The case against Penn State assistant football Coach Jerry Sandusky is getting thornier, now that his lawyer is asking that all 52 sex-abuse counts against him be dropped. Sandusky has been charged with raping 10 minors over a 15 year period. His lawyer, Joe Amendola, gave a plethora of reasons he sought such dismissals, in what is called an “omnibus pretrial motion.”
“We raised a number of issues that we thought were pertinent for various reasons,” said Amendola. “But the judge will have to decide that. We’ll see what happens.”
The issues included the claim that Sandusky was not read his Miranda rights when questions by Penn State police in 1998; that most of the alleged rapes are supposed to have happened before 2002, which, according to the statute of limitations which says a sex-abuse victim has five years after their 18th birthday to report the crime, would make them invalid; that two of the alleged victims haven’t even been identified; that police performed an illegal search of his house, and any evidence so-procured was inadmissible; that one of the witnesses to the alleged rapes now suffered from dementia and could not testify in court; and that no specific dates for many of the alleged abuses have been established, making it impossible for the defense to establish legitimate alibis.
Judge John Cleland has subsequently scheduled a hearing on April 5.
