Pennsylvania's Governor Is Suing The NCAA Over Its Sanctions Against Penn State

Business Insider ^ | January 2, 2013 | Peter Jackson, Associated Press

[Uncle Chip]

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Gov. Tom Corbett scheduled a news conference for Wednesday to announce the filing of a federal lawsuit against the NCAA over stiff sanctions imposed against Penn State in the aftermath of the Jerry Sandusky child sex abuse scandal.

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A person associated with the university and knowledgeable about the matter told The Associated Press that it is an antitrust action.

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In announcing the news conference, Corbett, a Republican, did not indicate whether his office coordinated its legal strategy with state Attorney General-elect Kathleen Kane, who is scheduled to be sworn in Jan. 15.

Kane, a Democrat, ran on a vow to investigate why it took state prosecutors nearly three years to charge Sandusky, an assistant under legendary football coach Joe Paterno. Corbett was the attorney general when that office took over the case in early 2009 and until he became governor in January 2011.

State and congressional lawmakers from Pennsylvania have objected to using the Penn State fine to finance activities in other states. Penn State has already made the first $12 million payment, and an NCAA task force is deciding how it should be spent.

The NCAA, which declined to comment Tuesday on the planned lawsuit, has said at least a quarter of the money would be spent in Pennsylvania.

Republican U.S. Rep. Charlie Dent called that an "unacceptable and unsatisfactory" response by the NCAA to a request from the state's U.S. House delegation that the whole $60 million be distributed to causes within the state.

Last week, state Sen. Jake Corman, a Republican whose district includes Penn State's main campus, said he plans to seek court action barring any of the first $12 million from being released to groups outside the state.

[SeminoleCounty]

Suing the NCAA on Anti-Trust grounds will make this interesting...and the NCAA will settle out of court instead of risking an anti-trust ruling that would be adverse

The NCAA should have stayed out of the PSU case. Their jurisdiction is limited on criminal matters, and, they will lose the Paterno lawsuit based on the SCOTUS decision in Tarkanian v NCAA from 20 yrs ago

[Uncle Chip]

Whose job is it to oversee charities in Pennsylvania??

In 2007 Sandusky’s Second Mile Charity shows 19 employees receiving $965,000 in compensation. The charity adds 73 employees in 2008 [supposedly] for a total of 92, and yet total compensation for that year only rises to $977,000.

What???? Somebody was cooking the books and laundering money through Sandusky’s Second Mile, and in 2008 they realized that the jig was up and had to adjust their books accordingly, which then disappeared as the Sandusky scandal surfaced.

http://www.notpsu.blogspot.com/2012/12/second-mile-financials-dont-add-up-part.html

Where was the money from the Second Mile going during all those years when they were paying out nearly a mi$$ion a year but only had 19 employees???

And why was the Second Mile allowed to destroy all their records by the then Attorney General of PA who had Sandusky under investigation during that time???

[WKUHilltopper]

“Tell that to the Class A Bond holders of General Motors...”

No S***!

Law is only law when it is convenient to a tyranny.

[dfwgator]

Where was the money from the Second Mile going during all those years when they were paying out nearly a mi$$ion a year but only had 19 employees???

That's the story nobody wants to see the light of day.

[huckfillary]

Exactly. As far as I know, no one currently with the team is guilty of anything. So why are THEY being punished? Don’t we have laws against this sort of thing ? In agreeing to the NCAA sanctions, Penn State and the NCAA committed a violation of current players’ rights. No one is saying the guilty should not be punished, and harshly, but punishing current players and coaches and students is not the answer.

[Theoria]

Thanks for that post. I hadn’t seen that info before.

[brityank]

Actually this may be more like Corbett trying to muddy the waters and head off an investigation into his handling of the Sandusky affair which languished for 3 years under his Attorney Generalship during which he was accepting money from Sandusky’s Second Mile Charity.

Definitely mud in the water!

Pinger! P.O.E.

[Buckeye McFrog]

It is supposed to go for child abuse prevention programs

It will go to pave highway overpasses in Allentown and to pay union bus driver pensions in Pittsburgh.

[nothingnew]

:: A contract is a contract. ::

And the answer is:

Tell that to the Class A Bond holders of General Motors...

Good post CDY

FMCDH(BITS)

[napscoordinator]

God Bless Penn State and Governor Corbett. The tragedy in all this is the mischaracter of justice that was put on his incredible school. I am glad that people are waking up and getting rid of these unfair actions. Penn State will rise again and sooner than most thing... Thank you Lord Jesus Christ!!!!!!

[NittanyLion]

The University signed a contract with the NCAA. Don’t see what the governor has to say about it. A contract is a contract.

