By Victor Thorn

On November 11, 2011, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania radio talk show host Mark Madden dropped a bombshell during an appearance on Boston’s WEEI when he told radio talk show hosts John Dennis and Gerry Callahan, “I hear there’s a rumor that there will be a more shocking development from the The Second Mile (TSM)—and hold on to your stomachs, boys, this is gross—that Jerry Sandusky and the Second Mile were pimping out young boys to rich donors.”

Now, further evidence that Jerry Sandusky’s TSM was being used to traffic underage boys to wealthy donors took a major step forward via a July 19 interview with Greg Bucceroni, currently employed as a school police officer in the Philadelphia, Pa. school district while also volunteering with the District Attorney’s office.

Bucceroni told this reporter, “In 1979 and 1980—when I was 13 and 14 years old—a well-connected pedophile named Edward Savitz took me on trips from Philadelphia to TSM fundraisers. I knew the minute I got there it was a breeding ground because of Savitz’s involvement. While [Jerry] Sandusky interacted with wealthy donors, the other men were sizing-up kids. I felt like a cheap whore because I was in these naked pictures that Savitz was passing around.”

When asked how certain he was in regard to these claims, Bucceroni replied, “I’m sure of it. Savitz talked about taking kids from Philly to TSM and introducing them to men—soliciting them to ‘his friends.’ They exchanged and swapped kids like baseball cards. It was a feeding frenzy. I felt like a prostitute or a go-go dancer at a bachelor party. I felt dirty, used and cheap.”

When it came to TSM’s founder, Bucceroni didn’t overplay what happened. “Savitz introduced me to Sandusky on two separate occasions, but he didn’t come across like a pedophile. The other guys at these functions, though, were different. I could tell from their body language what they had in mind. When I met him, Jerry was a like a movie star. Everyone called him ‘Coach.’ After Savitz hand-delivered my enrollment forms to him, Jerry grabbed me by the shoulder—not in a sexual way—and said, ‘Don’t worry, we’ll take care of you.’ Savitz told me that Jerry would take kids to football games.”

Sexually abused victims who testified at the Sandusky trial in Bellefonte, Pa. confirmed this point.

As questioning turned to other individuals at these get-togethers, Bucceroni remarked, “They were obviously wealthy—like doctors, attorneys, politicians and businessmen—and I could tell some were married from their wedding rings. But their body language gave away their intentions. On my second trip to TSM, I went with Savitz, another pedophile, and a boy my age. Savitz mingled with the other adults, discreetly showing them child porn pictures that he’d brought along. These are the kinds of places where guys from New York, Jersey and Pa. interact. Plus, with all the Penn State hoopla, TSM promoted itself as an alternative to jail or juvenile hall. They said it was the best thing since peanut butter and jelly. But Sandusky is just one in a handful of them. I hope you shine a light on this society of pedophiles.”

On July 16, nearly a month after Jerry Sandusky’s conviction on 45 counts of child sex abuse, Sara Ganim of Harrisburg’s Patriot-News revealed, “Sources close to the Jerry Sandusky case say that three men have come forward and told police that they were abused in the 1970s or 1980s by the convicted pedophile.” She continued, “If found to be credible, [they] would directly attack the 68-year-old’s defense argument that a person doesn’t become a pedophile in his or her 50s.”







The Story’s Beginning

During our July 19 interview, Greg Bucceroni described himself back in the mid-to-late 1970s as “a young tough John Travolta-type kid with a New York accent—a poster boy for juvenile delinquency that got in lots of trouble.”

In 1976 he met Edward Savitz, a “youth advocate,” Democratic political booster, and big donor to then-Philadelphia District Attorney Ed Rendell. In a July 17 article for the New York Daily News, Christian Reid wrote, “Savitz was finally arrested in March 1992, charged with involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, sex abuse of children, indecent assault and corrupting the morals of a minor. He died of AIDS in a hospice days before his trial was to begin in April 1993.”

Reid also noted, “Like Sandusky, Savitz met and groomed many of his alleged victims through his work with at-risk youths.” In this context, Reid continued, “…Savitz would engage in oral sex with Bucceroni and other victims. Savitz’s attorney, Barnaby Wittels, told the Daily News Savitz paid his victims in exchange for them performing deviant acts.” Lastly, “There were over 5,000 photos of Savitz’s many alleged victims recovered by authorities from Savitz’s apartment, including many of Bucceroni,” Reid wrote.

Bucceroni continued this narrative. “Instead of going to juvenile jail, Savitz pushed me toward TSM. My stepfather had already filled-out the paperwork, so when we drove up there [32 years later, Bucceroni can’t recall the exact location], Savitz said he’d keep me out of jail if I ‘treated his friends right.’ Back in those days I didn’t know anything about Penn State or Jerry Sandusky. My whole goal was to stay out of jail, so I went along with it. Afterward, Savitz gave me and the other kids money and gifts and alcohol, but a couple of months after the TSM trip I beat him up when he tried to molest me. That’s what caused him to call the police.”

Prompted to describe what Savitz did to him, Bucceroni explained, “He liked me to defecate on him, perform oral sex on me, or else he’d take naked pictures and masturbate while other juveniles had sex. Savitz also wanted me to introduce him to other kids. Savitz had an entire photo album from TSM. Over the decades, I’d say he probably had hundreds, if not thousands, of victims until his arrest in 1992. Time magazine even wrote about him.”

Indeed, an April 13, 1992 Time magazine article entitled “Uncle Ed’s Ugly Secret” began, “To the teenage boys who visited his apartment near Philadelphia’s Rittenhouse Square, Ed Savitz was an easy client who paid $15 for oral sex and had a fetish for soiled underwear and socks. Health and law-enforcement officials fear that Savitz was also a walking AIDS time bomb.”









Fast Forward

In November 2011 when the Sandusky scandal broke, Bucceroni spoke of his reaction. “After I told the Philadelphia police about Savitz in 1980, I tried to bury my past for the next 30 years. But everything I heard about TSM really hit home. There were all these allegations about TSM and their well-connected donors. So, I decided, since all of this stuff from my youth screwed up my life, maybe I could help other kids.”

But, Bucceroni insists, the process has brought about many hardships. “It would’ve been easier to get in the ring and fight Mike Tyson than come out and talk about this stuff. I don’t have an agenda, Eddie Savitz is dead, and I don’t plan on suing anybody. All I know is that if the Philly police had listened to me in 1980 and done their work, there’s a chance that the Penn State sex scandal could have been avoided. But the police did nothing.”

On a final note, Bucceroni added, “There are a lot of politicians that take money from these wealthy pedophiles. That’s why the Freeh Report didn’t go very deep. He kept the focus limited. Similarly, the mainstream media hasn’t—for the most part—touched this story either.”

The big question now is: will local and national TV stations, news reporters, and radio talk show hosts investigate this hidden angle, or will they continue to provide cover for a network of perverted pedophiles that prey on vulnerable children at supposed “safe havens” like TSM? If they continue to stay silent, they’re as guilty as all the others who’ve covered up this atrocity.

Victor Thorn is a hard-hitting researcher, journalist and author of over 50 books.