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Former Penn State President: 'I Wish In Hindsight I Would Have Known More'

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- As the former Penn State president waits to hear if he will be charged in connection with the Jerry Sandusky sex abuse scandal, Graham Spanier is now speaking out.

"I wish in hindsight that I would have known more about Jerry Sandusky and his terrible, terrible hidden past so that I could have intervened, because it would have been my instinct to do so," he told ABC World News.

But Spanier claims he never had the information to reach that level of awareness, so last November his 16-year tenure as the leader of Penn State came to an end – a direct result of the Jerry Sandusky sex abuse scandal.

Two of Spanier's associates, Gary Schultz and Tim Curley, are facing criminal charges that they failed to report a sexual assault and lied in a grand jury investigation.

Spanier has not been charged, but a probe led by former FBI Director Louis Freeh said Spanier hid critical facts from authorities.

Both Spanier and his attorneys went on the offensive today.

"That report is absolutely wrong," Spanier told ABC News. "The conclusions in that report that in effect we conspired to conceal a known child predator are just incorrect."

When asked about the shower incident in 2001, Spanier said he was never informed about anything sexual in nature. He said Sandusky's relations with the boy were described to him as horseplay.

Meanwhile, the team that compiled the Freeh report says it stands by all of its claims.

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