Judge Mark Ciavarella and Judge Michael Conahan
Suppose you had a 15 year old daughter in a high school. She’s a good kid, a good student with a big heart. She’s not perfect (what kid really is?) – her one flaw is when push comes to shove, she shoves back. When she senses she’s being treated unfairly, or worst yet, her friends are, she feels it’s her duty to strike back, figuratively speaking, and it’s gotten her into trouble with the school once or twice.
This time she decided to do a parody of the school’s vice principle. The school overreacts and she’s arrested, but her lawyer is sure because of her clean police record and high GPA that she”ll get a slap on the wrist. Instead, she comes out of the hearing wearing a pair of handcuffs and a brand spanking new 3 month sentence at a Juvenile Detention Facility.
You are now entering the Luzerne County, Pennsylvania juvenile court system – Welcome to Bizarro World! For years, this is how thing worked in Luzerne County: Kids would appear before judges without a lawyer, given hearings that lasted only a minute or two, and then given outrageous sentences to juvenile prison for dangerous offenses like – Hmm, let me look this up….ah yes, here we go – writing a fake sick note, stealing loose change from cars, and possession of drug paraphernalia. Many were decent kids who had never been in trouble before. CNN had a short list of these master criminals:
15-year-old Hillary Transue was sentenced to three months at a juvenile detention center on a charge of harassment for mocking an assistant principal on a MySpace page.
13-year-old Shane Bly, who was accused of trespassing in a vacant building, was confined to a boot camp for two weekends.
Kurt Kruger, 17, sentenced to detention and five months of boot camp for helping a friend steal DVDs from Wal-Mart.
Obviously, this sort of thing didn’t happen without a few parents complaining. For years, youth advocacy groups complained that Luzerne County sentences were unusually harsh. Nearly a quarter of its juvenile defendants ended up in detention centers from 2002 to 2006, compared with a state rate of 1 in 10.
It became clear almost immediately that the increase in juvenile sentences began after PA Child Care LLC and a sister company, Western PA Child Care LLC took over the responsibility of juvenile lockups after the Luzerne County facility lockups were shutdown. More about that later.
By following the paper trail, investigators determined that Judge Mark Ciavarella had presided over nearly all of the questionable cases. Not surprisingly, they also found that the judge had taken kickbacks in exchange for guaranteeing the placement of juvenile offenders into facilities operated by PA Child Care and Western PA Child Care LLC.
Oh yes, and the judge who shut down the state juvenile detention center and used money from the Luzerne County budget to fund a multimillion-dollar lease for the private facilities? None other than Judge Michael T. Conahan.
The way things worked, simply put, is this. 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.
They shut down the county-run juvenile detention center, arguing that it was in poor condition 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. It has yet to emerge who at Western PA Child Care LLC was in charge of the payoffs, although I prefer to look at it the way The JDJournal.com did:
PA Child Care and Western PA Child Care have not been charged with wrongdoing, for some bizarre reason beyond the comprehension of the human intellect.
Ciavarella pleaded guilty earlier this month to federal criminal charges of fraud and other tax charges, according to the U.S. attorney’s office. Conahan also pleaded guilty to the same charges. The two secretly received more than $2.6 million, prosecutors said. They have been disbarred and have resigned from their elected positions, agreed to serve 87 months in prison under plea deals.
Ciavarella acknowledged in a letter to county President Judge Chester Muroski that he disgraced his judgeship:
“While much of what has recently been reported in the press about me is inaccurate or untrue, your statement that I have disgraced my judgeship is true,”
The amount of money these two “judges” received was staggering, but it isn’t the money that makes this a hellworthy offense. It’s the lives of the estimated 5,000 juveniles these two greedy sons of bitches destroyed or damaged beyond repair, all for the sake of the almighty dollar, that will have Ciavarella and Conahan roasting their fat asses in the nether regions for eternity. PYSIH is known for being tough when it comes to criminals, and we have no sympathy at all for whining perps who complain that their sentences are unfair. But admin brought this to me, and we were both disgusted with Ciavarella and Conahan.
