Philadelphia, Pa. – Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan of the Court of Common Pleas in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, plead guilty in open court that they sentenced children to juvenile detention because they were paid off to do it by the PA Childcare and a sister company, Western PA Childcare corporation that ran the private facilities.
Ciavarella wrote in a letter to the court,
“Your statement that I have disgraced my judgeship is true. My actions have destroyed everything I worked to accomplish and I have only myself to blame.”
The two judges face up to seven years in prison under a plea agreement made with the state.
The companies in question paid the two judges more than $2.6 million dollars to send children to detention. The companies receive a stipend from the government for each inmate they house. So as more children were sentenced to the detention center, PA Childcare and Western PA Childcare received more money from the government, prosecutors said.
According to the Juvenile Law Center, a Philadelphia nonprofit group, teenagers were sentenced to detention for simple misdemeanors.
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 offenses didn’t require one.
Marsha Levick, chief counsel for the Juvenile Law Center, estimated that of approximately 5,000 juveniles who came before Ciavarella from 2003 and 2006, between 1,000 and 2,000 received sentences that far outweighed their crimes. She said the center will be suing the judges and the companies to compensate the victims.
Levick said.
“That judges would allow their greed to trump the rights of defendants is just obscene,”
This nightmare scenario has long been the cry of those trying to end the practice of privatizing prisons in the United States.
This is the real government we have! Wow! I know that they will have to kill me to send me through that!
Probably there's a discount or a bonus for US citizens killed too.
This isn't the only place this is happening.
He got a light sentence because he ruined hundreds of lives for millions of dollars.
If he had stolen $200 from an unattended cash register, he would've gotten twenty years.
The system rewards crimes that involve large sums of money.
Just goes to show ya that gov't (our) subsidies and stipends lead to greed and corruption. End 'em!
7 years? They should have to spend at least as much time as all the children they sentenced combined. This is disgusting.
No, it goes to show that privatizing prisons and other functions of the government lead to greed and corruption. They wouldn't have been getting kickbacks if these were state institutions.
Not surprised. But pissed
Please folks, this is inflammatory. I am not saying this was not a horrible thing, but this article is clearly erroneous in many of it's facts. These men did not get seven years — they got 28 and 17 1/2 years. And they were convicted several years ago. This kind of reporting makes "liberals" look as crazy as teabaggers. If this article focused more on the fact that after three years, privatization is still in full swing, that would be one thing — but it's not. It's erroneous and inflammatory. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal
Corruption within our legal or "injustice" system? Just another day in America, the Land of the "Free". We are survivors of corrupt Judges and a corrupt District Attorney in Nashville, TN. Our story can be read at http://justiceforisla.wordpress.com/2012/01/05/paying-the-price-of-being-falsely-accused/.
The judgfes are the scum of the earth; indeed, they are the scum off the scum of the earth. Both deserve to DIE in jail, and I would applaud the news.
But what of the companies involved: PA Childcare and a sister company, Western PA Childcare?
Are either/both still in operation?
Why AREN'T the CEO and the BoD of both companies in prison, too?
The judgfes are the scum of the earth; indeed, they are the scum off the scum of the earth. Both deserve to DIE in jail, and I would applaud the news.
But what of the companies involved: PA Childcare and a sister company, Western PA Childcare?
Are either/both still in operation?
Why AREN'T the CEO and the BoD of both companies in prison, too?
This is why giving private companies the ability to make a profit from people going to jail is a bad idea. They will figure out a way to, um, maximize their bottom line.
Hey, at least they caught the bastards this time. More importantly, though, we need to put an end to the practice of privatizing prisons and start returning some of the currently private facilities to public hands. There exists a blatant conflict of interest between the citizenry, who expect prison sentences to be handed out only where deemed necessary and of the minimum length needed to ensure protection of the citizenry and punishment/rehabilitation of the criminal, and private facilities who make money off of every new inmate they receive.
This basically creates a perverse incentive on the part of private security and prison firms to push for artificially strict sentencing standards beyond what is necessary and proper, and to increase both the number and severity of crimes that can land one behind bars as a means of inflating their bottom lines. That is just as scary as outright buying off judges, and yet it remains perfectly legal. As ugly as this is, one could argue that in some ways things like this needed to happen before people at large were willing to examine the ramifications of prison privatization.
