They walked Jerry Sandusky out the back door of the courthouse and to a waiting sheriff's vehicle, just 50 yards downhill from where they used to hang criminals in the courtyard of the old county jail.
Back then they'd invite as many people as they could fit to ring the gallows and bear witness. Those that couldn't gain admission would climb the roofs of local houses to watch the execution from high above in this old tightly packed, Victorian downtown.
That was the 1800s, but things haven't changed so much; just five miles from here, at the Rockville prison, is the state's execution chamber. And in Bellefonte tradition, a crowd gathered to jeer and scream Friday night behind the courthouse, to let their venom ring around Sandusky's head for eternity.
Happy Valley, indeed.
Jerry Sandusky is taken into custody after a jury found him guilty of child molestation.
The verdict ended the fallacy that this was an area too devoted to Penn State football to render a fair and proper judgment. The anger at Sandusky was deeper than the outside world could fathom. There may have been a conspiracy to protect Sandusky in the highest levels of Penn State. That will be played out in legal proceedings against university officials, an independent investigation set for release next month and the inevitable slew of civil cases to come that will seek to tap into the school's $1.8 billion endowment.
None of that represents the rank and file here, not the good people who never hesitated to see Sandusky as a monster and were pained when he seemingly dragged the entire region's reputation down with him.
For at least 15 years Sandusky quietly stalked this idyllic, Rockwellian community, preying on its most susceptible boys. Using his Second Mile charity to meet at-risk kids, he often fostered relationships with the poor, the fatherless, the troubled or even simply the bored.
In one haunting bit of testimony, Victim No. 4 recounted that he compartmentalized the sexual abuse from Sandusky, and endured teasing from classmates who suspected something inappropriate because he had so few positives in his life. The chance to leave his little town and troubled home for afternoons hanging around the Penn State football program were enough, he testified.
"I thought, 'I didn't want to lose this. This is something good happening to me,' " he said.
This, time and again, is whom Sandusky chose to target, to trick, to molest, to injure forever. Under the camouflage of mentoring, he stripped them of their innocence and left them in a confused heap in an empty locker room or alone in a dark basement, used and discarded on some creepy waterbed.
During this trial a parade of victims overcame their own fear and embarrassment to detail, often with chilling testimony through sobs and gasped breath what Sandusky did to them. They uncovered a hidden side to this bucolic region, where not everyone is wealthy and educated and as pure as Penn State's famous white uniforms.
They also cried about regret. Victim No. 4, now 28, said he wished he'd summoned the courage to come forward sooner and save the younger victims. Victim No. 9's mother wept at the memories of sending her son, against his wishes, to stay with Sandusky because she believed he needed a positive male role model.
Former Penn State assistant coach Mike McQueary noted that he didn't punch out Sandusky when he discovered him in a shower abusing a boy in 2001 and instead let his university bosses handle the case. Which they didn't. A former Penn State police detective conveyed his frustration at not being able to convince the then-district attorney to charge Sandusky in 1998.
On and on it went. Years and years and years. Incident and incident and incident.
Until finally, deep into a warm Friday night, Juror 4 stood up in that box, representing 11 other citizens that had pored over each and every allegation during 21 hours of deliberation, and read from those papers.
Finally, it was over for Sandusky. Finally, the deception and protection were gone. Finally, this once hulking man, backed by the prestige of Nittany Lion football, propped up by the illusion of charitable work, had nowhere to run, no tale to tell, no one capable of keeping him from facing the awful truth of his life.
Guilty. Guilty. Damn, Damn Guilty.