Corrupt Judges Trade Sentences for Cash
February 15th, 2009 | 
Author: 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.
I have often maintained that there is far too little oversight on our judicial officials. Here is just one example of what can happen when judges are left to answer to no one.
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February 15th, 2009 at 3:28 pm
Organised crime is systematic criminal activity for money or power. The judges’ criminbality is in the great tradition of British common law. When the law began in the 12th century, every office in the trade of authority, from Chancellor down, was for sale, and the buyer in turn extorted bribes from people who had to deal with the office.
February 16th, 2009 at 12:55 am
Sadly it is not much different from today, where every person with even a modest amount of authority seems to be for sale on some level. I am surprised these judges are not looking at more time in prison.
February 16th, 2009 at 12:58 am
As I send my child out into this world each day and prepare to send out yet another child, I realize that far too often, the very people we look to for guidance and trust are the ones that end up abusing our children.