Leaders of the Penn State task force that oversaw the university’s Sandusky investigation chose their investigative firm exclusively from a list compiled by the Corbett administration, according to an e-mail released by the education department. Despite offers of help from numerous law firms, trustees Ken Frazier and Ron Tomalis only considered three former prosecutors that … […]

The U.S. Department of Education today refused to release thousands of pages of records it received as it investigated allegations that Penn State failed to publicly report criminal activity on its campuses. Citing an “ongoing law enforcement investigation” into the university’s compliance with the Clery Act, the government said it would withhold 54,000 pages of … […]

The chairman of Penn State’s task force that oversaw Louis Freeh’s investigation last month has doubts that top Penn State officials decided not to report child abuse allegations to protect the reputation of the school’s football program. In a deposition given to lawyers as part of a lawsuit with Pennsylvania last month,  Trustee Ken Frazier … […]

The Commonwealth Court today said it would review a cache of e-mails between the Attorney General’s office and investigators for Louis J. Freeh that the agency claims doesn’t have to release in response to a Right-to-Know Law request. In a 3-0 opinion, the court said an internal review of the records conducted by the OAG’s … […]

The Commonwealth Court today ruled that Penn State’s communications with Louis J. Freeh may be withheld due to the attorney-client and attorney-work product privileges. In a unanimous opinion, the judges said the work-product privilege isn’t limited to materials prepared in anticipation of litigation, and that we failed to prove Penn State waived the attorney-client privilege … […]

As Penn State was on the verge of hiring Louis J. Freeh to lead its internal probe of the Sandusky scandal, trustee Ken Frazier asked the former FBI director one last question. Even after a personal interview and a week of vetting by university and state officials, Frazier wanted to hear it from Freeh himself: … […]

Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams’s office spent four months fighting the release of records that it says it doesn’t even have. Now we get to find out why. In July, I asked his office for e-mails and other documents sent to Sandusky prosecutor Frank Fina from former supervising grand jury judge Barry Feudale and a bunch … […]

On Saturday night I had the honor of participating in a panel discussion about the events of November 2011. It’s hard to believe that two years have passed and we’re still seeking answers about what happened in the wake of the Sandusky scandal. As you may know, I spent the last year fighting for your … […]

I’ve previously written about how the NCAA and Big Ten requested to participate in Penn State’s investigation into how it handled allegations of child sexual abuse. However, none of the letters indicated whether their request was granted or not. Yesterday I came across a statement by a university attorney who said Freeh provided regular updates … […]

The leaders of Penn State’s committee that oversaw Louis J. Freeh’s investigation personally dealt with inquiries from the NCAA and the Big Ten conference, according to an e-mail recently released from the Department of Education. As the university’s internal investigation got under way, trustees Ken Frazier and Ron Tomalis had personal conversations with both athletic … […]

Federal investigators cleared former Penn State President Graham Spanier for secret government work last year after Louis J. Freeh turned over information he said should have disqualified him for the post. Commenting on Spanier’s involvement with a project for an undisclosed government agency, Freeh expressed surprise in an April 12 e-mail that his national security clearance … […]

Madison, Wis. – Penn State University filed papers this week to keep records related to its Sandusky investigation from becoming public. Writing that the release of some emails sent to trustees would cause “substantial harm,” univeristy lawyers intervened in an appeal that challenged a decision by the Department of Education to withhold some records under … […]

Dauphin County court officials yesterday posted transcripts of this week’s preliminary hearing. In the event you didn’t immediately read the more than 300 pages of testimony, they reveal many details not previously known, including some that poke even more holes into the sieve that’s commonly known as the Freeh report. The testimony of Kim Belcher, … […]

Investigators for Louis J. Freeh continued to help state prosecutors for more than three months after they ended their work for Penn State, according to records from the state Attorney General’s office. Instead of cutting ties with law enforcement when he issued his report in July last year, Freeh’s firm continued to assist the attorney … […]

State officials today ordered the Pennsylvania State Police to release correspondance with Louis J. Freeh and three people who worked for his firm. The decision by the Office of Open Records gives officials 30 days to provide records sent to and received from Freeh, his General Counsel Omar McNeil, and investigators Tom Cloud and Greg … […]

Last month’s release of e-mails between the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s office and Louis Freeh’s investigators was a partial victory in the hunt for the truth. They showed a clear bias toward creating a final report that matched the narrative originally established by prosecutors in November 2011. But the disclosure didn’t go far enough. The AG’s Right-to-Know … […]

The 12 emails between state prosecutors and Freeh investigators I released today don’t prove a thing. They don’t indicate that Paterno, Spanier, Curley or Schultz are innocent, and they won’t convince the world that anybody that has anything to do with Penn State isn’t scum. What they do suggest, if not confirm, is that the … […]

It was billed as an independent investigation that would serve as the definitive narrative on what happened at Penn State. But a series of internal emails released by the Pennsylvania Attorney General last week suggest investigators for Louis J. Freeh didn’t arrive at their conclusions on their own. After working with state prosecutors to convict … […]

Since the Office of Open Records ordered the Department of Education last month to release contracts with Louis J. Freeh, I’d been wondering how it was going to respond. Surely it wouldn’t just hand over the contracts after blocking three previous requests. Somehow it would try to weasel out of doing what it should do. … […]

Tom Corbett became Pennsylvania’s favorite politician for a day. In a bizarre move that many are still struggling to completely understand, the embattled governor and Penn State trustee suddenly decided to fight the university’s unfair and unprecedented sanctions by filing an antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA. It came six months after the sanctions were imposed, and went forward without … […]

Secretary of Education Ron Tomalis has one thing to say about whether he has a copy of Penn State’s contract with Louis Freeh: “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” That was essentially his department’s response to my latest request for a copy of the contract – the third time my request was deemed so unclear that … […]

For the last few months, I’ve been trying to get a copy of Penn State’s agreement with Freeh Sporkin & Sullivan that governed the conduct of its investigation. Ron Tomalis, the Penn State trustee and Secretary of Education, was also second in command of the board committee that hired Freeh. So you’d think he, of … […]