Had a forensic psychologist in my class today talk about the Sandusky case made some good points.

[strumpfasaurus]

His two main points were that Sexual predators of the highest degree look or the best way to acquire as many targets as possible as in example Sandusky in second mile.

His second point was very interesting and was about the graduate assistant. He pretty much said that people are going way too hard on the grad assistant and that although most of us say that if we were in his position we would have kicked Sandusky's a** or gone straight to the police, the reality is that most of us would have done exactly what he did and go to paterno or call someone like our dad first. Keep in mind this is from a licensed forensic psychologist who specialises in cases dealing with sexual predators.

 

[SWC75]

To project what you would do in a situation you haven't been in is probably not a good idea. That doesn't mean that you can't recognize right from wrong. It means you can't be certain that you'd do right.

 

[orangenirvana]

My guess is McQueary was in complete and utter shock. Who wouldn't be?

I would hope most people aren't witness to something so disturbing in their lifetime.

That certainly doesn't excuse his silence for nearly a decade afterwards, however.

 

[qdawgg]

My guess is McQueary was in complete and utter shock. Who wouldn't be?

I would hope most people aren't witness to something so disturbing in their lifetime.

That certainly doesn't excuse his silence for nearly a decade afterwards, however.

Agree with all of this. I would imagine the more time that went by where nothing happened and he felt as if he at least told Paterno - it was harder and harder to take it any further. The promotion didn't hurt.

 

[Rocco]

I agree with both points. I really can't imagine being in McQueary's position at the time of the "incident" and hope to never ever be, but utter disbelief and shock had to be the first things he felt. Easy for everyone else to say they would've immediately stopped Sandusky, but then again, we weren't there and hopefully never will be.

 

[Eric15]

I agree with both points. I really can't imagine being in McQueary's position at the time of the "incident" and hope to never ever be, but utter disbelief and shock had to be the first things he felt. Easy for everyone else to say they would've immediately stopped Sandusky, but then again, we weren't there and hopefully never will be.

I agree with your thoughts. I know that many on here disagree, but I simply don't hold McQueary nearly as responsible as the people in power at Penn State.

 

[WickedOrange]

McQuery grew up with the sandusky's,so yeah it must have been a shock to him

Or par for the course.

 

[Cusefan95]

I think the reason why people focus so much on McQuery is that he is the one person in the story the average person can identify with. You can't identify with a pedophile (hopefully), and you can't identify with a highly regarded national championship winning football coach...but people can identify with a grad assistant. Because of that it's important to feel like if you were in the same situation, you would have handled it better than he did - which is why there is all the chest thumping about how "I would would have kicked Sandusky's butt" or ripping on McQuery's inaction.

Ripping on him for saying in a call with his now-former players that he was drinking a lot? Yeah, I'm sure getting credible death threats might have an impact on your judgement, and cause you to let down your guard a little more than you should with kids you feel a close personal relationship with. To say nothing of, like, pounding beers to try to calm your nerves.

 

[hungrychuck]

Well, Penn State people focus on him because they would like to divert attention from JoePa.

Or resent that he ever reported the incident.

 

[RoysRunts]

Did McQueary or did he not Golf in the Sandusky Fundraiser

 

[arbitragegls]

...this is a sordid mess that will not be fixed for some time...I still find in unfathomable that the District Judge has him walking about like nothing happened...and then his lawyer and Sandusky are doing interviews etc...really a made for TV and movie affair

 

[billsin01]

That certainly doesn't excuse his silence for nearly a decade afterwards, however.

The point for me is two-fold:

1. I would hope to God that, if I were in the situation, I would at least go to the kid's aid and try to get him some medical attention. Beating the hell out of sandusky? I don't know. I certainly feel like I'd like to do that, but whether I did or not, I'd at least hope I helped the poor kid.

2. He stayed at PSU ... for 10 years? Once he reports it and things don't happen and this dude is still rolling around free? He had to go to the cops (which he may or may not have done) and then he should get the hell out of there. Being a part of this whole thing earns him any civil suits he may encounter, IMO.

