You are right on the money
IMHO the grad assistant (McQuarry, and his Dad, who was with him when McQuarry told Paterno) should have reported it to the police immediately after reporting it to Paterno as it was done.
Hard to argue against that.doesn't he also fit in the desciption of what the law considers a "mandated reporter" with a duty to do so?
“he had a grad assistant (McQuarry) who saw Sandusky actually sodomizing a boy in the shower”
Why didn’t that guy go straight to the cops? Who witnesses rape and tattletales to their boss?
“Yeah, Joepa may not be legally responsible in any way since he reported it to someone in ‘higher authority’”
That’s ridiculous. There is no “authority” in the administration in regard to the law. If you want to report a crime, you go to a legal authority, not an educational authority. You go to a cop or an officer of the court, not some paper pushing academic.
” It sounds like Sandusky’s “punishment” was being told he couldn’t bring boys into the facilities anymore. Huh????”
Hadn’t the university already told Sandusky he wasn’t to bring boys into the showers after the 1998 incident?
He’s legaly obligated !!!
A person who, while engaged in a professional capacity or activity described in subsection (b) of this section on Federal land or in a federally operated (or contracted) facility, learns of facts that give reason to suspect that a child has suffered an incident of child abuse, shall as soon as possible make a report of the suspected abuse to the agency designated under subsection (d) of this section.
(b) Covered professionals
Persons engaged in the following professions and activities are subject to the requirements of subsection (a) of this section:
.
(4) Teachers, teacher’s aides or assistants, school counselors and guidance personnel, school officials, and school administrators.
5) Child care workers and administrators.
(6) Law enforcement personnel, probation officers, criminal prosecutors, and juvenile rehabilitation or detention facility employees.
(7) Foster parents.
(8) Commercial film and photo processors.
(c) Definitions
For the purposes of this section—
(1) the term “child abuse” means the physical or mental injury, sexual abuse or exploitation, or negligent treatment of a child;
(
(4) the term “sexual abuse” includes the employment, use, persuasion, inducement, enticement, or coercion of a child to engage in, or assist another person to engage in, sexually explicit conduct or the rape, molestation, prostitution, or other form of sexual exploitation of children, or incest with children;
(5) the term “sexually explicit conduct” means actual or simulated—
(A) sexual intercourse, including sexual contact in the manner of genital-genital, oral-genital, anal-genital, or oral-anal contact, whether between persons of the same or of opposite sex; sexual contact means the intentional touching, either directly or through clothing, of the genitalia, anus, groin, breast, inner thigh, or buttocks of any person with an intent to abuse, humiliate, harass, degrade, or arouse or gratify sexual desire of any person;
Re: “Joepa should have went to the police.”
with WHAT???
The police’s first question would have been, “What did you see, and when and where did you see it?”
Paterno: “Oh, I wasn’t even there. McQueary said he saw it.”
Two words: HEARSAY EVIDENCE. Not even admissible in court. I am not a lawyer but it is quite likely that the police could have acted only on a report from McQueary, who actually claims to have seen the incident.
This is not to say Paterno should not have told his superior, which he did. The administrator in charge of the campus police department (who was however indicted for perjury) also was told, which means a law enforcement agency DID know about it.
If anybody was in a position to go to the police, e.g. the State Police, with something on which they could have acted, it was McQueary because he was the only eyewitness (other than the boy in question).
[Yes, he may not be legally responsible, but he certainly has moral culpability. ]
He certainly is. How many other boys were sodomized after his failure to report this?