Two top Penn State officials charged with perjury are set to surrender on allegations that they failed to alert police about claims of sexual abuse by the University's football team's former defensive coordinator, Jerry Sandusky. Such reporting is required by law.
Tim Curley and Gary Schultz are expected to surrender today at a Harrisburg district court. Their departures from the university were announced last night after an emergency meeting of the Board of Trustees.
Curley, the athletic director, has requested administrative leave so that he can focus on his defense. Schultz, the school's senior vice president for business and finance, will go back into retirement.
Both men say that they are innocent of any wrongdoing in connection with the probe into whether Sandusky sexually abused eight boys over 15 years.
State Attorney General Linda Kelly and state police Commissioner Frank Noonan are expected to make more details of the case available to the public later today.
Sandusky was arrested on Saturday on charges that he preyed on boys that he met through the Second Mile, a charity he founded for at-risk youths. The charity said in a statement yesterday that Sandusky had had no involvement with the Second Mile programs involving children since 2008, when Sandusky told the foundation that he was being investigated on child-sex allegations.
Coach Joe Paterno says that he's shocked and deeply saddened by the sexual abuse charges. Paterno in a statement issued by his son, Scott, said that he's troubled that someone he thought he knew might have harmed young people.
Paterno went before a grand jury where he testified that he was informed by an assistant coach in 2002 that he had witnessed an incident in the shower of the team locker room. Prosecutors have said Paterno had passed on the information to athletic director Tim Curley.