Two former Penn State University administrators pleaded guilty Monday to misdemeanor child endangerment for their roles in the Jerry Sandusky child molestation case, reports the AP, more than five years after the scandal engulfed the school. Former Athletic Director Tim Curley and former Vice President Gary Schultz originally were charged with felonies. The reduced charge is punishable by up to five years in prison. Penn State ex-President Graham Spanier was also charged; his prosecution appears to be moving forward, with jury selection set for next week. The three handled a 2001 complaint by a graduate assistant who said he saw Sandusky, a retired defensive football coach, sexually abusing a boy in a team shower. They did not report the matter to police or child welfare authorities, but barred Sandusky from bringing children to campus.
Sandusky was not arrested until a decade later. He was convicted in 2012 of 45 counts of sexual abuse of 10 boys, and is serving a 30- to 60-year state prison term. Shortly after Sandusky's arrest, Paterno was fired. Schultz and Curley were arrested in 2011, and Spanier in 2012. The three former administrators at Penn State had also faced conspiracy charges. Each felony count carried the possibility of seven years in prison. Their case has dragged on for years because of a dispute about their representation during a grand jury appearance by Penn State's then-chief counsel Cynthia Baldwin. That legal fight prompted the Superior Court decision that threw out several charges, including perjury and obstruction. Penn State's costs in the Sandusky scandal are approaching a quarter-billion dollars. (More Penn State sex abuse stories.)
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