighborhood with an iconic coach who surely could not have been as good a person as we all thought.
My wishful thinking:
Had the right people (e.g. Freeh and media... perhaps 60 Minutes?) taken the opportunity to teach recognition and courage and those lessons for victims and parents, many more individual cases, as well as serial predators such as Nassar, likely would have been stopped.
Freeh had the first shot at all this. But he chose to not lead for the greater good, but rather for the greater profit. Same with many of our OGBOT, who chose to CYA over the public good. They could have been outstanding case studies for 'in plain sight' non-recognition, and honestly relating their individual, very human stories about not being able to get their heads around the rumors and accusations could have been very helpful.
The Paternos, with Clemente et. al., tried to teach this lesson, but relatively few people paid attention to those efforts because of the damage Freeh and the OGBOT had done via the rush to deflect. Too bad for so many.
Maybe if/when the Freeh research findings by the A9+ becomes public knowledge, coupled with the Nassar story, some positive momentum will be made. Too bad the court isn't seeing it that way. Just another unnecessary barrier to an important public service.
IMHO, Nassar was doing almost exactly what JS was doing. He was working with kids and his exposed activities were edgy but not illegal (at least for what anyone knew). As his activities moved more and more into the darker grey areas, people become more suspicions but still were unaware of an actionable offense. But if you observed what happened at PSU, when people were able to connect the dots of what happened over 20 years (because all of the data finally was centralized) they set upon a which hunt. They arrested and ruined lives of people tangentially involved.
Joe Paterno, the perfect case in point. He followed the rules perfectly. Even after two years of investigation, the NCAA published protocols if you are in a similar situation and those protocols are exactly as Paterno did (report it to the AD and someone outside the sports vertical reporting structure).
So tell me, after working with Nassar and observing odd but not illegal behaviors, and watching Paterno get ruined, would you be more or less likely to blow the whistle on edgy behaviors?
Oddly enough I think most people upon a second report of this behavior would make a report to someone...even if anonymous. Joe did exactly that...the outrage was for him not having a cape on and intervening with a retired employee. Joe couldn't fire him, arrest him, or even yell at him. It was wrong how Joe took the brunt of the moral outrage, justifying it by saying you won't make a call now because of ether of these scenarios...well that is on you and that is your right. Feel free to CYA as you may not have the info or intuition to make that call. Who knows? Funny thing about asking that question is there is no right answer until you are actually wearing those shoes. We would all hope that the right calls are made, but it's not always the case for so many different reasons.
I respectfully disagree. Everyone who tried to do something has been ruined, most especially the name of Joe Paterno.
Totally agree. The problem is, when the perp is a friend or co-worker, you have a tendency to NOT believe it goes beyond creepy. And, simply by reporting a problem, you can create a problem.
I know a gal who got into an argument with her boyfriend. He was drunk and wanted her car keys. There was a physical event as he tried to forcibly take them. He goes off in a huff and calls the police saying he was physically abused (they are actually both gals but the one in question is undergoing conversion therapy and probably drugged up as a result). She was arrested and booked. The cops dropped the spousal abuse charges but are charged her with resisting. She lost her job.
So I am sorry but the mear act of reporting a suspicion causes a LOT of problems. If you are accused, you can expect a knock at your door about once a month from the authorities and trust me when I tell you it is pretty common for teen agers to make these claims when in an emotional state just to cause trouble. That is why these issues are so difficult to deal with.
So what do people do? They hide and protect their families. The system is screwed up beyond belief. If you don't believe me, go down to family court one day and spend it in the gallery.
