fbpx
Politics Foreign Affairs Culture Fellows Program

McQueary goes rogue

Don’t know if you’ve been following developments today in the Penn State situation, but it appears that Mike McQueary’s e-mail to his friends saying that he did try to stop the Sandusky rape, and that he had “discussions” with police immediately afterward, really complicates the prosecution’s case. Why? Because it contradicts his sworn grand jury […]

Don’t know if you’ve been following developments today in the Penn State situation, but it appears that Mike McQueary’s e-mail to his friends saying that he did try to stop the Sandusky rape, and that he had “discussions” with police immediately afterward, really complicates the prosecution’s case. Why? Because it contradicts his sworn grand jury testimony, thereby allowing defense attorneys to call his reliability as a witness into question. Cops say they never heard from him.  Somebody’s lying here. Either McQueary lied to the grand jury, or he’s lying to his friends. Either way, it was a gift to the defense. But Sandusky’s bizarre TV interview is being widely described as a gift to the prosecution.

Here’s an interesting open letter to McQueary from sympathetic journalist Jane Leavy, who wrote about sex abuse and Mickey Mantle. She address McQueary here:

I wonder how much of what you saw in those 30-45 seconds you were able to see, by which I mean comprehend? Trauma is not the sole province of victims. If that were true, soldiers returning from Afghanistan wouldn’t suffer from PTSD. “Predators and witnesses can also dissociate,” said Gartner, who treats survivors of childhood sexual abuse in his New York City practice.

Trauma fractures comprehension as a pebble shatters a windshield. The wound at the site of impact spreads across the field of vision, obscuring reality and challenging belief. I know from my own experience that you can know exactly what happened and wonder: Did that really happen? Did I see what I think I saw? Equilibrium is lost. Sanity hangs in the balance.

So, your reply didn’t surprise me when a CBS correspondent appeared at your front door wanting to know how you feel. “All over the place. Crazy. Shaken up. Like a snow globe.”

Among those I’ve interviewed on the subject the people most sympathetic to you are those who have investigated predators, treated their victims, seen the graphic photos, and heard the excruciating tales. “To walk in and see it — it’s a horror and a reality that the mind can’t accept,” said former FBI agent Jane Turner, who investigated childhood sexual abuse cases during her 25-year career. “Your mind gives you what you can handle.”

UPDATE: Uh oh. Sounds like Jerry’s interview has blown up in his face:

Ben Andreozzi, a Pennsylvania lawyer representing one of eight alleged victims in the Penn State sexual child abuse case, called Jerry Sandusky a “coward” on Wednesday and said that Sandusky’s recent comments on television had emboldened his client to pursue sexual assault charges against Sandusky.

“Mr. Sandusky suggested in some of his comments about the victims that maybe people were backing off,” Andreozzi said in a telephone interview from his office in Harrisburg. “My client heard that and has dug in his heels. He is feeling more comfortable about going through with this. The comments maybe backfired. They have caused victims to be more motivated to testify against him.”

Advertisement

Comments

Want to join the conversation?

Subscribe for as little as $5/mo to start commenting on Rod’s blog.

Join Now