Pennsylvania attorney general calls recantation ‘highly suspect’
Former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky is scheduled to appear remotely Tuesday in a State College, Pennsylvania, courtroom for a hearing on an accuser’s bid to recant his testimony in the 2012 sexual-abuse case against him. The proceeding is part of Sandusky’s lawyers’ latest effort to secure a new trial.
Sandusky, 82, has been serving a decades-long prison sentence since his 2012 conviction on 45 counts of sexual abuse. Eight young men testified at his original trial about what they said happened to them as boys, providing the basis for the conviction.
Sandusky’s lawyers have repeatedly sought a new trial since the 2012 conviction and have lost each prior bid. Tuesday’s proceeding is the latest of those efforts.
The bid rests on an affidavit from one of the original accusers, identified in court documents only as R.R. In the affidavit filed by Sandusky’s attorneys, R.R. said he had been coached extensively by authorities during the original case and stated that he could “safely affirm details I did not fully recall.”
The Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General has said the supposed recantation is “highly suspect.” The office is opposing the new-trial bid.