A Texas Tie To The Horror
Carrying a child molester off the field? Charges against Jerry Sandusky castAlamo Bowl trip in a new light
Jerry Sandusky gets carried off the field by the Penn State players after the1999 Alamo Bowl win.
Jerry Sandusky faces 40 counts of child abuse, spanning more than a decade.
Jerry Sandusky allegedly brought one of his victims to the Alamo Bowl.
Photo courtesy of Alamo Bowl
Pennsylvanian authorities aren't the only ones pursuing former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky for child abuse. Investigations stretch as far as the Lone Star State.
Officials in San Antonio are looking into allegations that one of Sandusky's victims was molested at the Alamo Bowl game in 1999, when the victim was 15 years old. This was Sandusky's last game as defensive coordinator. The same one in which the Nittany Lions defense shut out Texas A&M 24-0 — the one the Penn State players carried Sandusky off the field on their shoulders after.
Victim 4 as the 15-year-old's identified in court documents seemed to be a particular obsession of Sandusky's. The coach promised the boy a spot on the Penn State football team as a walk-on, confided in the child when Joe Paterno revealed that Sandusky wouldn't be the next head coach at Penn State, bought him cigarettes and marijuana. The boy even appeared with Sandusky "in a photo accompanying an article about Sandusky in Sports Illustrated."
The indictment recounts in shocking detail instance after instance of sexual abuse to Victim 4 over more than two years.
According to the Grand Jury report, the unnamed Victim 4 "was listed along with Sandusky's wife, as a member of Sandusky's family party" for the Alamo Bowl game and one other. "He traveled to and from both bowl games with the football team and other Penn State staff, coaches and their families, sharing the accommodations."
Victim 4 also often bunked with Sandusky and the rest of the Penn State team and staff at Toftrees Golf Resort in Pennsylvania, where the Nittany Lions stayed overnight prior to home games.
Sandusky's indictment recounts in shocking detail instance after instance of sexual abuse to Victim 4 over more than two years, for which Sandusky never asked permission and for which the victim never granted consent.
The coach rewarded compliance with gifts and punished disobedience with threats. The report notes that "Sandusky did threaten to send [Victim 4] home from the Alamo Bowl in Texas when Victim 4 resisted his advances."
"We are investigating the possibility that an offense may have happened while here in San Antonio," said Sgt. Chris Benavides, a spokesperson for the San Antonio Police Department. Sandusky will face prosecution in Texas if the allegations prove to be true.
It seems that Sandusky often had this boy or another in tow. It's hard to imagine that the children acted at ease in public, when they were being subjected to sexual abuse behind closed doors.
How did no one — Sandusky's family, the Penn State team and staff — notice that something was amiss? Did more people look the other way?
