Posted by moranis on 11/9/2011 12:51:00 PM (view original):
Posted by AlCheez on 11/9/2011 12:45:00 PM (view original):
Posted by moranis on 11/9/2011 12:39:00 PM (view original):
Posted by AlCheez on 11/9/2011 12:37:00 PM (view original):
And, in your mind, to what end is he embellishing the story now?
I have no idea, but it just doesn't make sense that anyone would let a child be raped.
I think it makes more sense that he would fail to act due to one or a combination of any number of fears than it does that he would start lying about what he saw in front of a grand jury 7-8 years later.
If your son told you he saw someone raping a 10 year old boy, what would you do? I mean seriously, it just isn't credible that that many people, including McQueary's father, wouldn't have called the police if they had been told of a child rape.
It just doesn't make sense.
Perhaps McQueary is embellishing now because Victim #2's family spoke to him and need corroboration, maybe he felt bad about how he handled it so he is being over zealous now, maybe his memory is fuzzy but he heard of a rape and thinks that is how it happened, etc. Plenty of reasons people embellish stories after the fact.
I certainly hope I would call the police, or rather, persuade him to make the call. But if I thought it might ruin my son's life/career to do so, maybe I wouldn't. It's easy to talk big about what we would do in a specific situation, but people are largely cowards about doing the right thing when it comes with risk to themselves/their family. Again, none of this justifies or excuses the inaction, but you're talking about a State College family. You've got one eyewitness to a crime being committed by a guy who, at the time, was second only to Paterno in terms of his stature at that university and in that community. You don't see any way they might reasonably be concerned about it going very, very badly for him if they go straight to the cops with the info? I go back to what I said before, I believe that these football programs (especially in a place like State College) become their own little kingdoms, and there are things that go on inside and in the name of them that won't make sense to someone outside of them.
He could be lying - I don't know. The grand jury obviously found him to be credible while finding others involved less so.