Two U.S. judges admit to jailing children for money

[Lord of the Abyss]

Link

U.S. judges admit to jailing children for money

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – Two judges pleaded guilty on Thursday to accepting more than $2.6 million from a private youth detention centre in Pennsylvania in return for giving hundreds of youths and teenagers long sentences.

Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan of the Court of Common Pleas in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, entered plea agreements in federal court in Scranton admitting that they took payoffs from PA Childcare and a sister company, Western PA Childcare, between 2003 and 2006.

"Your statement that I have disgraced my judgeship is true," Ciavarella wrote in a letter to the court. "My actions have destroyed everything I worked to accomplish and I have only myself to blame."

Conahan, who along with Ciavarella faces up to seven years in prison, did not make any comment on the case.

When someone is sent to a detention centre, the company running the facility receives money from the county government to defray the cost of incarceration. So as more children were sentenced to the detention centre, PA Childcare and Western PA Childcare received more money from the government, prosecutors said.

Teenagers who came before Ciavarella in juvenile court often were sentenced to detention centres for minor offences that would typically have been classified as misdemeanours, according to the Juvenile Law Centre, a Philadelphia nonprofit group.

One 17-year-old boy was sentenced to three months' detention for being in the company of another minor caught shoplifting.

Others were given similar sentences for "simple assault" resulting from a schoolyard scuffle that would normally draw a warning, a spokeswoman for the Juvenile Law Centre said.

The Constitution guarantees the right to legal representation in U.S. courts. But many of the juveniles appeared before Ciavarella without an attorney because they were told by the probation service that their minor offences didn't require one.

Marsha Levick, chief counsel for the Juvenile Law Centre, estimated that of approximately 5,000 juveniles who came before Ciavarella from 2003 and 2006, between 1,000 and 2,000 received excessively harsh detention sentences. She said the centre will sue the judges, PA Childcare and Western PA Childcare for financial compensation for their victims.

"That judges would allow their greed to trump the rights of defendants is just obscene," Levick said.

The judges attempted to hide their income from the scheme by creating false records and routing payments through intermediaries, prosecutors said.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court removed Ciavarella and Conahan from their duties after federal prosecutors filed charges on January 26. The court has also appointed a judge to review all the cases involved.

Ah, yes, the profit motive; the source of everything good according to the Right strikes again. I do wonder how common this sort of thing is.

[Kamakazie Sith]

Wow. Sounds like two judges should be spending at the very least an equivalent amount of time behind bars along with whatever civil judgments are awarded against them.

[Punarbhava]

That doesn't seem like very much cash for all the effort of creating fake records and using intermediaries to funnel it all. Aren't judges paid pretty well to begin with, partially as a guard against this sort of thing?

[Darth Wong]

That doesn't seem like very much cash for all the effort of creating fake records and using intermediaries to funnel it all. Aren't judges paid pretty well to begin with, partially as a guard against this sort of thing?

I don't think judges are paid nearly enough to consider $2.6 million not to be "very much cash at all".

[Kamakazie Sith]

That doesn't seem like very much cash for all the effort of creating fake records and using intermediaries to funnel it all. Aren't judges paid pretty well to begin with, partially as a guard against this sort of thing?

The most I've ever heard of a judge making is a bit over $200,000/year and those judge sit on SCOTUS.

[General Zod]

That doesn't seem like very much cash for all the effort of creating fake records and using intermediaries to funnel it all. Aren't judges paid pretty well to begin with, partially as a guard against this sort of thing?

I don't think judges are paid nearly enough to consider $2.6 million not to be "very much cash at all".

There's been a number of rows with judges and the feds (in NYC, I think, at least) to get their pay increased to keep up with cost of living adjustments over the last couple of years. It's not hard to see how some judges might consider a few million tempting.

[Alyeska]

The companies that paid these judges should also face stiff fines. Anyone at these companies that knew children were being sentenced for money should face significant prison time for this.

[Kitsune]

Is there any possibility that there is a bias which would put this in a different light....
Not that I think there is but thought I would ask.

[weemadando]

And again we see the privatisation of everything being shown for the glorious leading light of civilisation that it is.

[Johonebesus]

The companies that paid these judges should also face stiff fines. Anyone at these companies that knew children were being sentenced for money should face significant prison time for this.

Forget that and go to the root of the problem. States should handle their own prison systems without hiring private companies to run the them.

[Kitsune]

NY Times article on the same subject......
Three Months in Juvenile for a spoof website.