 

[Jake]

Well, he now says he went to police. So put yourself in his position. He went to Paterno, he went to Curley and Shultz and he went to the local police. All of whom failed to act. Maybe they all told him "we will handle this, you will not speak of this again, (or your fired)."

Again, I think morally you have to go to someone else, but...

 

[SUFan44]

A lot of mitigating circumstances in all of this. Who knows what was said to whom, how many people were truly involved in the cover-up process, and who threatened certain people if they did blow the whistle.

Just a shame of a situation.

 

[Cusefan95]

Again, I think morally you have to go to someone else, but...

If he wanted to stay in coaching, where's he going to go? It's not like he'd made a name for himself yet...so his options may have been to make a deal with the devil and stay there until he had a reputation that could get him a ticket out of State College, or abandon coaching and pursue a career as a junior high gym teacher.

Plus, the more I read about this the more it seems like he took a job at the Firm, and was going to be screwed once he went against Paterno...and Penn State...and the police...and the local judges...

 

[BonaCuse]

One of the hosts on John Ditullio's show in Rochester had a good point yesterday. He said that 10 years ago he was in (I think) New York City waiting for the subway with his wife and kids. A subway pulled up that he wasnt getting into. A train door opened, and he saw right in front of him a man closed fisted beating a woman. He said many thoughts raced through his head in those split seconds "I should save this girl and beat the crap out of the guy" "What if he is armed?" "What if this guy kills me, what happens to my wife and kids?" He said that he decided not to do anything, and he has thought about it a lot, but now a lot more recently in the wake of this.

He said that if you ask anyone what they would do in that situation what they would do, most would say "I would have stopped it." or something to that affect. Personally I probably would have gotten the train number and called 911, but that's a different story. Until you're actually in that situation, it's hard to say what you would do.

Granted these are two extremely different incidents, but I can see where he was going. That, and I believe many psychologists have said that over 50% of people would have probably done the same thing as McQueary.

*Note: No way I am defending McQueary, because now he is saying he tried to stop it. I have no idea what took place in those locker rooms.

 

[Sullycuse]

The point for me is two-fold:

1. I would hope to God that, if I were in the situation, I would at least go to the kid's aid and try to get him some medical attention. Beating the hell out of sandusky? I don't know. I certainly feel like I'd like to do that, but whether I did or not, I'd at least hope I helped the poor kid.

2. He stayed at PSU ... for 10 years? Once he reports it and things don't happen and this dude is still rolling around free? He had to go to the cops (which he may or may not have done) and then he should get the hell out of there. Being a part of this whole thing earns him any civil suits he may encounter, IMO.

I may be a bit off-base here, but I've been thinking a lot about the second point here (as has everyone else)... i'm pretty sure this thread started after his claim that he did in fact go to the police, and i know many of the responses certainly did.
(and the change in general perception is amazing, it went from pure vitriol to "well we have to wait and see before we judge him"...pretty interesting the guilty before proven innocent strategy that was initially used for McQuery...)

If he did in fact go to the police, the person in charge of campus police and joepa and so on and so forth, as he says he did, and to his knowledge there was an investigation where officers listened to conversations with sandusky and a victims mother, and nothing came of it, where could he possibly go to at that point to further the issue? he had done what he could, as far as I can see, short of following him around to try and catch him in the act again.

And as to staying at Penn State, his alma mater, the hometown team for however many years (i realize he was originally all in for ND), with the great Joe Paterno... can you really say that you would leave one of the elite jobs/company's in your field ? This is Penn State, after all, who's to say he wasn't looking for jobs but they were HUGE steps backward and decided to sit tight. Also, who's to say he didn't consider moving on, but felt some responsibility, and decided to stay in the program because he felt he needed to be there as some sort of line of defense, knowing that Sandusky wouldn't associate with them while he was there to look him in the eye? Or he wanted to be there when the case finally came up, so he could make sure the event was properly accounted for?

It doesn't seem that ridiculous that any of those could be the case for staying at Penn State, especially the latter ones, if he weathers that storm, and even helps to dissipate it as a witness, he becomes a savior for the next era of Penn State, and Penn State football...who, as a Penn State player/alum wouldn't want to participate in that???

