A lawyer for former Penn State football coach Jerry Sandusky, convicted of molesting young boys, argued on Tuesday that he deserved a new trial because the judge made several errors, including one that left the defence “flying blind” at the trial.
Philadelphia attorney Norris Gelman argued before a three-judge appeals panel in state Superior Court that Judge John Cleland, the trial judge, failed to instruct the jury that the boys did not make a “prompt report” of their sexual abuse, sometimes waiting more than a decade to speak with authorities.
“The time that elapsed between the molestation and initial report is striking,” Gelman said.
The long delay could have drawn into question their credibility when the jury was deciding the case, Gelman said.
But one of the jurists on the appeals panel, Superior Court Judge William Platt, pointed out the “prompt report” legal argument did not apply to children or people without the capacity to make a prompt report.
Sandusky, 69, was convicted in June last year on 45 counts of child sex abuse for molesting 10 boys over 15 years, some in the football team’s showers on campus. His victims accused him of fondling and oral and anal abuse.