Sandusky Defense Suggests the Police Coached Accusers Joe Amendola, the attorney for Jerry Sandusky, returned to court Tuesday for the second day of the defense's case. BELLEFONTE, Pa. - Trying to cast doubt on testimony that Jerry Sandusky sexually abused boys, his lawyers suggested Tuesday that the accusers made those charges only after the police told them that others had told similar tales. Two state troopers who investigated the case acknowledged, under questioning by the defense lawyers, Joseph L. Amendola and Karl Rominger, that some of the accusers, who are now adults, first insisted that little or nothing sexual had happened involving Sandusky, a former Penn State assistant football coach, but later told more damning stories in second and third police interviews. Amendola repeatedly asked if, in trying to coax possible victims into talking, the investigators had told the young men that other people had made accusations against Sandusky. The troopers, Cpl. Scott F. Rossman and Joseph A. Leiter, a corporal who is now retired, said they had done so. Leiter at first said he did not tell any of the witnesses about specific allegations, objecting to the suggestion that he had, for example, mentioned oral sex. But the defense later played a recording of an April 2011 interview with one of the accusers, in which Leiter was much more explicit. "There's a pretty well-defined progression in the way he operated, and still operates," Leiter said in the recording. Oftentimes this progression, especially when it goes on for an extended period of time, leads to more than touching and feeling, there's acts of oral sex that has taken place by both parties, and unfortunately there has been, that's classified as a rape has occurred. He later added, "We need you to tell us as graphically as you can what took place." But Leiter and Rossman also testified Tuesday how difficult it can be to get victims of violent crimes to talk about painful memories. Of one of Sandusky's accusers, Leiter said: "He was very reluctant. He'd curl up in a fetal position on the end of his couch. Rossman testified that he had told some witnesses that he thought they were withholding information. Did it occur to you when you were saying that that you might be tainting the interviews? Amendola said. "No," Rossman replied. He and Leiter insisted that they had done nothing out of the ordinary in a criminal investigation. Amendola elicited testimony that the young man heard on the recording had a history of dishonesty, and made allegations against Sandusky only after the first news reports about the allegations. The defense called the young man's lawyer, Benjamin Andreozzi, to the witness stand, questioning whether he and his client stood to gain from a lawsuit. Andreozzi said that until that police interview last year, he had never heard his client describe sexual encounters with Sandusky, but he also seemed to say that the silence made perfect sense. "He's been extremely uncomfortable talking about this from Day 1," Andreozzi said. He viewed Jerry as a father figure. At the start of the police interview "he was shaking," he said. He was clearly emotionally distraught by having to go to the authorities. He didn't feel comfortable. He added, "To this day, he's not comfortable talking about the details." Amendola called a string of witnesses to testify to Sandusky's character, including a former player for Penn State and the Jets, Lance Mehl. "We all looked up to him," Mehl said. He was a class act.