Well, apparently, Paterno let him leave the program with dignity and emeritus status.
Sandusky wasn't cleared in 1998. The DA decided he didn't have enough evidence to prosecute Sandusky for molestation. That's not "cleared." (And I may be wrong, but I think the University Police file wasn't available to the DA; the DA's case was based primarily on an audiotape that a mother made of a call from Sandusky).
But even if he wasn't prosecuted for molesting them, Sandusky was still showering, nude, with preteen boys, in the Penn State football locker room showers. The first question is, would you have seen anything wrong with that, if you were Paterno?
Then, in 2000, a janitor caught Sandusky orally sodomizing a boy in the Penn State football locker room showers but was too afraid to report it to police. Why was he afraid? Afraid of Sandusky? Afraid to bring shame on Penn State? Afraid because Sandusky had been Joe Paterno's good friend for 30+ years?
And I have a hard time believing that Joe Paterno wouldn't have been told that his friend of decades, his former defensive coordinator - the guy whose defense won the national title for Penn State against Miami in the Orange Bowl - the guy who 'retired early and unexpectedly' after the University Police investigations into his showering with preteen boys - was back in the showers with a small boy.
One of the best things I loved about Joe Paterno is that it was his program. He was the benevolent grandfather who knew what was going on and ran a tight ship. Players walked the straight and narrow are were disciplined . . . because Paterno's network let him know if they missed curfew, even if they were in a small town twenty miles away.
I understand I'm making some assumptions. I either have to assume that Paterno was like every other football coach of any reasonably successful program, called the shots, and was tapped into the intelligence of his program . . . or I have to assume that Paterno was incredibly incompetent and naive, that he was left in the dark when everyone else knew, that people intentionally didn't tell him things, that he didn't know the open secrets that everyone else knew, that people were either so scared of Paterno or disrepected him so much that they let the Penn State showers be used by Sandusky for years to molest boys; and that Joe Paterno was clueless and grossly negligent since 1998 or before.
Which assumption should I choose?
If you are talking about the 2002 case, he was told about that. There does not appear to be any more cases that involved the football team's facilities after that. The abuse uncovered in the 2008 case that blew the lid off this occurred off campus mostly at Sandusky's home.
Then, in 2000, a janitor caught Sandusky orally sodomizing a boy in the Penn State football locker room showers but was too afraid to report it to police. Why was he afraid? Afraid of Sandusky? Afraid to bring shame on Penn State? Afraid because Sandusky had been Joe Paterno's good friend for 30+ years?
Or maybe he was just afraid of getting involved. The other janitors told him to report it. They didn't seem concerned about Paterno's reaction.