Wasn't that long ago a article was posted about more states moving to "private" jails but the sentence that disturbed me was that the states had to agree to keeping the facilities "mostly full". That is just wrong! We shouldn't allow the privatization of some areas, and jails are one of them. These judges, and those companies should have to pay those children and their families. Those same people should be jailed. That is what we as a society should be demanding!
Jacquelyn Wyer Neubauer——- Even state ran institutions/programs can receive kickbacks believe me DSS and family court judges , private guardian ad litems are all getting paid off our youth!!
Ashley Masters – I'm not sure exactly what point you are trying to make. Are you saying that state-run detention facilities pay kickbacks to judges or that corporations pay state-run detention facilities to house detainees? Neither of those scenarios makes any sense. State-run facilities aren't going to have any incentive to fill up their cells, and companies wouldn't be providing kickbacks to anyone unless it helped them turn a profit.
The blame for this far exceeds the two scumbag judges who soldout justice in America. I blame the corporations, lobbyists and ALEC for buying out the lawmakers to privatize the prison systems, schools, military, post office, etc. and creating the enviornment to make this kind of further corruption possible.
Jacquelyn Wyer Neubauer I know two kids that was placed in foster care. the paternal grandmother made a false report. The mother had a public defender and went to court, the lie was thrown out but they still put her on a registry for child neglect due to a child seat belt ticket she got while riding on a church van !! (last summer) The whole reason was dss wanted to be compensated for the time the kids was in their care. The Judge knew this and found a reason to put her on the registry. The fact is parents get pulled over all the time and get child seat belt tickets but the police do not report it to DSS or put them on a child neglect registry. Sorry for the misunderstanding I guess my point was that rather it is jail, dss, judges private or government our kids are in danger!! Her paid court appointed guardian was giving a 11,000 dollar cap per Judges order. Who really gets all that money. I'm sure the guardian took that judge to a nice dinner. While the mother and her kids suffer financially and emotionally!!
Whoa. I remember this case. I thought they were already sentenced.
I thought that was the basis of our system. Making a profitable industry at the pain and misfortune of our fellow man.
This is what a fear if we continue to let companies run this country. We wont have any rights left and the rich will make money off our misery. If u vote republican and want "less government" u should know that is what
Money worshipping bastards
This has been happening all over the country and it goes to show, when you privatize penal institutions, you will see greed and corruption show it's evil face everytime.
Just as a point of perspective, back 100 years ago, people like this would have been dragged to the streets and beheaded……just saying.
Just as a point of perspective, back 100 years ago, people like this would have been dragged to the streets and beheaded……just saying.
Why am I not surprised? That is what happens when jails are run by private companies!
A glorious example of the right wing world…
Jesus wept.
"A glorious example of the right wing world…"…wow, way to lump a a whole group of people for 2 others faults.
White-Collar and Intellectual thugs! They destroyed thousands of young live and violated these young people civil rights and due-process!
The sad thing is that they will probably be kept in administrative segregation, protecting their sorry asses from the general population, many of whom frown on this kind of behavior.
Now, if the parents of the juvies have any sense, they will find the right lawyer and sue the crap out of these two companies (as well as the judges) for circumventing their rights.
Jacquelyn Wyer Neubauer So what I said made plenty of sense! State ran institutions/ programs do receive kickbacks. I was referring to your comment ( "they wouldn't have been getting kickbacks if they were state institutions") that comment is very untrue!! Maybe you should investigate your own state a little bit more before making that comment.
Jacquelyn Wyer Neubauer
You couldn't make it up. What is the matter with these bastards?
Ashley Masters – No, those judges WOULDN'T have been getting kickbacks from a state-run detention facility, because government facilities are trying to cut their budgets, not pack in more people to feed and drain resources. It's corporate detention facilities who offer judges kickbacks, because they receive payment per prisoner from the government. We are talking about JUDGES receiving kickbacks, not the institutions themselves. What you're referring to is non-sequitur to the article and your sentence structure is kind of difficult to understand, so I decided to let you off the hook and ignore it. But if you want to insist that I'm the one who doesn't know what I'm talking about, then – well, here's your response.
