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Friday, November 11, 2011

Jerry Sandusky: The Bernie Madoff of Pedophiles


Disclaimer: I don't mean to be insensitive to the victims of these awful crimes.  Just trying to be funny, it's the only way I can deal with things.

Imagine your some working pedophile, just getting by on the few kids that want your shitty baseball cards, puppies, or whatever else you're peddling out of a rusty brown van.  Years of blown coverage and outdated trench coats have limited your pool of potential victims, and parents are becoming increasingly aware of your tactics.  You aren't looking for the best looking kids, just something acceptable.

Then you hear about this Sandusky character. Hundreds of kids at his disposal through charities, foundations, coaching, and every father that dreamed of their son playing for Linebacker U.  "Hey Joe, let me take Joe Jr. for an ice cream and I'll tell him a few blitz secrets." "Sure Jerry, sounds good." Hell, in a seriously bold move for a pederast, he adopted six children and fostered many more on a rolling basis.  And best of all, he never had to worry about getting caught.  The entire community loved him, and even more importantly, anyone that told was screwing Penn State football (God in PA).  While most diddlers had to outsmart nosy parents and clever police officers, Sandusky openly hung out with kids. Anyone that suspected him chose between protecting children from horrible crimes or tarnishing the pride, identity, and reputation of the massive Penn State community.

Your everyday pedophile was pretty amazed by Sandusky's operation.  I imagine that low-level con men and country club hustlers felt similar when they learned about Madoff bilking the investing community.  Most con men were lucky to trick Nana out of $10,000, while Madoff was printing money from large institutional investors that were none the wiser.  If you took down Madoff, you were taking down billions in private investment--no one wanted to be that guy.  Unfortunately, the longer someone like Madoff or Sandusky is allowed to betray an entire community of trusting individuals, the worse the fallout.  If Sandusky was arrested when a guy caught him anally raping a boy in a shower in 2002, we wouldn't be in this mess. Similarly, if SEC looked at Madoff's shitty books before the financial collapse, investors would have saved billions.  As it turns out someone blew the whistle on both of these guys, and our and our government chose not to pursue.  In Madoff's case, the SEC punted.  For Sandusky, a much more troubling scenario ensued.  The complaint went up the chain, the DA wanted to prosecute, but then he went missing and his laptop was found without any data.  Interesting....

When individuals betray a large community of people that not only trust that individual, but have a stake in his or her success, the downside risk from whistle-blowing will force complicity or enabling.  No one wants the of foreseeable consequences, but they will come to pass.   Allowing continued betrayals just delays the inevitable, and severely increase the horrible consequences.

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