According to the Freeh report, former Penn State Leaders failed to act appropriately by not reporting sexual assault reports. Freeh’s group found that Graham Spanier, Tim Curley, Gary Schultz and Joe Paterno took no action to find out who the victim was in the 2001 incident.
The report found the following reasons were given for not reporting that incident:
-Curely and Schultz stated the “humane” thing to do was to carefully and responsibly assess the best way to handle vague but troubling allegations.
-Paterno told a reporter, “I didn’t know exactly how to handle it and I was afraid to do something that might jeopardize what the university procedure was. So I backed away and turned it over to some other people, people that I thought might have a little more expertise than I did. It didn’t work out that way.
-Spanier said, in his interview with the Special Investigative Counsel, that he never heard a report from anyone that Sandusky was engaged in any sexual abuse of children. He also said if he had known or suspected Sandusky was abusing children, he would have been the first to intervene.
The SIC found it was more reasonable to conclude that in order to avoid bad publicity, the four listed above repeatedly concealed facts relating to Sandusky’s activities.
The Board of Trustees was not exempt from this report of failure. The report states the board failed to exercise its oversight functions in 1998 and 2001 by not having regular reporting procedures or committee structures in place; a failure to make reasonable inquiry in 2011 from Spanier and General Counsel about the nature and direction of the Grand Jury investigation and the university’s response to such.
It also noted the university did not comply with the Clery Act for reporting suspected child abuse incidents. It stated that many on the football staff had never even heard of the Clery Act.