The corruption begins with these 2 judges but that's not were it ends..it still going on.. with local governments.
And DHS child protective services does the same thing!
Here's something even scarier: Look at what the privatized prisons are doing: http://newsone.com/1562805/prison-labor-statistics-wiki/
I suspect that the reason they're pushing for the Juvie crowd is to build up their slave-force for future use/abuse. Juvie prisons are the training grounds for future career criminals. By the time the kid is an adult, they wind up in the adult prison population, and end up in the slave labor pool.
secondary comment here: Notice that the judges have been tried and found guilty. They will now spend the next 7 years incarcerated, although if it's to be a "Club Fed" minimum security prison or a maximum security prison where they will become targets for the hardened criminals there due to their former occupations.
With that said, why has no one at PA Childcare and Western PA Childcare been charged and incarcerated for bribing officials. After all, "Corporations are people, too!" If corporations are people, too, then the executive officers, including their CFO, should be before the courts, waiting to be sentenced. The judges could not have been able to accept over $2 million dollars in bribes if those at the very highest levels, including the CFO, didn't know where that money was going.
for more information on this article, check out the Wikipedia article concerning the Kids for Cash Scandal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal
I've been saying this shit for years — states like California, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Texas have taken prison privatization to new depths of depravity. There needs to be some legislation curtailing this immoral practice. Since when should someone be allowed to profit from misery (poverty, incarceration)?
Jacquelyn Wyer Neubauer State-run anything receives federal dollars. In order to keep getting those federal dollars, the state has to show definite areas of need. And this includes the state's prison system. What Ashley said actually makes plenty of sense when you think about it.
Say what you will about Michael Moore, but he covered this years ago in his documentary "Capitalism: A Love Story."
Ya bribery of a judge you'd think would be a serious felony.
Jacquelyn Wyer Neubauer Okay you little online gangsta, I have let you belittle me twice!! I have spent time a state run prison. I know what goes on in the prison system. Like I said in my original sentence EVERYBODY receives kickbacks and if they don't receive kickbacks….. they receive votes!! State ran or private, Its a corrupt world baby doll. That was my point!! Never did I put you down for your Mayberry thoughts. You are very pretty, I tried to get an address on that Mary Puppins. Lets just drop it cause I am not the one!!
I knew about this several decades ago — it's had to have been going on since at least the 80s in certain states.
I didn't read the article, so please excuse my ignorance/assumption, but my guess is these assholes will not see a shred of justice.
I hope they do, though. But this thing is probably so widespread, two convictions won't even make a ripple.
Ashley Masters – Yeah, sorry. I did get snarkier than usual in my last post. (Though you did imply I didn't know what I was talking about, which got me pretty irritated.)
Nevertheless, I maintain that there's a difference between what you're talking about and what I'm talking about. Even what Carl Hewitt refers to – the idea that a State may inflate its spending to avoid losing money in the next year's budget – is not as damaging as a for-profit company offering kickbacks to individuals. While corruption does exist and should be eradicated from government agencies, the situation described in this article is a direct result of a profit-seeking entity being hired by the State. In the situation Carl describes, maybe someone would get an annual raise by currying favor with their supervisor and keeping the prisons full. That would be wrong and should be stopped, but it's not as bad as cashing in EVERY SINGLE time you put someone away – in a kickback arrangement, the culprit knows exactly how much he is earning with each conviction and probably receives much more frequent gratification.
The bottom line is that I'm not in favor of the government awarding contracts to private industries to do their job for them. It reduces transparency and creates a middleman who skims money off the top and rips everyone off. Whatever greed and corruption there is in state-run facilities, it's inevitably going to be multiplied when you add profit as a motivating force.
This was one of the saddest chapters in our history.
So this is why for profit prisons are a terrible fucking idea, there is always some monster willing to buy people and more than a few willing to sell them.
So this is why for profit prisons are a terrible fucking idea, there is always some monster willing to buy people and more than a few willing to sell them.
