Lies and Contradictions, The Freeh Report

For the past year, Penn State’s Board of Trustees has been promising to adopt a new culture of openness and transparency.  As part of this new era, they’ve allotted time at board meetings for public comments and questions, have spoken more freely to student groups and organizations and held several press conferences.  However, despite these initiatives, a large portion of the Penn State community continues to feel lied to or misled about the decisions of the board. 

Questions relating to every subject from when the board first learned of the investigations into Jerry Sandusky, to the reasons behind the firing of Joe Paterno, why and how Judge Louis Freeh was hired to conduct an investigation into the university’s handling of the Sandusky matter, and why they allowed the Freeh report to be used as a basis for the NCAA to impose sanctions on the football program, without a review of its legitimacy, continue to be asked on a near daily basis.  The board asserts that they have answered these questions time and again, so why do the same questions continue to be raised? 

The following is a compilation of video clips from various press conferences and board meetings, and reveals the answers that have been given to questions surrounding the Freeh report.   When one is able to consider the board’s responses, back to back, and from different members, it becomes increasingly clear why the Penn State community, one year after the investigation into Sandusky’s behavior became public knowledge, still feels it lacks the answers to these very important questions.  If the board holds any hope that the community will, at some point, move forward, it will have to begin with giving real, honest answers, instead of responses that appear to be either lies or contradictions.