Corbett is taking the position that the NCAA harmed a third-party (commonwealth businesses and taxpayers) and thus the commonwealth has standing to sue on behalf of its citizens. He's taking the further position that the consent decree was signed under duress and thus is unenforceable, and in any event that the NCAA lacks the authority to enforce penalties on a criminal matter within the commonwealth.

If Corbett can get past the issue of standing, I think he's going to win this case (assuming the NCAA doesn't settle). However despicable the actions, the NCAA overstepped its bounds on this one in an attempt to make itself look good.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

This is why the death penalty would have been cleaner - no football at Penn State for a decade. Done. No fines.

Penn State alum Franco Harris it taking this issue to the mat. His position is that Paterno did not, indeed could not, know some of the things that it is taken for granted that he did know. He makes a serious argument, which of course means that journalists try their worst to get people to leap to negative conclusions.

Nov 19, 2012 State College, PA - Franco Harris to NBC's Bob Costas: Paterno's … legacy will be greater than ever

I think the link above is worth a look, granted that it is ten or fifteen minutes to long.

It is legitimate to question whether any college should have a big time athletic program - but it is also true that in the nature of things colleges can’t be expected to have the public profile with academics that they can get with a winning football team. And as far as the educational purpose is concerned, Paterno had an awful lot of his athletes graduating on schedule. If you are going to have a big time athletic program, you would want one which had a reputation like the one which Penn State abruptly lost.

And whatever might have been the shortcomings of Penn State, does anyone suppose that the players Paterno recruited had any reason to know that??? Or any of the student body? It appears that the NCAA has punished everyone - to include the taxpayers of Pennsylvania, BTW - who had no knowledge or reason to suspect the hanky p anky which was going on.

Maybe Joe Paterno just “won”

The Lottery

Shirley Jackson

[NittanyLion]

You seem to be in favor of the collective mass punishment of those having no connection to the illicit sex, including the taxpayers. Why not focus on those who actually committed crimes?

Well, it's harder to feel morally superior when you focus on the actual issues. Much easier to paint wide swathes of people as inferior and deserving of contempt / scorn...

[Pining_4_TX]

You mean like Joe Paterno and others who covered up the crimes and let these boys be raped? Or the students who went to bars with Sandusky’s attorney? How about the janitor who saw Sandusky “wrestling” with a boy in the gym but didn’t say anything? How about the administrators? This went on for years, and some of it happened in the locker rooms and on out of town trips where the players and coaches knew that Sandusky was bringing little boys with him. So nobody else happened to walk in and see something? You may believe that, but I don’t. To me they are all every bit as guilty as Sandusky is. It never ceases to amaze me how people can put blinders on when their guys caught doing wrong.

[Uncle Chip]

This explains what Corbett is really up to:

http://notpsu.blogspot.com/2013/01/corbetts-lawsuit-does-not-clear-paterno.html

He’s buying time —

[Delta Dawn]

The other reason that I think that the NCAA took the action it did and as quickly as it did was to hold off any investigations into what it knew about the Sandusky affair.

I am betting that more than one NCAA official queried Paterno why it was that his long time Defensive coordinator was no longer with the program.

Of course, the one person who would know what the NCAA knew and when is no longer alive. Which is why the NCAA did what it did.

[kevman]

this guy is right this is bs this should be a legal and criminal investitation sorry folks that is what it is i am a carolina fine but this is insane! 4 yrs prob come on?

[Lancey Howard]

I am betting that more than one NCAA official queried Paterno why it was that his long time Defensive coordinator was no longer with the program.

It's very possible that by 1998 Paterno had become creeped out by Sandusky, especially if he heard the story about the mother who wore a wire for the police after Sandusky brought her son home with a wet head. Of course, this was a few years before Mike McQueery caught the homosexual pedophile in the showers with a young boy and then just walked away ...after slamming a locker to show his disapproval, don't you know... and then told Paterno the next day that he had witnessed something he thought was dreadfully inappropriate.

[IrishBrigade]

The tragedy in all this is the mischaracter of justice that was put on his incredible school. I am glad that people are waking up and getting rid of these unfair actions...

...sorry to be bumping this old thread...but the above quote is a real eyeopener...not to put too fine a point on this issue, but the only real ‘tragedy’ involved is the Sandusky buggering that went on with boys half his size and weight...any other considerations are just complaining by spoiled individuals with too much time on their hands, bitching about their precious plaything being diminished in size and scope...sorry you guys can’t go to a bowl game for a few years, and that maybe your recruiting will fall off to Indiana or Minnesota level, but in the grand scheme of things, hardly the stuff of catastrophe you appear to be raving about...now the taxpayers of Pa being forced to pay reparations for the mess this ‘incredible’ university created, that’s a different ball of wax, isn’t it?