These two men had a responsibility to these children to do the right thing, to try and teach them some life lessons that would help them grow to be better adults. To be fair, but just. There isn’t a much higher calling than than this. But Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan betrayed these children. They are traitors to the law, to themselves, and to 5000 kids who learned only one thing for sure: Trust no one.
Do Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan Deserve Hell?
- Yes (91%, 189 Votes)
- No (9%, 18 Votes)
Total Voters: 207
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47 Comments »
These Judges were crooks, plain and simple. When I think “Judge” it brings to mind someone who would not abuse their position of power and who would act in accordance with the law. In the end, these two men were just like any other fucktard in a position of authority who cheats, deceives, and abuses others to their advantage. Judge dumb and dumber were men, first and foremost. That is a hard lesson to swallow, namely for all of those directly affected by their mis-actions. Lawsuits anyone?
They should burn, and be sentenced to longer prison sentences. They made even more of a joke out of the juvenille justice system.
And it’s not over for Ciavarella and Conahan Poptart. While I was researching this story, I found articles about them being involved with a case-fixing scam with a local organized crime boss involving car insurance. They’re were also involved in fixing a lawsuit against The Scranton Times LP, owners of the Citizens Voice, a PA newspaper.
This article from The National Law Journal lays it all out in detail:
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNLJ.jsp?id=1202428486624
Hell Will give them a thrown to sit upon!
“fucktard”
lol, gonna use that one.
Hopefully, He’ll get raped in his old ass in the shower.
What a bunch of scumbags. They are not judges. Don’t get me wrong, I am all for harsh punishment. Hillary Transue gets 3 months in jail for using MySpace to harass the Vice Prinicpal. WTF?????????? Lori Drew gets nothing in Missouri for causing Megan Meier to commit suicide. Drew is a rotten scumbag of the lowest denominator.
and the 9 yr old who murdered his dad and dad’s friend gets nothing at all… just a psych test every like 4 years… this world sucks balls!
Are you insane? We are talking about a nine year old. Would you prefer he got put in an adult prison or better yet executed? Americans are so stupid with their judgements of others. It’s the most hypocritical judgemental society. You know in Britian they actually reform prisoners but that would be unfair to the victims according to you. You would prefer they just suffer then go back into society only to harm again. Get off your high horse. What are you perfect? How would you like it if society treated you in a way that your worst sin was all that mattered. Get a life.
Hey ava, allow me to say, from the bottom of my stupid, hypocritical, judgmental heart, go fuck yourself. There are some people who commit crimes so horrible and cruel that they can’t be rehabilitated, no matter how young they are, We have several examples of people like this on this website. These people have no souls. When you look into their eyes, there’s nothing there – they are just plain evil.
BTW, if you take a look at American history, we went though a period where we tried the British model in our prisons. The emphasis was on rehabilitation, not punishment. We learned very quickly what you are learning now in the UK, that except for a few exceptions, most people who are in prison are there because that where they belong, they have no interest in changing their lives because they chose to lead a life of crime, and the best way to handle them is to keep them separated from the public for as long as possible.
Take your snobbish British snout and cram it firmly up your arse, you barmy bugger.
3 months for mocking your assistant principle. These two should get life for impersonating human beings.
So the first amendment is no longer valid if you’re under 18?
Nope, not while these two Constitutional abortionists were in charge of Luzerne County PA’s Juvie Court, and neither were the fifth, sixth, eighth and ninth amendments as far as I can tell. In fact, the only rule of law that applied in their courtrooms was the Golden Rule. You probably know the one I’m talking about, don’t you Michelle?
“He who has the gold, rules.”
You fucking people make me sick.
When a judge is too lenient with a sentence, You people are all over him like a cheap suit complaining and damming him to hell, when the judge is harsh you do the same fucking thing.
you can’t fucking win
These cases were more than just “harsh” judges. I believe we are “all over” these guys due to thier blatant abuse of power, and greed.
I would not mind harsh if they were doing such to protect society’s best interest, but these POS were passing down the sentences as to line their own pockets – BIG difference!
