STATE COLLEGE, Pennsylvania (AP) _ A child sex abuse case has brought down one of the most renowned coaches in American sports.
Joe Paterno, who is 84 years old and has coached Penn State's college football team for more than 45 years, said Wednesday he will retire at the end of this season, bringing his illustrious career to an end because he failed to do all he could about an allegation of child sex abuse against a former assistant coach at the acclaimed university.
Penn State coach Joe Paterno watches his football team practice, Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2011, in State College, Pa. Paterno, who preached success with honor for half a century but whose legend was shattered by a child sex abuse scandal, said Wednesday that he will retire at the end of this season. (AP-Yonhap News)
“This is a tragedy,” Paterno said of the abuse. “It is one of the great sorrows of my life. With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more.”
Paterno has been besieged by criticism since former assistant coach and one-time heir apparent Jerry Sandusky was charged over the weekend with molesting eight young boys between 1994 and 2009. Penn State athletic director Tim Curley and vice president Gary Schultz have been charged with failing to notify authorities after an eyewitness reported a 2002 assault.
Paterno, who is in the middle of his 46th season with the Nittany Lions, has won 409 games, a record for major college football. But now, the grandfatherly coach known as “Joe Pa,” who had painstakingly burnished a reputation for winning “the right way,” leaves the only school he's ever coached in disgrace.
“I am absolutely devastated by the developments in this case,” he said. “I grieve for the children and their families, and I pray for their comfort and relief.”
But Paterno might not be able to execute his exit strategy as the school's board of trustees is still considering its options, which could include forcing Paterno to leave immediately. Penn State, which is ranked No. 12 in the AP college football poll with a 8-1 record, has three more games to go this season, plus a likely end-of-season bowl game.
Paterno has not been accused of legal wrongdoing. But he has been assailed, in what the state police commissioner called a lapse of “moral responsibility,” for not doing more to stop Sandusky.
He has been questioned over his apparent failure to follow up on a report of the 2002 incident, in which Sandusky allegedly sodomized a 10-year-old boy in the showers at the team's football complex. A witness, Mike McQueary, is currently an assistant coach for the team but was a graduate assistant at the time.
Paterno told Curley, who has since stepped down and has been charged with lying to the state grand jury investigating the case. The Penn State vice president has also been charged, and the university president could follow.
But in the place known as Happy Valley, none held the same status as Paterno. And in the end, he could not withstand the backlash from a scandal that goes well beyond the everyday stories of corruption in college sports.
The coach defended his decision to take the news to his athletic director. Paterno said it was obvious that the graduate student was “distraught,” but said the graduate student did not tell him about the “very specific actions” in the grand jury report.
After Paterno reported the incident to Curley, Sandusky was told to stay away from the school, but critics say the coach should have done more _ tried to identify and help the victim, for example, or alerted authorities.
“Here we are again,” John Salveson, former president of the Pennsylvania chapter of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said in an interview earlier this week. “When an institution discovers abuse of a kid, their first reaction was to protect the reputation of the institution and the perpetrator.”
Paterno's requirement that his players not just achieve success but adhere to a moral code, that they win with honor, transcended his sport.
“Deep down, I feel I've had an impact. I don't feel I've wasted my career,” Paterno once said. “If I did, I would have gotten out a long time ago.”
Along the road to the wins record, Paterno turned Penn State into one of the game's best-known programs, and the standard-bearer for college football success in the East.
National titles in 1982 and 1986 cemented him as one of the game's greats. In all, Paterno guided five teams to unbeaten, untied seasons, and he reached 300 wins faster than any other coach.
“He will go down as the greatest football coach in the history of the game. Every young coach, in my opinion, can take a lesson from him,” former Florida coach Urban Meyer said after his last game with the Gators, a 37-24 win over Penn State at the 2011 Outback Bowl.
The terms of Paterno's departure conflict significantly with the reputation he built over nearly a half-century of turning a quaint program into a powerhouse with instant name recognition.
