Jerry Sandusky Primary Image Restoration Strategy

DENIAL STRATEGY

Jerry Sandusky Pre-Scandal:

For nearly a decade preceding the eruption of the Penn State crisis, Jerry Sandusky embraced the denial strategy as his primary image restoration strategy. Sandusky sought to convince others there was no crisis, but rather misunderstood notions of his well-intentioned behavior. Despite allegations of severely inappropriate behavior, dating as far back as 1998, Sandusky avoided charges and prosecution by denying the allegations ever occurred (Thamel, 2011).

''They've taken everything that I ever did for any young person and twisted it to say that my motives were sexual or whatever,'' Mr. Sandusky said. He added: ''I had kid after kid after kid who might say I was a father figure. And they just twisted

Collectively, they publicly sought to deny the existence of a crisis looming at Penn State concerning various allegations levied against Jerry Sandusky. While their true motives for denying allegations in the decade leading up to the crisis may never be known, it is apparent their strategy and actions played a crucial role in what now is unequivocally regarded as a ‘cover-up’ by Penn State University officials. Employment of this strategy was evident in the manner in which Paterno, Spainer, Curley and Schultz ultimately addressed allegations of Sandusky sexually assaulting a young boy on Penn State property in early 2002 – nearly a decade before the crisis erupted in the national

Various reports suggest that he acted to persuade the men not to report what they knew to the criminal justice system but rather to have ‘empathy for Sandusky’ with no known mention of concern for the victims and their families (Alderfer, 2013).

Their effectiveness in collectively denying allegations against Sandusky during this time lead the Attorney General of Pennsylvania, Linda Kelly to comment retrospectively ''Those officials and administrators to whom it was reported did not report that incident to law enforcement or to any child protective agency. Their inaction, likely, allowed a child predator to continue to victimize children for many, many years” (Thamel, 2011).

Without question, Paterno, Spainer, Schultz and Curly’s use of the denial strategy prior to the eruption of the crisis was highly effective in that this strategy largely suppressed occurrences of official investigations, criminal charges levied against Sandusky and far-reaching impacts that would have otherwise damaged the image of Penn State