BELLEFONTE, Pa. — The jury in the Jerry Sandusky child sex abuse trial has reached a verdict on Friday night.
Sandusky, 68, was charged with 48 counts accusing him of abusing 10 boys over the course of 15 years. He could face life in prison if convicted of all counts.
Jurors began deliberating the sometime-graphic case on Thursday. Earlier in the evening, Sandusky’s attorney, Joe Amendola, said he would be shocked and “die of a heart attack” if the former Penn State assistant football coach were acquitted on all counts in his child sex abuse trial, the Associated Press reports.
Sandusky, the former long-time defensive coordinator for the Penn State football team, was accused of sexually abusing several boys from a youth program he started while coaching at Penn State.
The sex abuse scandal had rocked the previously scandal-free Penn State football program, leading to the dismissal of long-time head coach Joe Paterno and several other university officials including former athletic director Tim Curley and now-retired university vice-president Gary Schultz.
Curley and Schultz are both charged with lying to a grand jury about what they knew of an alleged 2001 assault by Sandusky on a child in a Penn State shower witnessed by then-graduate assistant Mike McQueary. They are also charged with failing to report suspected child abuse to authorities.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
