JoePa’s side of Sandusky story

The Washington Post has a heck of a scoop: The first extended interview with legendary, former(!) football coach Joe Paterno, who was fired days after the full scope of the sexual abuse allegations against his former defensive coordinator, Jerry Sandusky, came to light.

The story sets a scene of a cancer-ravaged old man, fretting about his legacy and admitting to not knowing how to handle the lurid, shocking and disgusting allegations arising against his longtime friend and coworker.

“This is where he is: wracked by radiation and chemotherapy, in a wheelchair with a broken pelvis, and “shocked and saddened” as he struggles to explain a breakdown of devastating proportions. Jerry Sandusky, his former assistant coach at Penn State from 1969 to 1999, is charged with more than 50 counts of sexually abusing young boys over a 15-year period. If Mr. Sandusky is guilty, “I’m sick about it,” Mr. Paterno said.How Mr. Sandusky, 67, allegedly evaded detection by state child services, university administrators, teachers, parents, donors and Mr. Paterno himself, remains an open question. “I wish I knew,” Mr. Paterno said. “I don’t know the answer to that. It’s hard.”

Almost as difficult for Mr. Paterno to answer is the question of why, after receiving a report in 2002 that Mr. Sandusky had abused a boy in the shower of Penn State’s Lasch Football Building, and forwarding it to his superiors, he didn’t follow up more aggressively.

“I didn’t know exactly how to handle it and I was afraid to do something that might jeopardize what the university procedure was,” he said. “So I backed away and turned it over to some other people, people I thought would have a little more expertise than I did. It didn’t work out that way.”

You can read more here.