Judges Plead Guilty in Scheme to Jail Youths for Profit
By IAN URBINA and SEAN D. HAMILL

At worst, Hillary Transue thought she might get a stern lecture when she appeared before a judge for building a spoof MySpace page mocking the assistant principal at her high school in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. She was a stellar student who had never been in trouble, and the page stated clearly at the bottom that it was just a joke.

Instead, the judge sentenced her to three months at a juvenile detention center on a charge of harassment.

She was handcuffed and taken away as her stunned parents stood by.

“I felt like I had been thrown into some surreal sort of nightmare,” said Hillary, 17, who was sentenced in 2007. “All I wanted to know was how this could be fair and why the judge would do such a thing.”

The answers became a bit clearer on Thursday as the judge, Mark A. Ciavarella Jr., and a colleague, Michael T. Conahan, appeared in federal court in Scranton, Pa., to plead guilty to wire fraud and income tax fraud for taking more than $2.6 million in kickbacks to send teenagers to two privately run youth detention centers run by PA Child Care and a sister company, Western PA Child Care.

While prosecutors say that Judge Conahan, 56, secured contracts for the two centers to house juvenile offenders, Judge Ciavarella, 58, was the one who carried out the sentencing to keep the centers filled.

“In my entire career, I’ve never heard of anything remotely approaching this,” said Senior Judge Arthur E. Grim, who was appointed by the State Supreme Court this week to determine what should be done with the estimated 5,000 juveniles who have been sentenced by Judge Ciavarella since the scheme started in 2003. Many of them were first-time offenders and some remain in detention.

The case has shocked Luzerne County, an area in northeastern Pennsylvania that has been battered by a loss of industrial jobs and the closing of most of its anthracite coal mines.

And it raised concerns about whether juveniles should be required to have counsel either before or during their appearances in court and whether juvenile courts should be open to the public or child advocates.

If the court agrees to the plea agreement, both judges will serve 87 months in federal prison and resign from the bench and bar. They are expected to be sentenced in the next several months. Lawyers for both men declined to comment.

Since state law forbids retirement benefits to judges convicted of a felony while in office, the judges would also lose their pensions.

With Judge Conahan serving as president judge in control of the budget and Judge Ciavarella overseeing the juvenile courts, they set the kickback scheme in motion in December 2002, the authorities said.

They shut down the county-run juvenile detention center, arguing that it was in poor condition, the authorities said, and maintained that the county had no choice but to send detained juveniles to the newly built private detention centers.

Prosecutors say the judges tried to conceal the kickbacks as payments to a company they control in Florida.

Though he pleaded guilty to the charges Thursday, Judge Ciavarella has denied sentencing juveniles who did not deserve it or sending them to the detention centers in a quid pro quo with the centers.

But Assistant United States Attorney Gordon A. Zubrod said after the hearing that the government continues to charge a quid pro quo.

“We’re not negotiating that, no,” Mr. Zubrod said. “We’re not backing off.”

No charges have been filed against executives of the detention centers. Prosecutors said the investigation into the case was continuing.

For years, youth advocacy groups complained that Judge Ciavarella was unusually harsh. He sent a quarter of his juvenile defendants to detention centers from 2002 to 2006, compared with a state rate of 1 in 10. He also routinely ignored requests for leniency made by prosecutors and probation officers.

“The juvenile system, by design, is intended to be a less punitive system than the adult system, and yet here were scores of children with very minor infractions having their lives ruined,” said Marsha Levick, a lawyer with the Philadelphia-based Juvenile Law Center.

“There was a culture of intimidation surrounding this judge and no one was willing to speak up about the sentences he was handing down.”

Last year, the Juvenile Law Center, which had raised concerns about Judge Ciavarella in the past, filed a motion to the State Supreme Court about more than 500 juveniles who had appeared before the judge without representation. The court originally rejected the petition, but recently reversed that decision.

The United States Supreme Court ruled in 1967 that children have a constitutional right to counsel. But in Pennsylvania, as in 20 other states, children can waive counsel, and about half of the children that Judge Ciavarella sentenced had chosen to do so. Only Illinois, New Mexico and North Carolina require juveniles to have representation when they appear before judges.

Clay Yeager, the former director of the Office of Juvenile Justice in Pennsylvania, said typical juvenile proceedings are kept closed to the public to protect the privacy of children.

“But they are kept open to probation officers, district attorneys, and public defenders, all of whom are sworn to protect the interests of children,” he said. “It’s pretty clear those people didn’t do their jobs.”

On Thursday in Federal District Court in Scranton, more than 80 people packed every available seat in the courtroom. At one point, as Assistant United States Attorney William S. Houser explained to Judge Edwin M. Kosik that the government was willing to reach a plea agreement with the men because the case involved “complex charges that could have resulted in years of litigation,” one man sitting in the audience said “bull” loud enough to be heard in the courtroom.

