Former Penn State football coach Jerry Sandusky will likely spend the rest of his life in prison, after a judge handed down a prison sentence Tuesday for his convictions on child sexual abuse charges.
Judge John Cleland said Sandusky will face no less than 30 years and no more than 60 years, with credit for time served.
He was convicted in June of sexually abusing 10 boys over a 15-year period.
The 68-year-old had faced a maximum of 400 years in prison.
His attorneys have 10 days to appeal the decision. They have already vowed to appeal his conviction.
Sandusky entered the courthouse Tuesday wearing a red jumpsuit with a bullet-proof vest underneath. Though he was handcuffed, he clutched a manila envelope and smiled briefly as he got out of a police vehicle. His wife, Dottie, arrived in the parking lot moments earlier.
He had pleaded his case in an audio statement Monday in which he protested his innocence and insisted he was falsely accused.
“They could take away my life, they could make me out as a monster, they could treat me as a monster, but they can’t take away my heart,” the former assistant coach said in the recording. “In my heart, I know I did not do these alleged disgusting acts.”
He accused the judge of bringing the case to trial too quickly, the victims of conspiring together, and the attorneys of trying to make money in future civil suits.
Members of Sandusky’s defense team have long maintained that they were denied sufficient time to prepare.
Tom Kline, an attorney for the person identified in court as Victim No. 5, called Sandusky’s recording “preposterous.”
“If you are to believe Mr. Sandusky, then we have the grand conspiracy, which his lawyers attempted to play out in the court, which involved 10 young men, a janitor, Mr. (Mike) McQueary, the press, the lawyers and everyone else who’s involved,” Kline told CNN.
“The fact of the matter is that there was no collusion whatsoever. My client came forward only after there was a knock on the door by the police, which led him to a grand jury room. He had never spoken to anyone. He told his story.”
McQueary, a former Penn State assistant football, testified that he saw Sandusky in a shower with an underage boy. He filed a whistleblower lawsuit last week against the university, according to a court document from Centre County, Pennsylvania.
Sandusky co-counsel Karl Rominger said of his client’s audio recording, “If he wants to say that, God bless the First Amendment.”
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article courtesy of CNN.com
