Kids can now use the playground outside his house again

Meh.

My faith in a panel of 12 totally random people to all take things very seriously is very very low, and I don't really think that's all that off base.

in my experience, juries almost always take their job seriously. they try really, really hard. it's just that they're full of crazy people who focus on dumb issues.

Yeah maybe my wording is bad.

I think people take it seriously, I just think they seriously suck at jurying because they generally suck at most things.

The system is structured to try and make it as idiot proof as possible. I haven't read them in their entirety, but the jury charges in this case seemed very well written by the judge. I just can't say enough about how well this judge ran the case.

Earlier I listened to an interesting exchange on CNN with a lawyer concerning the civil suits. Penn State is offering some type of program to Sandusky's victims which is intended to facilitate "communication and discussion" between the victims and the university. A cynic, like me, would scoff at this "program" thinking it's a not-so-subtle effort to try and engage the victims in a dialogue aimed at trying to prevent (or limit) lawsuits. However, the lawyer pointed out that some of the victims may have a real problem with the statute of limitations on some of these offenses, thus making it either difficult (or impossible) to press their claims. Of course, Penn State's attorneys would point out these [possible] statute of limitations problems during the "open discussions" envisaged under this program they're pushing.

Attorneys for the victims will do their own assessments concerning statute of limitation problems and advise their clients accordingly. I suspect the actual motivation on the part of Penn State - by offering this program - is to get a sense of how open the plaintiffs (and their attorneys) are to negotiating out-of-court settlements. Penn State might have some leverage if there are indeed SOL problems, but at the same time they can't come across as ghouls by telling the victims, in effect, "Sorry, but we don't have to pay and we're not going to pay." It will all boil down to how much money the victims attorneys seek and how badly Penn State wants these cases to go away.

I don't know anything about law but is there any possibility Sandusky can go all righteous and start verbally implicating all those involved in the facilitation of rape? In some crazy attempt to blame others. Even his wife.

? Would what he says matter or be admissable in any way ?

Basically can others get in trouble now based largely on his words?

It appears the SOL in civil cases like these is only 2 years in PA.

WTF

How is that even possible????

It shows a total lack of understanding of the nature of the crime, specifically that they often aren't reported immediately because of the damage done.

Here's some information about settlements related to sex abuse cases in the Catholic Church:

http://www.bishop-accountability.org/settlements/

The largest awards were less than $6M/victim with fees of 40% going to the attorneys. And, as you'd expect, the largest amounts appear to have been reached through trial rather than negotiated settlements.

Hard to imagine any of these kids will get more than the worst of the worst Catholic Church abuse cases, but anything is possible I guess.

This isn't as cut and dry as it seems. After the Catholic Church scandal, lots of laws were passed to either extend or remove any SOL limitations in special circumstances such as this.

Furthermore, the SOL doesn't necessarily start tolling when the act is committed. It doesn't even necessarily start tolling when the victim became aware that it was wrong. In fact, I believe that the SOL is 2 years after the victim's 18th birthday at a minimum, which will cover a lot (perhaps not all) of these victims. Maybe I'm confusing it with another state; I'll have to check on it.

But IIRC the Catholic Church tried to hide behind some of this SOL stuff and were roundly laughed at in some (not all) cases. Some lawmakers changed laws to make sure they could be sued, and other courts just told them to GTFO. It's a case-by-case basis.

Just curoius how much is it for a black market nuke and to get russia to put it in orbit?

I actually think the Catholic Church cases, while obviously similar at their core, possibly present a much different legal dilemma than these cases do: 1) there's more options available to sue now thanks to the church paving the way, 2) they were succeeding against the dioceses as individual components, 3) them being a church made things complicated (although PSU's status as a state entity or non-state entity could also do that, 4) the church was many actors spread out over a huge area with little direct oversight... here we have 1 bad actor in one concentrated area with about 50,000 people staring at him doing it.

Karak:

I've had that same thought about Judge Cleland. I recall the controversy that erupted when Sandusky was arrested last November and was promptly granted minimal bail by a local judge (Leslie Duthcott?) who turned out to have connections to Sandusky's charity, the Second Mile. In the furor that followed, it must have quickly dawned on all involved that they had to get a judge with a sterling reputation who was beyond reproach to oversee the trial. The way Judge Cleland handled this case and kept a tight lid on it suggests to me that John Cleland is probably the best trial judge in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. I doubt if very many of his rulings in this case will be overturned on appeal.

Dottie's best play at this point is to claim abuse

Dottie's second best play at this point is to switch to Depends.

That's a good question Cousin. I'm not sure about this, but in the eyes of the law, I suspect your credibility goes way down once you are convicted of a crime - not to mention 45 crimes!

Sandusky might want to yap and try to implicate others, but I'm not sure if any court would even allow him to testify. (Plus, his attorneys will probably not want him talking while his appeals are pending.) His influence on future cases is probably nil. The one area where he can have some impact though and (possibly) cause headaches for other defendants is with the press. You can bet that television reporters are already plotting how to go about obtaining "exclusive" prison interviews with Sandusky. Somebody like Barbara Walters might take a break from "The View" in order to interview Pennsylvania's most notorious inmate from behind bars.

Is that even a possibility? Did OJ give out interviews in prison? I just think will all the other crap going on w/ Penn State and BoT, that they won't let him say a word.

Yeah that's kinda what I was getting at. Is "everything" Sandusky says from here on out tainted/incredible? Or would the legal system actually listen to him "come clean" (bad pun) about other people around him who did illegal things.

100% Sandusky does a prime time TV interview. No doubt.

.

There are definitely many differences, but it's debatable whether they work in PSU's favor or against it. One subject I absolutely know nothing about is the importance of the church's unique status as a business entity vs. PSU's - lots of attorneys are going to make lots of money off this subject alone. Without being an expert on either the church abuse or the PSU abuse cases, I certainly have the impression that the church's situation was far more systemic and documented, but I could be mistaken about the church, PSU, or both.

I wonder who wants a jury trial less - PSU (because of how bad it could/will make it look) or the victims (who probably don't want to go through this all again over the course of years before getting it settled). Therefore it seems likely to me that very few of the civil suits will ever get to a jury, which reduces the likelihood of some eye-popping number coming out of this. It also means we may never know what most of the victims end up receiving.

Oh man, that will be 100x better than testifying for the jury since we'll be able to see it. He probably won't be able to get a word in because Amedilola will keep interupting to grab the spotlight.

Well, OJ didn't go to prison for the murders. He certainly gave plenty of interviews after the trial, though. I don't think anyone tried to interview him about his armed robbery conviction.

Sandusky interview would be great. Who would be the best to interview him?

Howard Stern?