Are you just experiencing selective reading? The bottom line is that these “judges” have manipulated the public to make their pockets fatter at the expense of these kids. They had a responsibility to these kids and completely disregarded it. I’m sure you wouldn’t be too happy if your child was sentenced to three months for something so trivial. It is painfully obvoius that they were not being harsh at all, they were being self serving.
it really doesn’t have much to do with the sentences for me atleast… its the fact that these two “representatives of the law” decided to get paid off to send fairly innocent CHILDREN to jail… hop off your soapbox and read the whole story!
stormy weathers, it’s not so much about the sentences for me. Don’t get me wrong, I do find the sentences to be harsh, but I am more disgusted about the abuse of power which the Judges engaged in to fatten their pockets. This just makes more of a mockery out of our system which is already laugh-able at times.
I am not so worried about the kids, to be honest. For the most part, I am sure that they have come out okay. I think they will fare fine with the help of some attorneys and a lofty monetary settlement.
Stormy, are you messing with people’s heads again?
Always mess with their minds ;)
Damn…..
Don’t feel bad Poptart1, Stormy gets everybody at one time or another, even yours truly.
He’s also our resident master of politically incorrect humor, a job which he tackles fearlessly.
Extra Extra: Stormy Weathers Eats Balls and Makes Everyone Mad!
Who knows where thoughts come from, they just appear
Story Weathers:
Do you really think that a judge has the right to get kickbacks from a place that he should only send a juvenile to if it is the best interest of that child? Do you think that a young girl should be sentenced to juvie for mocking her vice principal? Sorry, every child does it. Anyways, they had conflicts of interest. A judge shouldn’t get money and bribes for doing their jobs. Taxpayers pay them to decide whether a juvenile deserves a detention center but when the detention center is paying the judges and there aren’t any checks and balances you get corruption.
Can I send the woosy whimp of a vice principal to hell?
Boo Fucking Who!
Someone made fun of me on myspace – what a fucktard!
I went to high school in the early 1980′s and I will admit that stepping thru those doors was like going back 30 to 40 years even then…
While one of our Vice Principals was breaking up a fight in the cafeteria he got whacked by a stray punch. He was hit soooo hard that one second we saw his face, the next second his loafers were were his face was!
everyone cheered, a few other students broke up the fight…. the kid that threw the punch was bloodied up bad…. whatever was hit bled bad….
So what happened?
If it were today
1. The two fighters would have ben expelled, maybe arrested
2. Those who broke up the fight would have been suspended under “zero tolerance” rules
3. Maybe the Vice Principal would have been sued
4. COPS COPS SWAT
5. All those who cheered in the cafe would have detention…
What happened?
1. Fight was broken up
2. Vice principal got to his feet
3. First stop – nurses’s office
4. Next day – looked like everyone was in class, the kid who hit the principal was back with a bandaid
My point is being a Vice Principal is going to make one a target of insults – while I know the job is NOT easy, for that salary, benefits and job security (vps may become counselors or teachers) – make fun of me, my mother, whoever – as long as there is no real threat made who cares?????
We had a salesman at the school wanted to do a pie throwing or dunk tank to raise money and in front of 500 students and the VP I suggested he be the target – he lust laughed!
One student, a graduating senior wrote a piece about him in the school’s magazine – and it got published – nothing done to the student (although someone had to walk a very straiht line)
“Can I send the woosy whimp of a vice principal to hell?”
I vote yes. I say man up, wuss. I can’t even believe the police got involved in this situation.
I remember English class, it was ninth grade and we would have a free-write every Friday. My friends and I used to make “hit lists” which would contain people from real life at school (including teachers) and people that were famous. We used to write little clever antecdotes as to why that person should be “hit”. It would then be turned into the teacher for credit. It was all in good fun, no one was really serious, and a lot of it was damn funny stuff that we still laugh about to this day.
Nowadays, I am certain that if something like a “hit list” surfaced in a public high school, let alone was turned into an English teacher, there would be some serious consequences. My friends and I would probably be suspended for making terrorist threats or some bullshit like that in this day and age. Kids joke and poke fun, bottom line. The key thing is understanding what is normal joking versus problematic behaviors or actions that indicate serious issues with a child.
I think the principal was a douche wuss crybaby and I agree with Lyzzard, I cannot understand why the police would even waste their time on something that minor. It is par for the course to get picked on as a teacher, principal, whatever. Grow a spine Principal Wuss Ball!
