Press Box: Paterno family responds to Freeh report
The family of Joe Paterno claimed that an investigation by former FBI director Louis Freeh into the Jerry Sandusky child sex abuse case is not supported by facts.
A response to Freeh's July 2012 report was released Sunday by the legal team of the former Penn State football coach. The roughly 180-page document portrays Paterno as the victim of Freeh's "rush to injustice."
The Paternos hired former U.S. Attorney General Dick Thornburgh and other legal experts to review Freeh's report.
"We conclude that the observations as to Joe Paterno in the Freeh report are unfounded, and have done a disservice not only to Joe Paterno and to the Penn State University community, but also to the victims of Jerry Sandusky and the critical mission of educating the public on the dangers of child sexual victimization," the report reads.
Freeh issued a statement later Sunday defending his report.
"I stand by our conclusion that four of the most powerful people at Penn State failed to protect against a child sexual predator harming children for over a decade," he said.
---NCAA sanctions prohibit Penn State from participating in the postseason until the 2016 season, but Nittany Lions coach Bill O'Brien said at a banquet on Saturday night that the team is looking into playing a regular-season game in Ireland.
"We are definitely looking into playing in Ireland, no question about it," O'Brien said, the Patriot News reported. "We're working on an opponent and we're working with the Big Ten on that. So that's something that's definitely in the works."
NBA
---Former NBA player and current ESPN college basketball analyst Jay Williams told the New York Times in an interview that that some of his Chicago Bulls teammates smoke marijuana before games during the 2002-2003 season.
"I didn't know how to handle it at first," Williams said, according to the Times report. "I didn't know how to be around it. Guys were on the bench, trying to kick it to girls in the stands, having ball boys run over. I mean, some guys were high."
"There were guys smoking weed before games. Guys asking in the middle of the game, 'Do you smell popcorn?' "
