Legal News

Judges to Plead Guilty in Scheme to Exchange Juvies for Cash

By Dan Slater

Here’s a unique scenario: Judges channeling juvenile offenders into a private detention facility in exchange for payments from the facility’s owners.

The Legal Intelligencer reports that two Pennsylvania judges — Mark Ciavarella Jr. and Michael Conahan — have conditionally agreed to plead guilty and serve more than seven years each in prison for their roles in the scheme. U.S. Attorney Martin Carlson reportedly indicated that the indictment against the judges was the first set of charges and that the investigation was ongoing.

The criminal information, released Monday, reportedly alleges that between June 2000 and the end of April 2007, Ciavarella and Conahan collected more than $2.6 million in exchange for decisions from the bench that benefitted the owners of a private juvenile detention center including a 2004 agreement for the placement of juvenile offenders worth $58 million.

Conahan’s lawyer, Philip Gelso, declined comment. Ciavarella attorney Al Flora said that the charges were just “allegations” and the plea agreements were “conditional” on the defendants accepting the facts to be presented by prosecutors at a plea hearing that has not yet been scheduled.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on January 28, 2009 (boomark / email).