Jerry Sandusky’s son Jeffrey arrested on child sex charges
This undated photo provided by the Centre County Correctional Facility shows Jeffrey Sandusky who was charged Monday
One of Jerry Sandusky’s sons was arrested Monday on multiple sexual offense charges involving children, more than five years after the former Penn State assistant coach was himself first arrested.
Jeffrey S. Sandusky, 41, a stalwart supporter who attended many of his father’s court proceedings, was charged with 14 counts, according to court records. He was jailed on $200,000 bail.
His defense lawyer, Lance Marshall, declined to comment on the allegations.
Marshall said the charges were statutory sexual assault, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, six counts of unlawful contact with a minor and two counts each of photographing or depicting sexual acts, sexual abuse of children and corruption of minors.
The state Corrections Department said that because of the charges, Jeffrey Sandusky was suspended without pay Monday from employment as a corrections officer at Rockview State Prison, near State College. He had been hired in August 2015.
Pennsylvania State Police at Rockview began investigating in November, after they learned that Sandusky last March allegedly sent a 15-year-old girl he knew text messages asking for nude photographs, according to an incident report. Sandusky then allegedly told the girl to erase the texts and not to tell anyone about them, according to Centre County District Attorney Stacy Parks Miller’s office. Investigators later were able to retrieve the texts, according to Miller’s office.
Another teenage girl told investigators that Sandusky asked her for oral sex about three years ago when she was 16 years old, according to Miller’s office.
Neither girl reported any physical abuse or touching, but Miller described Sandusky’s actions as “predatory, grooming behavior with children who trusted him.”
State police arrested Sandusky Monday at his mother’s State College home, according to an incident report. A preliminary hearing was scheduled for Feb. 22.
“All children have a right to feel safe,” Miller said. “We will prosecute this case as aggressively as we do all child abuse cases.”
She added: “At this point, we only know of these two victims, but if anyone has anything to tell us about their interactions with this defendant, we are ready and willing to listen.” Tipsters can call state police at Rockview at (814) 696-6100.
Jerry Sandusky is serving a lengthy prison sentence for sexual abuse of 10 boys. Jeffrey is one of Jerry Sandusky’s six adopted children.
—
WHYY’s Dana DiFilippo contributed to this report.
WHYY is your source for fact-based, in-depth journalism and information. As a nonprofit organization, we rely on financial support from readers like you. Please give today.