In 9th grade we had to do vocab words and there was a group that was so into doing so – the teacher thought that he broke through to these kids…….
Turns out they were cracking on eachothers’ mothers in class using the vocab words….
The word was “dominate” and one kid read how “Sylvia” dominated a man in the bedroom… teacher said he’d like to meet Sylvia, then asked who she really is and from a corner of the room “My mother”
Oops!
Everyone had a good laugh…..
Whats the big deal. Harder punishment on kids is what we need. I will bet they learn a real lesson this time. If you ask me, I think the judges were still too lineament.
If it were punishment for justice’s sake, yes, but this was not.
Also does a kid who insulted a vice principal on MySpace deserve a police record? Note I did not read “threaten” in anypart of the story.
When god allowed you to be born, I believe he was too “lineament”
oh my…. SeYa, I don’t see how thew Judges were too lenient. Explain so I can “get it”.
I am not saying that the judges should not be punished for what they did. But you are asking for them to be punished too. Let me see, stealing, libel, drugs..etc and your saying that juvy is too harsh a penality for the brats. Come on, you all probably want a slap on the wrist. Has it ever entered your mind that kids like this are repeat offenders that move on to more not so kindly crimes. Let them get a good taste of it now, and maybe they will think about what the consiquences are in the futre.
It’s spelled “lenient.”
I think that along with being greedy and dishonest, this judge was also a sadist who disliked kids. I feel justice is served with him serving time in jail. Maybe some of the kids he sent to juvey for no reason can visit him, lol.
That’s a great post! I love when justice is served.
What a crock!!! My kids pull the piss out of their fat, gumby looking, ass of a principal all the time. As long as they are keeping their comments above a certain level i let them go…whats the use of being a kid if you cant have fun and pull the mickey out of ‘he powers that be’ a little?
i thought PA was a lil out of wack. 2 of my cousins (both minors) 1: a screen to a bowl went off in the metal detector at school and 2: the other selling a pack of cigarrettes. State police arrested them and thier punishments through court are pending. The bowl ok drug paraphernalia I understand thats court worthy, but selling a pack of cigarettes, COME ON who arrests a 14 year old kid for that?!
Your right Glyss…they seem to concerntrate on the small issues while the big problems in schools go unadressed.
We really need to investigate anyone background before they step into any office and take control. The America justice system is just planinly screwed up, its corrupt.
I hope those 2 screwballs (judges) enjoy the vaseline up their butt.
This is a particularly horrid example of greed in the big business of prison in the U.S. The incarceration system is badly broken and corrupt.
We should reward prison owners, managers, workers when the prison does its job of rehabilitation and inmates do not return to prison. And, we should penalize them if former inmates are incarcerated again.
Instead, we do just the opposite. We reward them with more business, union jobs, etc., when their prisons fail and the recidivism rate goes up.
I hope these guys lose all their money and their freedom for a long, long time.
Those two bitch-boys of judges deserve both very long,horrible stays in federal prisons and (after prison) their eternal futures in Hell!
I have several reasons to wish that those two UNJUST “judges” should be eternally damned to Hell, including the fact that they had accepted “kickbacks” (bribes) to go and sentence as many young people to the new, privately owned (read: secretive) Juvi facilities.
Here are some (other) reasons why their evil deeds merit Hell:
(1) Juvi / Juvenile Detention can easily appear on any or all of those kids’ permanent record! Their futures are ruined if the permanent records are in any ways besmirched!
(2) It’s an ugly fact that sexual predators actually manage to sometimes get jobs in the Juvi / Juvenile-Detention industry. Imagine if your son or daughter gets raped (AIDS or syphilis or gonorrhoea, etc.) in Juvi because they made fun of some despicable vicious “vice” principal on Myspace or Facebook, etcetera.
(Putting kids at the “mercies” of perverts in power — talk about DISPROPORTIONATE punishment!)
(3) It’s also known that children placed in Juvi or similar facilities are often the targets for various social programs of dubious “good” or actually damaging (very BAD) capacities. For example, a fifteen-year-old whose only major flaw is that she’s a hothead might make her the target of some quack that wants to place her on something like Haldol or Resperidol, psychiatric drugs that are known by shrinks themselves to have no other value than chemical straightjjackets for the mind (mind control).
