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Spanier Denied Supreme Court Hearing
- Thread starter didier
- Start date
See my post #16 above. Humor me and tell me how any of the charge he was convicted of applies to him? A very important point that you will surely overlook is the fact that Jack Raykovitz was informed about the incident.
Every U.S. citizen should want Spainer's conviction overturned (especially those who work in education).
Spanier was charged based on an extremely broad interpretation of a statute that, as written today, was not in the books on the date of the alleged incident. The prosecution could not even produce an identity, or more importantly, an age of the alleged victim.
This case has far reaching effects beyond Spanier.
I am just as frustrated as most here and I doubt this will move the needle much (if at all), but here is another opportunity to learn more ... http://www.bigtrial.net/2019/02/pre...IRywiYl-WsrkTkSM7FInNtSZ-M3bmG5bvgm8SJMyb-5kA
On Monday at 10 a.m., Al Lindsay, Jerry Sandusky's appeals lawyer, will talk to the media about his reaction to the report of seven Penn State trustees on the "flawed methodology and conclusions" of the Louis Freeh Report.
"Of course we are gratified that somebody in a position of authority has challenged the Freeh Report, which, of course, we believe was flawed in many ways," Lindsay said in a press release. "I must reluctantly state, however, that there is a significant flaw in the A7 Report. The Report accepts as gospel that Jerry Sandusky actually did these things. So much of what is wrong in the Freeh Report and the A7 response, is that we are operating under that paradigm. Of course, it is our position from day one that Jerry Sandusky is absolutely innocent of the charges and was convicted of the various counts only by a very flawed criminal trial."
Also appearing with Lindsay will be John Snedden, a former NCIS special agent who conducted a contemporaneous but previously unknown federal investigation on the Penn State campus for six months in 2012 and found no official cover up.
In the press release, Snedden described previous investigations at Penn State as "politically motivated, agenda-driven, and collusive."
"What does that previously unknown concurrent and independent federal investigation have to say about this whole mess?" Snedden said in the press release. "Monday at 10 a.m. be there."
The press conference will be held at The Country Inn & Suites by Radisson, 1357 East College Avenue, State College PA.
Also appearing at the press conference will be Ralph Cipriano of bigtrial.net. Cipriano will talk about how confidential documents show that the entire board of trustees at Penn State paid out $118 million to 36 alleged victims of Sandusky -- an average of $3.3 million each -- without having those alleged victims questioned by lawyers, forensic psychiatrists or detectives, or subjected to polygraph tests or criminal background checks.
"Easy money," is how Big Trial has described the payouts at Penn State.
Lindsay presently has an appeal before the state Supreme Court on Sandusky's behalf filed under the Post-Conviction Relief Act. "Hopefully, we will be granted a new trial," Lindsay said.
The press conference caps some recent new developments in the so-called Penn State sex scandal. The report done by the trustees on Freeh was recently leaked. The leaking of that report, and perhaps the contents as well, are expected to dominate a meeting of the full board of trustees at Penn State today.
Meanwhile, former Penn State president Graham Spanier, who was the subject of Snedden's investigation, yesterday lost his appeal to the state Supreme Court of his conviction of one count of endangering the welfare of a child. As a result of the appeal, Spanier may be headed to jail to serve a sentence of two months, followed by two months of home confinement.
Read more at http://www.bigtrial.net/2019/02/press-conference-in-happy-valley.html#OXpE7LSXhs8BfqMD.99
Yes, the big takeaway is that if you are brought to trial, put on a defense.
Spanier presented no defense. At all. Had an attorney paid for him, Snedden & others standing by, and did nothing.
What's a jury supposed to do with that?
How can you have so many posts on this board and be this ignorant? Who do you think was abused, and who do you think told him of this abuse? Note these are rhetorical questions.
If you think an untrained Spanier deserves a conviction for a teen not in his care not actually being abused, what does a properly trained Raykovitz deserve for a teen in his care? What about the properly trained state professionals that failed and allowed ALL of the abuse to occur?
With the benefit of hindsight, I'm sure GS would take a different approach. My guess is his lawyer read the actual laws the state was trying to convict him of and said none of them applied in his situation. So maybe they could only do damage by opening their mouths and figured the jury would come to the same conclusion (no actual laws were violated). If so, they didn't factor in the corruptness of the PA judicial system and the average intelligence of a PA juror. Even the jury foreman said they got it wrong after the trial.
