An accuser of convicted child molester Jerry Sandusky is expected to recant testimony over a decade after the former Penn State football coach was jailed on child sex abuse charges, according to a report.
Sandusky, now 82, will return to court Sept. 8 for an evidentiary hearing after one of his accusers, who testified in his trial, is prepared to tell the court the retired Nittany Lions defensive coordinator did not abuse him — and that prosecutors swayed his previous testimony, ABC News reported.
The accuser, known as Victim 10, alleges that prosecutors coached him to steer his testimony, asking him to reframe and revisit his allegations, according to a sworn affidavit obtained by the outlet.
Victim 10 added that throughout the pretrial process, prosecutors told him that trauma may have caused him to have a “fragmented” memory.
“[t]hroughout the pretrial process, I was told — both directly and indirectly — that trauma may have fragmented my memory, and that I could safely affirm details I did not fully recall. I was assured this was common and even expected,” the sworn affidavit said, according to ABC News.
Prosecutors are expected to address allegations at the hearing.
Sandusky’s defense team said in a motion seeking a new trial that Victim 10’s now-estranged wife was able to testify that he was not sexually abused by the ex-coach.
The Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office, however, said that the woman’s opinion on what she thinks may have happened to Victim 10 when he was 10 years old, or any other Sandusky child victim, was “irrelevant and inadmissible,” the outlet reported.
Sandusky was convicted of 45 counts of child sex abuse in 2012 for sexually abusing 10 boys over the span of a decade. In 2019, his 30-to 60-year prison sentence was reaffirmed by a judge.
During his trial in 2012, victims testified that Sandusky subjected them to a spectrum of abuse, from grooming to violent attacks.
The abuse, which took place from 1994 to 2009, involved young men he met with his Second Mile Charity, an organization he founded for at-risk youth that he used to find and groom child victims.
Letters written by the victims described the effect of their abuse as boys and in the years since, detailing their anxiety, difficulty with family and social relationships, and anger about what occurred.
One of them, described as Victim 4 in court records, said he does not forgive Sandusky and spoke of efforts to “attack us as if we had done something wrong.”
Sandusky’s arrest in 2011 — he retired from coaching at Penn State in 1999 — also prompted the firing of Hall of Fame head coach Joe Paterno, who died of lung cancer less than three months later.
Penn State has also paid more than $100 million to people who said they had been abused by Sandusky.
Former Penn State President Graham Spanier was previously convicted of child endangerment for failing to report the former coach’s abuse in 2001.
A federal judge tossed out Spanier’s conviction in 2019, a day before he was set to report to a two-month prison stint.
In 2024, Sandusky maintained his innocence from prison, insisting to the Daily Mail that his accusers were “coached and led” in their testimony and driven by money to lie.
“I never ever in my life ever thought about molesting anybody,” Sandusky told the outlet from Laurel Highlands State Correctional Institution in Pennsylvania.
“I was accused of heinous crimes, which I’ve never committed,” he added. “My wife was my only partner in sex, and that was after marriage.”
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