Penn State students hold vigil for victims

STATE COLLEGE, Pa., Nov. 12 (UPI) -- About 10,000 Penn State students attended a vigil Friday night for the victims of alleged sex abuse by former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky.

The event was held two days after a rally to protest the firing of Penn State's veteran head Coach Joe Paterno turned into a riot that spilled into the streets of State College. The crowd gathered Friday at Old Main was quiet, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

"May we never forget the victims, and may we fight until no child is harmed again," T.J. Bard, the student body president, said.

LaVar Arrington -- a two-time all-American linebacker for the Nittany Lions, who played six seasons in the NFL for Washington and the New York Giants -- also spoke. A moment of silence followed the tolling of Old Main's bell at 10 p.m., and the band played the school song with the students giving the Penn State cheer.

The university board at a meeting Friday named one of its members, Kenneth Frazier, chief executive officer of Merck & Co., to head an investigation into the sex abuse scandal. While no one except Sandusky has been charged with molesting children, two officials face charges for failing to report him to police.

Frazier, the son of a Philadelphia janitor, is a Penn State alumnus and went on to Harvard Law School.