Lawyers say Sandusky’s ‘Victim 2’ will sue Penn State
The boy Penn State graduate assistant Mike McQueary said he saw molested in a locker room shower by former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky has been identified, attorneys said Thursday.
He will sue the university for failing to protect him from sexual abuse, the attorneys said in a written statement. They did not name their client or say when the lawsuit would be filed.
The attorneys said they have “overwhelming evidence” of the details of abuse by Sandusky, including voice mails he left in the fall of 2011.
A jury last month convicted Sandusky on 45 counts of sexual abuse occurring over 15 years. During the trial, the boy was identified as “Victim 2.” McQueary testified he saw him and Sandusky naked in the shower engaged in what McQueary believed to be intercourse.
Victim 2 “suffered extensive sexual abuse over many years both before and after the 2001 incident Michael McQueary witnessed,” attorneys Joel Feller and Matt Casey said in the statement. “Penn State has now admitted, and there is no longer any question that its top officials could have and should have prevented these acts.”
The attorneys called the abuse a “direct result of a conspiracy to conceal Sandusky’s conduct.” They said decisions by top Penn State officials gave him access to the children.
Penn State issued a statement saying it takes such cases “very seriously” but will not comment on pending litigation. The university’s president and board “have publicly emphasized that their goal is to find solutions that rest on the principle of justice for the victims,” the statement said.
The lawyers, who represented other victims who testified at Sandusky’s trial, said nothing about why Victim 2 did not come forward earlier. They could not be reached for further comment.
Prosecutors said on several occasions they did not know the boy’s identity, and they offered no reaction to the lawyers’ announcement Thursday. “We can’t comment, given both our ongoing criminal prosecutions and our ongoing investigation,” said Nils Frederiksen, spokesman for the attorney general’s office.
The lawyers made public two voice mail messages left on Sept. 12 and Sept. 19, two months before Sandusky’s arrest.
In the first, a man who identifies himself as “Jer” says, “I would be very firm and express my feelings up front. But, you know, there is nothing really to hide so. If you want, give me a call.” He closes saying, “All right, take care. Love you.”
In the second, the caller invites the man to a Penn State game the following Saturday. He concludes the message saying, “Give me a call and I hope to talk to you later. Thanks. I love you.”
An internal Penn State investigation by former FBI director Louis Freeh concluded that university officials, fearing bad publicity, failed to take steps to identify and protect the victim after McQueary reported what he saw to head coach Joe Paterno, who died this year, and other university officials.
Bruce Antkowiak, a law professor at St. Vincent College in Pittsburgh, says Victim 2 coming forward is unlikely to have any effect on the case against former Penn State officials Tim Curley and Gary Schultz. Both face charges that they failed to report suspected child abuse and lied to a grand jury. He says the issues are not what happened to Victim 2 but what were the men told by McCreary and others and did they respond appropriately.
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Lawyers say Sandusky’s ‘Victim 2’ will sue Penn State
Donna Leinwand Leger
USA TODAY
July 26, 2012