So this is why for profit prisons are a terrible fucking idea, there is always some monster willing to buy people and more than a few willing to sell them.
The plea bargain should not have been accepted. 7 years is far too little.
7 years per child oversentanced maybe.
Tom J. Nelson A year per month of over sentencing.
Oh, I know. Let's privatize the juvenile justice system. What could go wrong. Do you think people would bribe judge or something.
No…..never…….
Sandy Auriene Sullivan as serious as a judge taking a bribe at most.
Those kids should (individually) get AS MUCH as the judges got!
Sandy Auriene Sullivan They're the 1%!! It's surprising this case even got to trial!!! This is America, the more money you got, the more you can get away with!!
They should be hang or shot for their crimes
They should be hang or shot for their crimes
This will continue to happen IF ANY of you VOTE REPUBLICAN and allow them to continue with their plans to ‘PROFITIZE’ government run agencies. These include schools, post offices and of course prisons. They have secondary education on their hit lists as well, that plan is to make them inaccessible to you, so that if you want to go to any college or university you will need to go to a profit university that will get you a loan for their overpriced tuition that will pay for your undervalued education. You graduate owing far too much money to the ‘profitized’ school that is in fact owned by a bank, quite likely the one that gave you the loan. There is ‘no telling’ what they will have these student loans tied to, your house, cars, your organs who knows. However, rest assured they would be predatory.
The ‘companies’ contracting the ‘profitized’ prisons are demanding contracts with our governments that demand a 90% occupancy rate. That means our cities, counties and states will have to always be looking for new ‘customers’ or prisoners. Less education and a BAD ECONOMY, means more criminals because they cannot support themselves, thus more crime and more arrests. This is simply not the kind of business that anyone demands a minimum occupancy rate or any such thing. That is like demanding that a rehab center have a 90 percent occupancy rate, does that mean come one will be out there creating drug addicts to keep the rehab facilities full? Hmmmm, maybe they are already doing that, maybe the future addicts they have their eyes on are your children or loved ones.
Judges are appointed by their peers, republicans appoint those crooked judges that are part of the republicant PROFITIZATION swindle going on. The appointment of said judges is quite likely the most important reason for voting democtatic. If you do not, you increase your chances (or a loved one) of being in one of these PROFITIZED PRISONS.
John N Swegan, EXACTLY! but it is also EASIER to swindle us, the citizens into the 'PROFITIZATION' of the kiddie jails than the adult prisons. Call it the GATEWAY swindles, that is what it is all about. Better NOT vote anyway, BUT DEMOCRATIC. All republicants and libertards are crimminals looking for a swindle angle. They do not tell you that their 'SMALLER GOVERNMENT' means MORE government money AND it goes into the pockets of people and places like Haliburtan & Blackwater.
ALREADY DONE & figured out. The 'PROFITIZED PRISON' companies DEMAND it in their contracts with the state & govt agencies. Look the articles up on the net or find me on FB, I have the links to the articles where they require 90% occupancy.
CCA currently has 48 states considering this BS. 'Correctional Corporation of America
You can be sure they WILL NOT ask for spending cuts in this area but increases.
Stephani Wiecz I live in Indiana, home of Mr. Privatization himself, Mitch Daniels. His effort to privatize the welfare department was such a fiasco even he couldn't deny it: the company was fired for incompetence and Indiana returned the Welfare department back to state employees. Next, he sold off the Toll road ("Leased" it if one wants to be technical) to a European firm… for 75 years. All these things did what he wanted: broke two state employee unions. Once they'd been broken up, the "Right To Work" bill was pushed for, and signed by him.
Crooked Republican politicians? I can "see them from my front porch".
It would only happen in the USA!
This is a horror that is being repeated all across our Nation! This is what privatized prisons cause so take a good look America. Unless you're in the top 1% this is your children's future! We need to stop this NOW!
if u think its any better in the so-called "liberal" states; you are wrong.
if u think its any better in the so-called "liberal" states; you are wrong.
