Three women and one man have accused longtime Philadelphia Daily News columnist Bill Conlin of sexual abuse. The incidents, they claim, happened over 40 years ago. Conlin “retired” from the paper Tuesday, but we all know that wasn’t his choice.

If you read the very detailed story by Nancy Phillips in the Inquirer, the claims are virtually unassailable. Conlin has retained a lawyer who is talking tough, but for what purpose, I’m not sure – the statute of limitations has run out, and there’s no indications Conlin will be charged with anything (unless, of course, much more recent charges emerge). Hunker down in your Florida condo, hope the reporters quit knocking on your door, and wait for the grim reaper.

I’ll only pull a couple choice details from the Inquirer story because it’s all very gory and after Penn State and Syracuse, reading this stuff makes me sick:

“I was numb,” she said, recalling that he put his hand between her legs and touched her genitals, and penetrated her with his fingers, stopping only when her brother, Ted, walked in. Her brother, now deceased, told her mother, who told her father.

“I was going to kill him, I was so furious,” recalled Blanchet’s father, Harry Hasson, now 75. He said he called Conlin in the Daily News newsroom and summoned him to Margate.

“He swore to me that he just touched her leg. Then all of a sudden, he started crying,” Hasson recalled. “He said, ‘I swear to God, I just touched her leg.’”

Conlin is an accomplished baseball writer, and received an award from the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. Here’s their statement on Conlin. Perhaps they didn’t read this claim:

Kevin Healey was a close friend of Conlin’s son Billy. One summer night when he was about 12, Healey said, he went to the Conlin house to watch a Phillies game and slept over in the living room. Conlin was covering the game for the Daily News.

Healey said he awakened in the middle of the night to find Conlin fondling his genitals and leaning toward his body with his mouth.

“I ran out of there like a bat out of hell,” said Healey, now 48 and a construction worker and painter who lives in Williamstown. “I left my sneakers, my socks and my shirt,” and ran home.

For what it’s worth, here’s what Conlin had to say about Jerry Sandusky last month. [Philadelphia Inquirer]