Former Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky claims he needs a new day in court because of lousy lawyering.
The convicted child molester plans to testify at his court hearing Friday, said his lawyer Al Lindsay. It will be the first time he has taken the stand.
Sandusky, 72 says his defense lawyers bungled the 2012 trial in which he was convicted of sexually abusing 10 boys and sentenced to at least 30 years in prison.
It’s unclear how his testimony will illustrate the lawyers’ missteps. He has to convince the Pennsylvania court his counsel was so ineffective it undermined the fairness of his trial.
The hearing before the Court of Common Pleas of Centre County is to start at 9:30 a.m. and Sandusky’s filing attacks the previous attorneys for a number of trial decisions, perhaps most notably for not calling Sandusky to testify and for not seeking a court ruling to block his adopted son Matt Sandusky from testifying against him to rebut his testimony if he took the stand.
Matt Sandusky, who told the public during the trial his father sexually abused him, too, was one of the men who filed a civil lawsuit against Penn State alleging its officials — including coaching legend Joe Paterno — did not act on information they received regarding Jerry Sandusky’s abuse.
At his sentencing, Jerry Sandusky and his wife, Dottie, said they were victims of a conspiracy created by ungrateful boys — including Matt, who was one of six children they adopted — and a scandal-hungry news media.
More criminal cases possibe?
In October, a lower court judge ruled that Sandusky could get another day in court, but not in the way Sandusky desires.
Centre County Judge Thomas King Kistler ruled that decades-old sexual abuse allegations against Sandusky from a Boston man could be brought in another criminal trial despite the statute of limitations.
Kistler ruled that the Pennsylvania statute had an exception for state employees and the former Penn State coach falls under it.
The ruling also “blew the doors wide open” for other victims who previously believed they were outside the statute, Daniel Kiss, the attorney who filed the petition on behalf of a Boston man, said at the time of the ruling.
Sandusky was convicted of acts against 10 boys, but at least 30 men were involved in a civil settlement with Penn State, and the number could grow.
