Four years after Jerry Sandusky, a former Penn State assistant football coach, was convicted of sexually abusing 10 young boys, the federal government is seeking to fine the university nearly $2.4 million for failing to alert the public about Mr. Sandusky’s conduct and other campus dangers.

In announcing the proposed fine — the largest ever for failure to comply with the Clery Act, a federal law requiring prompt public alerts about safety threats as well as annual disclosures of campus crime statistics — the United States Department of Education painted a damning picture of how university officials permitted Mr. Sandusky “unfettered access” to campus buildings and facilities even though officials knew he posed a danger to the campus community.

The largest portion of the proposed fine — $2,167,000 — is not directly related to Mr. Sandusky’s case but involves the university’s failure to properly classify and report crime statistics during the years from 2008 to 2011. The department said it found more than 300 crimes Penn State had not disclosed, including five sexual assaults.

The proposed fine is the university’s latest financial setback related to the Sandusky scandal. Last month, a jury awarded $7.3 million in damages to Mike McQueary, a former Nittany Lions assistant football coach who had testified to a grand jury that, in 2001, he told the former head coach, Joe Paterno, as well as other officials that he had witnessed Mr. Sandusky, by then retired from the university, abusing a young boy in a campus shower.