Saturday, August 31, 2013

The Facts


From the new book The Freeh Distort: A Disgrace to American Justice available at Amazon.com.


How the rush to judgment over unsubstantiated, biased, and deliberately slanted assumptions, has unfairly tarnished one of the nation’s finest universities, and Joe Paterno, the greatest coach in college football history.


If the “Freeh Report” had instead been submitted as a Law School term paper, it is hard to imagine how it could have risen to the level of D Minus under the most lenient of grading systems. Its “conclusions” were based upon nothing more than arbitrarily crafted assumptions, that have no basis in fact regarding evidence to support them.

Many people immediately realized there was something wrong with the “Freeh Report,” that things just didn’t add up. Many of them have written op-ed pieces to their newspapers, and even more have written letters to the editors, all in one way or another protesting some aspect of this report that has caused so much damage and heartbreak to Penn State University, its faculty, students, alumni and fans, and of course to the four individuals unmercifully crucified; Paterno, Spanier, Curley, and Schultz, and their family and friends.

After two of my op-ed column submissions were not accepted by the Harrisburg Patriot-News, I realized there was only one way to prove the “Freeh Report” was in fact totally false, and that was to dissect all of the obvious flaws, and try to explain in precise and plain detail to the public, and to the vitally important news media, how these points had been misconstrued and purposely distorted, to create out of whole cloth, something that just wasn’t there.

I hope I have been able to do that, and I hope the public and the news media will now join in an effort to compel the NCAA to reverse the sanctions so hastily imposed upon Penn State as a result of the “Freeh Report.”


Excerpt:
 
WHAT IS THE BAR FOR BLIND AND UNQUESTIONED ACCEPTANCE OF THE                                                         FREEH REPORT CONCLUSIONS?

The Freeh Report begins with an indisputable falsehood that an assault occurred in 1998, a point so critical it could not have been a mistake. It was deliberately designed to support so-called “conclusions” that are nothing more than pure unsupported speculations, with an obvious agenda to exclude any and all exculpatory evidence, or explanation to the contrary.

If known facts of record are clearly and indisputably misstated in the Freeh Report, why is the single, most damaging speculation of the entire report accepted as fact?

All of the subsequent results of the Freeh Report, which could eventually cost Penn State, and Pennsylvania taxpayers, a hundred million dollars, and the additional costs of destroying the reputation of one of the finest universities in the nation, and prominent individuals, including Joe Paterno, with over sixty years of completely unblemished service, ironically based upon education above sports, were all the result of a single sentence of pure speculation:

“HOWEVER, IT IS MORE REASONABLE TO CONCLUDE…”

 
The Freeh Report, while deliberately presenting falsehoods as fact, then states that it is more reasonable to “conclude” that four well respected persons are all liars and conspirators, who went to great lengths to protect a serial child-molester for the single purpose of protecting the reputation of the Penn State football program.
 
These charges were made in an afternoon press conference and within hours were accepted as unchallenged fact throughout the nation.

No one at the time, including the Penn State Board of Trustees, could have even read the Freeh Report upon which these “conclusions” were based.

Now that it is known that the Freeh Report contains several critical falsehoods, no matter whether they were deliberate or by mistake, what then is the basis for accepting as fact, anything in this document?

This question must be answered by the national news media. In the interest of justice, it can no longer be ignored.

EDITORS, REPORTERS, JOURNALISTS AND COMMENTATORS NOW HAVE TO STEP UP TO THE PLATE. THERE IS A LOT OF CROW ON THAT PLATE…BUT IT COULD TASTE PRETTY GOOD IF THE RIGHT THING IS DONE. YES, WE ARE PENN STATE…AND WE DESERVE JUSTICE!
Read more in The Freeh Distort: A Disgrace to American Justice available at Amazon.com in Kindle format for $4.99

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