 

[billsin01]

I may be a bit off-base here, but I've been thinking a lot about the second point here (as has everyone else)... i'm pretty sure this thread started after his claim that he did in fact go to the police, and i know many of the responses certainly did.
(and the change in general perception is amazing, it went from pure vitriol to "well we have to wait and see before we judge him"...pretty interesting the guilty before proven innocent strategy that was initially used for McQuery...)

If he did in fact go to the police, the person in charge of campus police and joepa and so on and so forth, as he says he did, and to his knowledge there was an investigation where officers listened to conversations with sandusky and a victims mother, and nothing came of it, where could he possibly go to at that point to further the issue? he had done what he could, as far as I can see, short of following him around to try and catch him in the act again.

And as to staying at Penn State, his alma mater, the hometown team for however many years (i realize he was originally all in for ND), with the great Joe Paterno... can you really say that you would leave one of the elite jobs/company's in your field ? This is Penn State, after all, who's to say he wasn't looking for jobs but they were HUGE steps backward and decided to sit tight. Also, who's to say he didn't consider moving on, but felt some responsibility, and decided to stay in the program because he felt he needed to be there as some sort of line of defense, knowing that Sandusky wouldn't associate with them while he was there to look him in the eye? Or he wanted to be there when the case finally came up, so he could make sure the event was properly accounted for?

It doesn't seem that ridiculous that any of those could be the case for staying at Penn State, especially the latter ones, if he weathers that storm, and even helps to dissipate it as a witness, he becomes a savior for the next era of Penn State, and Penn State football...who, as a Penn State player/alum wouldn't want to participate in that???

This is a good post and I'll grant basically every point you make. Here's where I differ, however: we're talking about not only anal rape or anal rape of minors -- we're talking anal rape of underprivileged minors and a guy who had put himself in a position to have access to literally hundreds of these types of kids.

So while the idea of working with people who are doing some shady stuff is fine, IMO, or even if there is some incident like a fight or a potential DWI where someone dies and it's deemed an accident or something, I can see basically going on and working.

But McQueary HAD options.

-- He could easily parlay his experience at PSU into a pretty good gig elsewhere, particularly if he explains to Paterno why he wants to move on asks him to pull some strings. Is this running away from a problem? Yeah, but at least it's understandable.

-- McQueary had the chance to go to the media. Does this effectively end his college coaching career? Maybe but if that's the case good riddance. "Oh, you're not going to hire me b/c I blew up a child rape ring? Ok, thanks anyway." And it's not like he'd be hurting for income -- a tell-all book might have netted him plenty of coin as a severance. Oh, and he can sue the university and anyone else. And before you suggest this is all unsavory, remember they're basically ruining his career b/c he's blowing the whistle on illegal activity.

-- He could have tried to catch him in the act or in the showers again. Maybe even on video or something. Why not? The guy wasn't really hiding much.

-- He wasn't much of a line of defense.

 

[kingottoiii]

But McQueary HAD options.

Another option would be an anonymous tip to the media. I am sure he could have left the door open for a reporter to walk in and catch Sandusky in the act. That way he has no risk in the situation.

 

[SWC75]

One of the hosts on John Ditullio's show in Rochester had a good point yesterday. He said that 10 years ago he was in (I think) New York City waiting for the subway with his wife and kids. A subway pulled up that he wasnt getting into. A train door opened, and he saw right in front of him a man closed fisted beating a woman. He said many thoughts raced through his head in those split seconds "I should save this girl and beat the crap out of the guy" "What if he is armed?" "What if this guy kills me, what happens to my wife and kids?" He said that he decided not to do anything, and he has thought about it a lot, but now a lot more recently in the wake of this.

He said that if you ask anyone what they would do in that situation what they would do, most would say "I would have stopped it." or something to that affect. Personally I probably would have gotten the train number and called 911, but that's a different story. Until you're actually in that situation, it's hard to say what you would do.

Granted these are two extremely different incidents, but I can see where he was going. That, and I believe many psychologists have said that over 50% of people would have probably done the same thing as McQueary.

*Note: No way I am defending McQueary, because now he is saying he tried to stop it. I have no idea what took place in those locker rooms.

