Sandusky jailed on new charges
Published 9:05 am Thursday, December 8, 2011
STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Ex-Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was jailed Wednesday after new child sex abuse charges were filed against him based on the claims of new two accusers, one of whom says he screamed in vain for help while Sandusky attacked him in a basement bedroom.
The latest accusers are the ninth and 10th described as victims in grand jury reports that claim Sandusky befriended and then molested boys he met through his charity for troubled youths, The Second Mile. A grand jury document released Wednesday echoed an earlier report, saying Sandusky gave the boys gifts while making advances on them.
One of the new accusers said Sandusky kept him in a basement bedroom during overnight visits to Sandusky’s home, forced him to perform oral sex and attempted on at least 16 occasions to anally penetrate him, sometimes successfully.
“The victim testified that on at least one occasion he screamed for help, knowing that Sandusky’s wife was upstairs, but no one ever came to help him,” the grand jury report said.
Sandusky now faces criminal accusations from 10 young men and more than 50 charges stemming from what authorities say were assaults over 15 years on boys in his home, on Penn State property and elsewhere. The scandal has provoked strong criticism that Penn State officials didn’t do enough to stop Sandusky. The scandal prompted the ouster of Hall of Fame football coach Joe Paterno and the school’s longtime president, Graham Spanier.
Sandusky, 67, has said repeatedly that he is innocent and has vowed to fight the case. In interviews with NBC and The New York Times, he said he showered and horsed around with boys but never sexually abused them. His lawyer, Joseph Amendola, said Wednesday that he had not read the latest grand jury report but had no reason to doubt Sandusky’s claims of innocence.
Sandusky was wide-eyed and quiet during the arraignment in a cramped district magistrate’s office outside the small town of Bellefonte. He could not immediately pay $250,000 cash bail and was driven to Centre County jail by agents from the state attorney general’s office.