I find all this further delving into the Freeh Report funny. Apart from compiling facts - at least those that don't include testimony from the key witnesses - it does more to confuse than it does inform. This has been true since Day 1. Its conclusions have the possibility of being valid only if you can overlook Freeh's disregard for reasonable doubt, which is baffling on multiple levels. This is a former judge, prosecutor, and head of the FBI? Sheesh. (In another way, perhaps it's not surprising that a former prosecutor would default to forming a closing argument.) However, Freeh's work on the Report is just low-hanging fruit, and I'll stop reaching for it with both hands. I don't care that Bob Costas decided later that perhaps he lept inductively with so many others.
I oversee the technical aspects of the cleanup of abandoned hazardous waste sites. When this work is not accomplished with public funds, it is done so through orders or settlement agreements, i.e., consent decrees, entered with responsible parties and lodged in U.S. District Courts. I put together the findings of fact. I would never consider taking a fact and construing an unsupported conclusion (You used benzene as part of your manufacturing process and benzene was found in the stream, therefore you committed a crime by intentionally releasing benzene to the stream; this is exactly the type of unsupported, overreaching conclusion replete in the Freeh Report, e.g., the way he throws around the word "conspiracy"). At any rate, the CDs that dictate performance of the work I oversee look nothing like the NCAA-PSU CD. If not told the latter was a settlement agreement, I wouldn't have guessed it myself. It's light on detail. Then again, that doesn't mean it isn't enforceable. The NCAA as the plaintiff is not the United States as a plaintiff, and that may be the key point at the end of the day. I have little idea of what responsibilities to their own bylaws and practices the NCAA might have. Does it hurt or do nothing to PSU's case that an authorized representative of Penn State signed onto the CD? Was the NCAA in violation of a law when it "bluffed" PSU with the idea they could be subject to the death penalty, or is it a case of negotiating (or even more benignly, a decision made without regard for negative consequences made by Emmert despite the warnings of counsel)? Are plaintiffs in Corman's suit sure it is a breach of the stipulation to perform the investigation that the NCAA repeatedly intervened or consulted with Freeh's firm during the investigation? In my world, if parties agree to perform investigative work, then my participation usually isn't required until they submit their findings or seek consultation, and the latter is done so in a very specific and open manner; again, I work with the understanding that any aspect of my dealings could be adjudicated in Federal Court, whereas I'm not sure that the NCAA need concern themselves about such a thing. Or do they? I have no earthly idea. I guess we'll find out.
I could go on.