I wonder how many people on this board have seen something in their lives that they didn't intervene in and maybe they should have. Or maybe it's a good idea they didn't in some cases. I was once driving home from a baseball game and saw 3-4 people standing around a person who had been injured in some way. They didn't look like they were his friends but I drove on telling myself that there was someone there and if the guy needed help they could provide it or get it, (I had no cellphone). There were many other cars driving by as well. I admit I was concerned that these guys might have caused the injury and might do the same to me. Stopping to see if I could help may have been the right thing to do. It might also have been a bad mistake for me. An ambulance rushed by me a few minutes later, going in the direction of the incident. I never heard or read anything about any crime taking place there. I was just left with a desire not to judge others in that situation too harshly.

I do agree that the fact that this guy remained employed there for a decade afterwards makes this case different from my case or that of the guy in the subway.

 

[billsin01]

I wonder how many people on this board have seen something in their lives that they didn't intervene in and maybe they should have. Or maybe it's a good idea they didn't in some cases. I was once driving home from a baseball game and saw 3-4 people standing around a person who had been injured in some way. They didn't look like they were his friends but I drove on telling myself that there was someone there and if the guy needed help they could provide it or get it, (I had no cellphone). There were many other cars driving by as well. I admit I was concerned that these guys might have caused the injury and might do the same to me. Stopping to see if I could help may have been the right thing to do. It might also have been a bad mistake for me. An ambulance rushed by me a few minutes later, going in the direction of the incident. I never heard or read anything about any crime taking place there. I was just left with a desire not to judge others in that situation too harshly.

I do agree that the fact that this guy remained employed there for a decade afterwards makes this case different from my case or that of the guy in the subway.

I don't know. We're talking about a situation where you go to work with the guy -- essentially -- for 10 years and probably know he's harming kid after kid. A guy beating up a woman on a subway is tough b/c how the hell do you know what to do? Is there any real benefit in getting involved? You hope to stop it but you could endanger your life and still not even solve the situation as she could end up back with the dude anyway.

I have never witnessed a horrible incident like one of these things but I have spoken up when people are dragging kids around by the arm in Target or somewhere and I constantly get after inner-city types for cursing at loud volumes or littering all over the Metro in DC. A simple, "Seriously? You're really going to just leave that there?" will do a lot b/c these people have an axe to grind for the most part and are banking on no one saying anything. In fact, I was walking in China Town in DC last year before the G'town game and an obese woman in the back seat of a lexus was having trouble getting out, so she threw her coffee coolatta into one of those little green patches they have along the sidewalks. I just waited for her to get out, then handed her her cup and pointed out the garbage can with some passive aggressive comment like, "I know it's tough to hold onto a cup and get out of a car." I thought the two guys she was with were going to kill me, but in the end they knew she was just being incredibly lazy.

Listen, I'm not a vigilante and I'm not expecting this kid to have been Superman. I also am not an angel. Basically any other crime and I'm not hammering this guy at all. Plus, I'll admit I have three young boys. But honestly, I don't think anyone can come up with an excuse for living with the knowledge of this stuff for 10 years and not taking it to whatever extent possible to either get it solved or to get the hell out of there.

 

[Cusefan95]

I do agree that the fact that this guy remained employed there for a decade afterwards makes this case different from my case or that of the guy in the subway.

I saw an interview this past summer with a police officer that was at the World Trade Center after it was attacked. He was inside the building and kept seeing cows falling to the ground, and said he couldn't make sense of why cows were in the financial district in Manhattan. Obviously it was actually people he was "seeing", but it was so emotionally disturbing that his brain went into protect mode and substituted out what his eyes were actually seeing for something that made no contextual sense, but protected him for that moment in time. It is absolutely amazing how the human mind works.

I don't think we'll ever know what McQuery did or didn't do...I'm not sure he even knows. My guess based on some of his bizarre behavior this week is that he saw something terrible, ran into a wall in trying to fix it (a wall partly constructed by a person he idolized...), and created some alternate "truth" so that he could live with himself. This case breaking may have caused the gaps in the story he's told himself for years to be exposed, and the whole thing is unraveling on him now. Personally I doubt he actually went to the police, and that it's actually his mind desperately trying to piece together a plausible story in which he's not a villain.