"The foreman of the jury that convicted former Pennsylvania State University President Graham B. Spanier of child endangerment said Thursday that he believes the verdict was a “mistake,” and that he was conflicted about not changing his vote and possibly forcing a mistrial."
I get what you are saying but the burden of proof is on the Prosecution - and they proved absolutely nothing.
In a normal situation that would have been plenty - but we all know this situation isn't 'normal'.
YEP....maybe Lucifer will appoint her to criminal trial judge.
Which is why the court dodged having to issue a written opinion by declining to even entertain the appeal....
No he doesn't and yes, I want him to win. Even if you buy that he failed at his job of president (and I'm not saying that), he definitely didn't commit a crime.
I agree that Spanier should have put on a defense because in this case it may have swayed the finders of fact in his favor (not always the case).
IMO, what's infinitely more troubling here is the interpretation of law (i.e. question of law). The prosecution clearly did not meet its burden under the law (i.e. meeting all elements of the law) to even get the case to a jury. This kind of broad and retroactive prosecution violates the basic principles of our criminal justice system (which is supposedly the most fair in the history of mankind). And PA judges seem to be fine with that because the case dealt with child abuse.
The fix was in on this from the very beginning. Just ask Cruising Route 66 or whatever his name was. He was right all along.
Because, in theory, the prosecution is legally bound to present evidence the prosecution believes will convince a jury of the defendant's peers that the defendant is guilty of whatever he/she is charged with. But, wait...that's not all! The evidence presented MUST convince a jury BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT.
Spanier's counsel obviously believed there was NO LOGICAL WAY a jury could possibly find the prosecution's argument reasonable since it couldn't even identify a victim. So why present a defense? Since it was CLEAR that the prosecution WASN'T going to be able to do what it was legally required to do, why should the defendant do anything that could even remotely raise a question?
Again, in theory, it actually was a sound defense strategy...if the jury was objective, capable of critical thinking and had a foreperson with even the slightest ability to facilitate and redirect the deliberations.
And before Art gets all up in my grill, I have personal experience in this having served as a jury foreman TWO TIMES. Juries can be highly irrational, and I would NOT want my life in the hands of 12 people who, when you really think about it, are more motivated to be done with jury duty and go home than to do the work that really needs to be done.
Well stated.
Also, recall that the jury foreman later stated that the jury was very divided and basically just wanted to go home for the weekend. The foreman says the jury made a mistake with the guilty verdict for Spanier.
It's true that Spanier's attorneys didn't call any defense witnesses. But that's not the same thing as presenting no defense. The defense made their case during cross-examination of the prosecution witnesses.
From Silver's closing, p.26-27:
To a person, the one thing that witnesses were certain about and remembered is that nobody told Graham at any time that Jerry Sandusky was engaging in sexual conduct with minors. Every witness who was asked that confirmed it. Not a single witness contradicted it. Not a one.
The closest thing to that sort of accusation that maybe Graham Spanier knew something is the 1998 email that closed the 1998 matter, the one in June of 1998. And that's the email that says just the opposite. It's Officer Harmon's email. And that's one that says, "Jerry Sandusky was not engaged in criminal conduct." The case was closed because there was not criminal conduct.
Every witness that was involved in 2001 was clear that they never told Graham Spanier that anyone suspected that to be sexual abuse. Clearly they did not believe it themselves, and I cannot imagine that Ms. Ditka will stand up in her closing and tell you that every one of the witnesses that the prosecution put on the stand in this case is part of some global conspiracy to hide something. She's not going to argue that. It makes utterly no sense, and it's preposterous.
These were her witnesses. I didn't call them and put them on the stand. That's why I don't need to call any witnesses. Her witnesses made the defense case.
Speaking of 'nobody being above the law' regarding abuse of children, a major impact of the Sandusky/Penn State investigations was to delay resources from similar investigation of the Catholic church abuse scandal, whose level of direct child abuse and cover up pales Penn State by comparison.
Yet, in Pennsylvania.......the judges reviewed the charges and convictions and thought everything was..........okie, dokie!
kind of.... Francofan says....'I am not a lawyer, but I believe the answer is No. I am not sure if you can file a PCRA on a misdemeanor charge, it would seem pointless. I am guessing that a writ of habeus corpus at the federal level doesn’t make any sense. I assume that Spanier will be going to jail soon.'
I guess Misdemeanor charges are tough to appeal to the US Supreme court, although I do think Don Blankenship did file an appeal on his conviction, but he was tried in Federal court not state court.