One of the parents at the hearing was Susan Mishanski of Hanover Township.

Her son, Kevin, now 18, was sentenced to 90 days in a detention facility last year in a simple assault case that everyone had told her would result in probation, since Kevin had never been in trouble and the boy he hit had only a black eye.

“It’s horrible to have your child taken away in shackles right in front of you when you think you’re going home with him,” she said. “It was nice to see them sitting on the other side of the bench.”

[Serafina]

On what charges could the judges be trialed?

After all, they propably ruined a few lives - there is a huge difference between having a criminal record with, say, a fine and one with jail time.

But more than that, i really hope they have a good rehabilitation programm for the children - after all, a lot of them will need it.

[Solauren]

I'm sure wrongful imprisonment charges could be brought against them.

Plus, anything the children suffered through in the insitutions could be levied against the judges. i.e assault, forcible confinement, etc.

[Kitsune]

According to the NYT article, there is a plea bargain for 87 months each in prison....
Corruption charges I assume

[Edi]

The plea bargain could very well include clauses that require them to testify against the people in the centers who bribed them. I'd require that if I were the prosecutor.

These assholes are scum of the lowest sort.

[Ekiqa]

These assholes are scum of the lowest sort.

They were most likely elected. Therefore, politicians: by definition, scum of the lowest sort. This isn't all too suprising.

[Count Chocula]

Ah, yes, the profit motive; the source of everything good according to the Right strikes again. I do wonder how common this sort of thing is.

Put away your broad brush, Bunky. Both judges were registered Democrats.

Scum is scum, and these two qualify. Good link to an article about a couple of scumbags, now get down off your soapbox.

[Kanastrous]

I believe that there have been confirmed sightings of Right-leaning Democrats.

And Lord A was noting Right-ness, not Republican-ness.

[K. A. Pital]

Yeah, the "Profit is good for ya" motive is definetely a thing that can unite both Democrats and Republicans in their utter corruption.

They're definetely scumbags, and to think that being Democrat somehow means you're not a scumbag is ridiculous. It just makes it slightly - because the difference between US political parties is frankly only slight - less probable. Nothing more, nothing less.

[Rahvin]

Put away your broad brush, Bunky. Both judges were registered Democrats.

Scum is scum, and these two qualify. Good link to an article about a couple of scumbags, now get down off your soapbox.

LotA was pointing out that this is the result of a sort of "free market" of the type envisioned by extreme-right libertarians, Chocula. The detention centers were privately run and received funding based on the number of children incarcerated, and therefor had an incentive to incarcerate as many as possible for as long as possible. In an unregulated free market, this is the result: the private companies pay off judges to incarcerate more children for longer periods of time, increasing profits.

The political registration of the "judges" (and I'm loath to use that word in this case) is irrelevant - it's still an example of right-wing economics in action.

[ArmorPierce]

On what charges could the judges be trialed?

After all, they propably ruined a few lives - there is a huge difference between having a criminal record with, say, a fine and one with jail time.

But more than that, i really hope they have a good rehabilitation programm for the children - after all, a lot of them will need it.

If they were minors their slate is wiped clean once they turn 18

Ah, yes, the profit motive; the source of everything good according to the Right strikes again. I do wonder how common this sort of thing is.

Put away your broad brush, Bunky. Both judges were registered Democrats.

Scum is scum, and these two qualify. Good link to an article about a couple of scumbags, now get down off your soapbox.

he was talking about the system that allowed this to occur, not the political affiliations of these two judges. Do as I say, not as I do is a common motto for plenty of people.

[Kanastrous]

Not necessarily. In a lot of states juvenile offenses aren't always expunged; they are sometimes merely sealed.

[Venator]

In the case of wrongful imprisonment, I would be very surprised if the charges weren't scrubbed from their record - same for being acquitted as an adult.

I'd be interested to know what kind of prison the judges find themselves in. Depending on the institution... criminals + judges = baaad.

[Jadeite]

The companies that paid these judges should also face stiff fines. Anyone at these companies that knew children were being sentenced for money should face significant prison time for this.

It should be more than a 'stiff fine', they should be closed down and their assets confiscated, with criminal and civil prosecution brought against everyone who is even remotely responsible for this. Corruption must not be tolerated, particularly when it infringes upon liberty, and those who indulge in it must be made examples of.

[Darth Wong]

They should be treated as if they had kidnapped these people and locked them in a basement dungeon.