If I'm right, the downside of this is that he is going to be totally useless as a witness in a criminal trial. There's just no way for him to be able to untangle what actually happened from the stories he's fabricated in his mind for a decade.

 

[SWC75]

I saw an interview this past summer with a police officer that was at the World Trade Center after it was attacked. He was inside the building and kept seeing cows falling to the ground, and said he couldn't make sense of why cows were in the financial district in Manhattan. Obviously it was actually people he was "seeing", but it was so emotionally disturbing that his brain went into protect mode and substituted out what his eyes were actually seeing for something that made no contextual sense, but protected him for that moment in time. It is absolutely amazing how the human mind works.

I don't think we'll ever know what McQuery did or didn't do...I'm not sure he even knows. My guess based on some of his bizarre behavior this week is that he saw something terrible, ran into a wall in trying to fix it (a wall partly constructed by a person he idolized...), and created some alternate "truth" so that he could live with himself. This case breaking may have caused the gaps in the story he's told himself for years to be exposed, and the whole thing is unraveling on him now. Personally I doubt he actually went to the police, and that it's actually his mind desperately trying to piece together a plausible story in which he's not a villain.

If I'm right, the downside of this is that he is going to be totally useless as a witness in a criminal trial. There's just no way for him to be able to untangle what actually happened from the stories he's fabricated in his mind for a decade.

I remember seeing a documentary on the RFK assassination in which a security guard guaranteed that Sirhan Sirhan could not have shot Kennedy because he grabbed Sirhan's hand with the gun in it and pinned it to a nearby table. I'm sure he believes that and could pass a lie detector test on it. That doesn't mean it actually happened. he may have wanted that to have happened so much that that's what he remembers.

I know of a woman who called her older sister and excitedly told her she'd figured out why she's always been so unhappy and had so much trouble with the realtionships in her life. She had suddenly remembered when her grandmother died and that their mother made her "kiss her goodbye" while grandma was lying in the casket. She was just a little girl and it was so traumatic...But the older sister remembered the funeral and it was closed casket and nobody kissed Grandma goodbye. She double checked with other older people who remembered the funeral and they confirmed that the incident which was supposedly the cause of all the younger sister's unhappiness never occcurred. Later the older sister saw the three Faces of Eve", in which Eve, (Joanne Woodard) has multiple personalities and a kindly psychiatrist makes her remember when Mmam made her kiss Grandma goodbye at ehr funeral. The older sister realized that the younger sister must have seen this film at some point and incorporated it into her memory banks and used that to blame Mamma for all her troubles. She got a tape of "The Three Faces of Eve" and sat down with her younger sister to watch it. After it was over the younger sister angrily insisted she hadn't gotten the memory from the film and that it had really happened. I'll bet she could have passed a lie detector test on it too.

Ironically the scene in the movie was a false memory, too. Chris Sizemore, (Eve's real name), had witnessed a grizzly farm accident as a child. Hollywood came up with the grandma story because the accident was a little too grizzly for 1957.

 

[Digable5]

I think a lot of good points have been made in this thread. One of the things I haven't seen yet and have been thinking about for some time is McQuery's credibility versus Sandusky's. On the surface, and especially after more details have come out, McQuery would seem to have more credibility. But what about when McQuery first reported the incident?

There's no evidence that I know of. So its a grad assistant's word against a longtime confidant of Joe Paterno's. Whether they believed McQuery or not, and I bet it would be hard to believe, what do they (Administrator's/Police) have to go on to persue Sandusky? Assuming they questioned him, what is he going to say? Assuming they were given permission and were able to talk to the kid, there are great chances he wouldn't have said anything.

As much as we all feel strongly that he is a filthy pedophile, he is still free and technically innocent until proven guilty. So, you can say McQuery could have continued to tell this person and that person, but when you feel you've done all you can and nothing else is being done, what else could you possibly do?

 

[RoysRunts]

http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/11/mcqueary_attended_sandusky_fun.html
He could have skipped the Golf Tourney!