Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Judge"

[Plecostomus]

I know this kind of Sh*t goes on around here (Upstate NY as well):

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/02/23/pennsylvania.corrupt.judges/index.html

Ciavarella pleaded guilty earlier this month to federal criminal charges of fraud and other tax charges, according to the U.S. attorney's office. Former Luzerne County Senior Judge Michael Conahan also pleaded guilty to the same charges. The two secretly received more than $2.6 million, prosecutors said.


The judges have been disbarred and have resigned from their elected positions. They agreed to serve 87 months in prison under their plea deals. Ciavarella and Conahan did not return calls, and their attorneys told CNN that they have no comment.


Ciavarella, 58, along with Conahan, 56, corruptly and fraudulently "created the potential for an increased number of juvenile offenders to be sent to juvenile detention facilities," federal court documents alleged. Children would be placed in private detention centers, under contract with the court, to increase the head count. In exchange, the two judges would receive kickbacks.

And the best part?

* Ciavarvella sent 15-year-old Hillary Transue to a wilderness camp for mocking an assistant principal on a MySpace page.

Hm, seems this "judge" needs to be reminded that we have freedom of speech in this country.

Well I have hope now that this is national something will be done about the corruption in some of the local forces around here.

 

[SPOCKED]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

I think this is an acceptable topic for misc; let's just not get in the habit of putting qualifiers in the thread title, please.

 

[Plecostomus]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

I think this is an acceptable topic for misc; let's just not get in the habit of putting qualifiers in the thread title, please.

Only did that because I wanted someone "qualified" to take a look before it turned into a pit of flaming acrimony.

 

[Mallory]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

I hardly think it's going to become acrimonious. I think most people will agree that these twp supposed judges were corrupt beyond belief and made some heinous decisions involving children during their tenure on the bench. Personally, I think their sentence is entirely too lax. They should be forced to serve the same time as the kids they sentenced, consecutively not concurrently. I'd settle for life without parole though.

 

[Plecostomus]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

I hardly think it's going to become acrimonious. I think most people will agree that these twp supposed judges were corrupt beyond belief and made some heinous decisions involving children during their tenure on the bench. Personally, I think their sentence is entirely too lax. They should be forced to serve the same time as the kids they sentenced, consecutively not concurrently. I'd settle for life without parole though.

Indeed. And forced to pay restitution.

Based on experiences in my life I know for a fact this kind of thing goes on every day. Ageism combined with greed... I hope this gets much much more media attention and people demand accountability when it comes to small-town "justice systems."

 

[MIB]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

This is absolutely reprehensible. These "judges" (not that they are deserving of the title) need to be slapped in the face with a nice long sentence. Give them the full experience of the kind of "justice" they handed out to those kids in order to line their own pockets.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Personally, I think their sentence is entirely too lax. They should be forced to serve the same time as the kids they sentenced, consecutively not concurrently. I'd settle for life without parole though.

Absolutely. The number of kid's lives these judges have damaged (possibly permanently) is huge. 87 months is a travesty for such a violation of position and trust.

 

[Plecostomus]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Personally, I think their sentence is entirely too lax. They should be forced to serve the same time as the kids they sentenced, consecutively not concurrently. I'd settle for life without parole though.

Absolutely. The number of kid's lives these judges have damaged (possibly permanently) is huge. 87 months is a travesty for such a violation of position and trust.

The thing is these judges aren't getting in trouble for the ageism/contempt for the people below them... they are getting in trouble for tax violations!

Ciavarella pleaded guilty earlier this month to federal criminal charges of fraud and other tax charges.

That's the real travesty right there. It's ok to ruin people's lives, show contempt for those below you and abuse your authority but for the love of God don't play games with the tax-system!

Hmm... the doesn't seem to convey my sense of sarcastic-and-outraged-ness properly. Perhaps we *do* need more Smilies.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Tax violations are fairly easy to prove. Hell, that's what ultimately brought down Al Capone.

I wonder if more criminal charges are forthcoming once a case is built regarding the sentencing of the kids?

 

[Plecostomus]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Tax violations are fairly easy to prove. Hell, that's what ultimately brought down Al Capone.

I wonder if more criminal charges are forthcoming once a case is built regarding the sentencing of the kids?

Hope so. I'd hate for this to be merely a civil penalty situation.

 

[RJDiogenes]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Hopefully, all of their cases will be reviewed and some kind of restitution made where appropriate.

 

[Plecostomus]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Hopefully, all of their cases will be reviewed and some kind of restitution made where appropriate.

I think the locality that the judge served in should be held responsible too, have the county/town whatever pay... also set up better oversight of the judicial system and all that.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

I hardly think it's going to become acrimonious. I think most people will agree that these twp supposed judges were corrupt beyond belief and made some heinous decisions involving children during their tenure on the bench. Personally, I think their sentence is entirely too lax. They should be forced to serve the same time as the kids they sentenced, consecutively not concurrently. I'd settle for life without parole though.

I agree...anybody who uses a position of power to abuse children needs to be
thoroughly punished--and not just as justice for their own crimes, but to demonstrate to society as a whole that this will not be tolerated.

 

[Captain Shaw]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

* Ciavarvella sent 15-year-old Hillary Transue to a wilderness camp for mocking an assistant principal on a MySpace page.

How the hell did this make it to court in the first place
If every kid went to court for mocking a teacher there would be nobody in school.
Hell in my school the was one teacher even the teachers mocked.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

* Ciavarvella sent 15-year-old Hillary Transue to a wilderness camp for mocking an assistant principal on a MySpace page.

How the hell did this make it to court in the first place
If every kid went to court for mocking a teacher there would be nobody in school.
Hell in my school the was one teacher even the teachers mocked.

Yeah, I was baffled by that one as well. Hopefully there's something more to it like she made some kind of threat, and it was just poorly described by the article. Still doesn't make the punishments being handed out because the judges were bribed right, but there would have to be at least some kind of actual crime involved.

 

[Plecostomus]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Judges around here can have you detained without cause on a complaint... no actual crime has to take place. And there is no limit on how long they can detain you for.

There has been a crackdown on that sort of thing recently, a judge was recently censured for the number of people she had in detention without cause. I'll see if I can find the link.

 

[Garak]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Bent judges should receive the harshest sentences of anyone before the court. I really feel quite strongly on that.

 

[hellsgate]

Re: Possible Hot-Button Topic: "Kids Jailed For Profit By Corrupt Ju

Any & all "without cause" laws should be immediately deleted from the books (ESPECIALLY in the event of abuse to juveniles,) except in cases of "state / national emergency". Such as crimes including "Amber Alerts", and kidnapping.

"Without cause" must be included in law, until such time as DNA Testing can irreversibly exonerate the person of interest, or provide feasible / viable indictable evidence in situations where releasing a prisoner on bail would do clear-and-present/imminent harm to the (possibly homeless) "person of interest" due to extremely cold weather, threat of violence via vigilante justice, do harm to the community due to (EXTREMELY HIGH) possibility of drug/alcohol relapse until treatment is possible and transfer to medical facilities is available, and/or there is clear-and-present/imminent, understandable, reasonable harm to the alleged victim(s).