More recently, Jerry Sandusky's outspoken lawyer, Joseph Amendola, repeatedly blasted the credibility of the 10 young men accusing the former Penn State assistant football coach of rape and molestation.
Amendola accused "Victim 1" of inventing his story in anger over Sandusky's "tough love" mentoring. The attorney also suggested that the victims lied to enrich themselves.
"People, when they're brought into the criminal justice system and they're labeled as victims, they're pampered, they're encouraged, they're treated specially," Amendola told ABC News.
Given that typical vitriol, I prepared for the worst when The Inquirer reported that former Philadelphia Daily News columnist Bill Conlin - he retired Tuesday, the same day the story was published online - molested three girls and a boy decades ago. (Another victim came forward Wednesday.)
Instead, the silence from likely critics has been refreshing. The story is exhaustively reported and documented. The victims seem unimpeachable.
Investigating our own
In 15 years at The Inquirer, I never fathomed seeing a colleague on the front page in a story about a local celebrity's allegedly preying on children.
It's highly unusual for one newspaper to investigate another, especially when both are members of the same corporate family. But it's a testament to The Inquirer's commitment to covering child sex abuse from all angles that it did not blink upon learning of a possible predator in its building.
Reading and rereading my colleague Nancy Phillips' account, I kept bracing for the part that fault-finders would seize on to attack the victims.
There is Conlin's niece, Kelley Blanchet, a mother of two and an Atlantic City prosecutor. Her father corroborated her story, saying Conlin sobbed when confronted.
And there are Karen and Kevin Healey, siblings who were childhood friends of Conlin's children.