I don't know the rules, really, but what are the odds that the SCOTUS would choose to hear a case over a misdemeanor conviction? Pretty much zero, I would think.
Just in case you incorrectly believed that the PA Attorney General's office was above trolling you, here's a little reminder that this is the guy whom they had testify against Spanier.
Series: http://topics.pennlive.com/tag/second-mile-investigation/
"Has this ever happened before?"
That was the first thing [then-Second Mile Development Director Bonnie] Marshall asked when [Jack] Raykovitz told her in early 2009 about the accusations against Sandusky.
"He looked at me and said, 'Yes, we knew of something in 2001 that Tim Curley talked to me about.' At that point, I didn't particularly want to know any more and he didn't volunteer anything else."
Full article: https://www.pennlive.com/midstate/2012/08/second_mile_jerry_sandusky_3.htmlThat was the first thing [then-Second Mile Development Director Bonnie] Marshall asked when [Jack] Raykovitz told her in early 2009 about the accusations against Sandusky.
"He looked at me and said, 'Yes, we knew of something in 2001 that Tim Curley talked to me about.' At that point, I didn't particularly want to know any more and he didn't volunteer anything else."
Series: http://topics.pennlive.com/tag/second-mile-investigation/
So I assume he is coming for Jack Raykovitz then.
I think he's absolutely right and if the federal court has any integrity his conviction will be thrown out. IANAL (dropped out after first year), but I don't think I have to finish and pass the bar to spot an ex post facto violation.
I hope that Spanier gets some immediate relief at the federal level from having to report to jail. I believe he should get relief due to the errors in the application of the law as well due to the facts of the case. He is a good man and does not in any way deserve punishment for his handling of the report that McQueary made in 2001 to Joe Paterno that was referred to Tim Curley and Gary Schultz. Spanier is the victim of political corruption by Governor Tom Corbett and the OAG's office.
Here is a link to the pennlive story of Spanier's federal appeal
https://www.pennlive.com/news/2019/...ame-of-jerry-sandusky-scandal-conviction.html
Spanier’s federal appeal hinges on the same questions he unsuccessfully raised before the state courts:
Here is a link to justia dockets and filings post on the federal appeal
https://dockets.justia.com/docket/p...YK9Z8k73iBrbDOMXFHi-VfTpQJBHADgggxlEwwGeI8uLM
Here is a link to the pennlive story of Spanier's federal appeal
https://www.pennlive.com/news/2019/...ame-of-jerry-sandusky-scandal-conviction.html
Spanier’s federal appeal hinges on the same questions he unsuccessfully raised before the state courts:
- That prosecutors charged him based on revisions of the child endangerment law that didn’t take effect until six years after the alleged criminal conduct;
- And that Boccabella permitted the conviction to stand on the basis of a statute-of-limitations exception that prosecutors had not raised either before or during the trial.
Here is a link to justia dockets and filings post on the federal appeal
https://dockets.justia.com/docket/p...YK9Z8k73iBrbDOMXFHi-VfTpQJBHADgggxlEwwGeI8uLM
they saw what happened to Kane
Huh! Denied PA Supreme Court hearing months ago. This filling is Federal Court. Go Graham!
Thank you, @wensilver.
I miss @wensilver around here
WTF? Read the record.
Spanier's lawyers have said that for the relevant provision of the state's statute of limitations to apply, prosecutors would have needed to prove the boy in the shower in 2001 was less than 14 years and 11 days old. Referred to as “Victim 2” in court records and testimony, the boy's identity has been disputed, with prosecutors saying they are not sure who he is.
At the lower-level Superior Court, two of three judges on the appeals panel turned down Spanier's arguments that too much time had passed to charge him, that he was not legally obligated to care for the boy and that he should not have been charged because he did not supervise children directly.
But the third Superior Court judge said Spanier should have been told at a reasonable time before trial that prosecutors planned to rely on an exception to the two-year statute of limitations. She said she would have reversed his conviction.
Two of Spanier's top aides when he was Penn State's president, former vice president Gary Schultz and former athletic director Tim Curley, pleaded guilty to child endangerment and testified against him in 2017. They have since served county jail sentences.
Spanier, who did not take the stand at trial in his own defense, has said Sandusky's attack on the boy was characterized to him as horseplay.
He told the sentencing judge he regretted he “did not intervene more forcefully.”
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