He made it to the big-time without losing a sense of where he was _ State College, population 42,000, a picturesque college town in the middle of Pennsylvania.
Paterno and his wife, Sue, raised five children in State College. Anybody could ring up his modest ranch home using the number listed in the phone book under “Paterno, Joseph V.”
Anybody could walk up to offer good luck as he walked to home games.
<한글 기사>
‘미국판 도가니’ 사건에 美 발칵
대학 전 풋볼팀 코치 10대 8명 성폭행 의혹..대학당국도 미온 대처
대학 풋볼의 ‘전설’ 현직 코치 조 패터노 전격 은퇴 발표
미국 유명대학 미식축구부 전직 코치가 10대 소년들을 장기간 상습 성폭행했다는 의혹이 제기됐다.
특히 이 코치가 자신이 세운 자선재단으로부터 도움을 받는 학생들을 항거불능 상태에서 장기간 성폭행했다는 의혹이 나오면서 ‘미국판 도가니’ 사건이라는 평가도 받고 있다.
펜실베이니아주립대 미식축구팀의 전직 수비코치였던 제리 샌더스키가 성폭행 의혹을 받고 있는 당사자다. 그는 최소한 15년간 8명의 어린 소년들을 성추행 혹은 성폭행했다는 의혹을 받고 있다.
샌더스키는 1999년까지 이 대학 수비코치를 지냈다.
지금까지 조사 결과 샌더스키는 불우한 청소년들을 돕기 위해 자신이 세운 자선 단체에서 만난 소년들을 꾀어 성폭행한 의혹을 받고 있다.
지난 2002년의 경우 펜실베이니아주립대 미식축구팀 샤워장에서 열살짜리 소년을 나체상태에서 성폭행하는 것이 목격되기도 했다.
이 장면은 당시 미식축구팀 일을 돕던 한 졸업생에 의해 목격됐으나 당시 대학 측은 경찰에 신고도 하지 않은 것으로 드러나 파문이 커지고 있다.
당시 목격자는 성폭행 사실을 조 패터노 코치에게 보고했고, 코치는 다시 대학 당국에 그 사실을 알렸지만 대학측은 이를 경찰에 신고하지 않았다.
대신 대학 당국은 샌더스키가 갖고 있던 미식축구팀 샤워장 출입 열쇠를 뺏고 다시는 어린 소년을 미식축구팀 건물로 데려오지 못하도록 하는 미온적 조치를 내리 는데 그쳤다.
린다 켈리 펜실베이니아 검찰총장은 지난 7일(현지시간) "대학 당국의 이런 처사가 오랜 세월동안 어린이들을 계속 희생되게 허용했다"고 비난했다.
당시 성폭행 사실을 보고받은 대학당국의 2명은 위증죄로 기소된 상태다. 성폭행 의혹을 받고 있는 당사자인 샌더스키는 10만달러의 보석금을 내고 석방돼 있으며 현재 재판이 진행중이다.
펜실베이니아주립대는 이번 사건의 파문이 확산되자 11일 특별위원회를 설치해 이번 사건 전반에 대한 의혹을 조사하기로 했다.
또 이 대학 미식축구부의 조 패터노(84) 코치는 2011년 시즌을 끝으로 은퇴하겠다고 발표했다.
미국 스포츠계에서 가장 존경받는 인물 중 한 사람인 그는 9일 성명을 내고 이 같은 비극적 사태가 야기된데 대해 책임감을 느낀다며 코치직에서 물러나겠다고 밝혔다.
패터노 코치는 "이번 사건은 내 생에서 가장 슬픈 일"이라며 "피해 어린이와 그 가족들을 생각하면 너무나 마음이 아프다. 그들을 위해 기도하겠다"고 말했다.
그는 "돌이켜 보면 좀 더 잘 할 수 있었을텐데 하는 생각이 든다"며 아쉬움을 표시했다.