Oh, wouldn’t you like to be the kid whose brain had been damaged because he/she got into an untimely fistfight — AND THEN WAS PLACED ON SOME POWERFUL, BRAIN-DAMAGING DRUG SUCH AS HALDOL OR RESPERIDOL AS PART OF THE “TREATMENT” AND PUNISHMENT?
Between the issues of (a) sexual perverts who occasionally find work in Juvi, and (b) the issues of a kid’s Permanent Record, and (c) the fact that drug companies like to target vulnerable populations with their precious drugs —- between those three issues there are more than enough reason to curse the fowl play that corrupt officials who play with the lives of minors, and more than enough reason to curse the corrupt officials themselves!
Oh, and I did mention the acceptance of “kickbacks” as a reason to cry Foul Play and curse the two Foul-Players, those two judges; didn’t I mention the bribery as another reason?
Let all corrupt officials who were willing to endanger and/or destroy the lives of any kids in exchange for “kickbacks” — let them go to Hell for what they’d done!
October 19, 2009
To:
PA Governor Edward G. Rendell
225 Main Capitol Building
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania 17120
From:
Richard Liberatoscioli
9 Reformed Rd.
#4
Linfield , PA 19468
Re: Authorization for use of deadly force
Governor Rendell,
Thank- you for your letter to the commander of the PA State Police requesting a criminal investigation into the widespread criminal charges surrounding the Lower Merion Police.
The PA State Commander sent notice the Montgomery County District Attorney for criminal investigation. This District Attorney has not responded at all in any way other than “we don’t have the authority to investigate the police”.
As you must know by the copy of the original criminal complaint, the charges are of widespread and blatant criminal public corruption in Montgomery County. The crimes committed range in scope from local, state and federal police and public corruption laws.
The most serious of the crimes was the Lower Merion Police murder attempt that left me permanently disabled and the current and standing threats to kill me by these police officers.
As you know, it is standard police policy in such a magnitude of criminal allegation that the armed officers be relived of their lethal weapons until a criminal investigation is conducted. There has been no investigation of these crimes. These officers remain at large armed and in all demonstrated conduct to make good on their treats of murder under the veil of widespread criminal cover up and corruption.
Therefore;
I ask of you to assist in the restoration of law and order within the commonwealth in the protection of its citizens and the authorization for use of deadly force in self defense against these public criminals.
Sincerely,
Richard Liberatoscioli
ncssi@msn.com
Richard
First, let me say that we here at PYSIH are sorry to hear of the hardships you have had to endure and the permanent injuries you suffered. We would also like to thank you for posting your letter to PA Governor Rendell. We would like to ask you to provide some more detail of what happened to you – as much as you feel comfortable in posting in a public forum such as this. We would really appreciate this, as it would make it much easier for us to verify what you say happened. Please don’t take this personally – it’s standard procedure in a case like this and has nothing to do with whether we believe you or not. If I didn’t ask, I wouldn’t be doing my job.
Max The Cat
Editor, PYSIH
pysiheditor@comcast.net
editor@pysih.com
i hate nothin worse than political word games.like{UNTRUE,ISSUES,UNTRUTHS} its called FUCKIN LIES.i dont have ISSUES,i have problems,im dude of every day language not this BULLSHIT TALK.i dont get MENTAL ISSUES,GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR,i get FUCKIN BAT SHIT CRAZY,LOL.
When a person is a traitor to their country, they get the death penalty for treason, no questions asked. When these pathetic excuses for men commit reverse treason, where the government betrays its own people, shouldnt they get the same? How is this democracy when the poor and middle class have no power, when their relation to the government is paying taxes that get shoved up the rich CEO’s asses. THis is NOT democracy, this is aristocracy. 1% of the population own 99% of the nations wealth, compared to 2006 when it was 20% holding 80%. When the economy is set up for success, capitalism can work to allow increased industrial growth, but now, all we get is a ressession and reverse treason. We NEED democracy, and this is a perfect example why!