Jerry Sandusky, the former Penn State defensive coordinator convicted of sexually abusing children, is expected back in court next month, court records show, more than a year after one of his accusers withdrew his allegations.
Sandusky, 82, was convicted in June 2012 on 45 counts of child sex abuse and sentenced to 30 to 60 years behind bars. His repeated efforts to secure post-conviction relief have been rejected in previous years.
In September 2025, he filed another petition, which was initially dismissed by a Pennsylvania judge.
That ruling was later vacated because of a procedural error. Sandusky was subsequently granted an evidentiary hearing after a witness identified in court documents as R.R. recanted his testimony.
Convicted child molester Jerry Sandusky, center, a former Penn State University assistant football coach, leaves the Centre County Courthouse in Bellefonte, Pa., after an appeal hearing on Oct. 29, 2015. Sandusky, 82, has been granted an evidentiary hearing in September following the recantation of allegations by one of his accusers. (Reuters/Pat Little)
“Affidavits from R.R. (alleged Victim 10) and the mother of alleged Victim 9 also establish that the Commonwealth engaged in questionable tactics to influence testimony of its witnesses,” Sandusky’s attorneys wrote in an amended petition.
In court filings, his legal team cited R.R.’s recantation as part of a wider claim that authorities shaped the accounts of Sandusky’s accusers through therapy, suggestive questioning and undisclosed revisions to witness statements.
“[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,” R.R. is quoted as saying in an exhibit attached to Sandusky’s petition. “I was assured this was common and even expected.”
Former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky, left, walks into the Centre County Courthouse before being sentenced in his child sex abuse case Oct. 9, 2012, in Bellefonte, Pa. (Patrick Smith/Getty Images)
Sandusky’s lawyers allege that R.R. “was coached extensively and asked to revisit and reframe his allegations.”
R.R.’s estranged wife, identified in the filings as Jasmine Rittmeyer, provided an affidavit and could testify, according to Sandusky’s amended petition.
Lawyers for the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office have described her as R.R.’s “soon-to-be” ex-wife.
“The opinion of R.R.’s estranged spouse thirteen years after defendant’s trial, pondering what she thinks may or may not have really happened to R.R. when he was 10 years old, or any other Sandusky child victim for that matter, is irrelevant and inadmissible,” Deputy AGs Cari Mahler and Jaime Keating wrote.
The Commonwealth wrote in court filings that Rittmeyer’s affidavit alleges Sandusky investigator Frank Parlato contacted R.R. and “suggested that it would be beneficial for [him] to recant his testimony” before the recantation.
In this Nov. 6, 1999, file photograph, Penn State’s Jerry Sandusky talks with the defense during the last timeout of the game in University Park, Pa. (Centre Daily Times/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
It is asking the judge not to allow Rittmeyer to testify about her opinion regarding Sandusky’s guilt or innocence or whether she believes R.R. told the truth at trial.
Prosecutors also want the focus of the hearing to be on R.R.’s recantation and not the entire case against Sandusky.
Sandusky’s lawyers had raised several other claims in the original petition, including that he was denied due process and is entitled to a new trial over allegations that prosecutors influenced the testimony of a different witness and later profited from his allegations.
Sandusky has maintained his innocence after more than a decade behind bars.
He’s due in the Bellefonte courthouse Tuesday, Sept. 8, at 9:30 a.m. for the evidentiary hearing.
