Jury selection begins for Sandusky trial

Jun 5, 2012 - 9:50 PM Bellefonte, PA (Sports Network) - A 24-year-old man whose father is employed at Penn State and an older women whose physician husband works in the same medical group as the father of a former assistant coach were among the jurors selected Monday for the Jerry Sandusky child sex-abuse case.

A total of nine jurors were picked on the first day out of 16 who will be chosen to serve, including four alternates. Jury selection will resume on Wednesday.

Sandusky, the former Penn State defensive coordinator, is charged with 52 counts of felony and misdemeanor sexual offenses against children. He has denied the charges.

The trial is expected to begin next week after months of build-up, legal maneuvering and media coverage.

The first three jurors selected early Monday -- all white -- included the man whose father works for the university and the woman with a connection to Mike McQueary's father, outlining the difficult task of finding people who are not connected in some way to the university that casts such a large shadow over the area.

It wasn't a problem for one middle-aged woman who was described as not having consumed a lot of media information about the case. The woman, who has two daughters and works at Walmart, was selected quickly after about 10 minutes of questioning.

Around 17 potential jurors raised their hands to indicate they knew one or more people on the list of about two dozen potential prosecution witnesses, including McQueary, the former assistant coach who said he witnessed Sandusky abusing a boy in the Penn State showers, and McQueary's father.

Twenty hands shot up when defense attorney Joseph Amendola showed his list of about five dozen potential witnesses, including Sue Paterno, the widow of late Penn State coach Joe Paterno, and their son Jay; as well as Sara Ganim, the Patriot-News crime reporter who won a Pulitzer Prize for covering the case.

Other potential witnesses include the current and former CEOs of the Second Mile, the charity Sandusky founded and is accused of using to groom potential victims.