Also, public prison officials lobby for the same things as their private competitors; longer sentences, additional crimes, and fewer civil liberties. When you frame the issue as public v. private, you are only buying into law enforcement's campaign against privatization. Meanwhile, its the justice system as a whole which has become too pro-prosecution. Judges are almost all former ADAs (about 90%) and cowardly politicians rush to pass more and more draconian criminal laws and justice reforms to appease a disturbingly mobbish public that is always whipped up into a fearful frenzy by the crime spectacles offered up by television media. The press, which depends on law enforcement for "access" to new real-life dramas for an incresingly voyeuristic audience, is generally unwavering in its support of the police state. This occurs everywhere regardless of whether the local prisons are public or private.
This is crazy!
Ms. Wiecz, the judges were both 'elected', and subsequently retained by election several times. I don't suppose the fact the fact that both were Democrats plays into your "crooked Republican conspiracy"
My grandfather was a judge in that courthouse. It's deeply disturbing both to hear about the bribery but also about private prisons both for young people and for adults. The WRONG way to go!
The last time I Googled, at least one was still in business, and still housing juveniles. The worst part is the damage to the kids won't be compensated. Some might get a few bucks, but the damage isn't monetary.
We have reached the bottom of the barrel and are still digging down. I want to vomit.
A total travesty of the human condition!
Why only 7 years , why not the amount of years they sentenced children put together!
What a DISGRACE!!!!! – what is wrong with you people!!
Ugh
wow, your conclusion makes frightening and incredibly disturbing sense… this is how the prisons will be kept at 90% occupancy… wherever all of us live, this is a time to get involved in actions to dismantle the privatized prison system and to dismantle the New Jim Crow system which is its racialized counterpart
Seven years is not nearly enough time for these guys.
want to bet 90% of this across America is REPUBLICAN run or backed?
republicrat. Demican. They are the same. wake up. Stop being brainwashed.
Disgusting. This is where 'for profit' prisons can lead to.
This is one of the most unspeakable, detestable and downright evil things I have ever heard a judge would even entertain. Judges make enough money, have enough status and responsibility that you shouldn't even think of worrying about the black heartedness it would take to do something like this at a time when your already worried to death about your child anyway. All I can say is WHAT COMES AROUND, GOES AROUND! I would say my prayers day and night if I was this bunch.
Can't even begin to say how angry these slugs have made me. When I think about what they've done to these kids I can't even speak.
Shame on every single American, who by endorcement or silence or apathy, has allowed privatization of prisons, where huge profits are to be made there is always, always corruption, wake up to yourselves.
Private prisons are a nightmare.
And the corporate criminals who conspired to kidnap and enslave children, what will they receive, a fine? A reduction in their bonus? I only hope our mushy media decides that kidnapping and enslaving children is more newsworthy than Republican outrage over gay marriage and abortion. Otherwise, the masterminds of this child abuse ring will keep on doing what they do.
It doesn't get much more despicable than this, and those two former judges should have received far, far more punishment for what they've done.
No they aren't. Wake up and cite your charges or we shall ignore your ignorant rants. The system is the same, the people are and issues they fight for are not.
whatever you say guy. be a good sheep.
Any one who throughs kids in jail for money is lost it and never find it, why I don't trust judges, this etc.
The parties differ slightly in philosophy but are otherwise more similar than they should be. Neither side has a monopoly on corruption.
BOTH jUDGES WERE DEMOCRATS!
BOTH JUDGES WERE DEMOCRATS!
BOTH JUDGES WERE DEMOCRATS!
BOTH JUDGES WERE DEMOCRATS!
Especially because BOTH JUDGES WERE DEMOCRATS!
Jonathan… both judges may have been democrats, however it has been and continues to be the Republican/Libertarian agenda to privatize schools, prisons, and other institutions historically run by state governments. 'Cause there's $$$ to be made. Besides, many Penna democrats really should be Republicans ("Republicrats" as my aunt would say) according to their political alignments and platforms. I know… I'm an Ohio and Penna person.
Jonathan… both judges may have been democrats, however it has been and continues to be the Republican/Libertarian agenda to privatize schools, prisons, and other institutions historically run by state governments. 'Cause there's $$$ to be made. Besides, many Penna democrats really should be Republicans ("Republicrats" as my aunt would say) according to their political alignments and platforms. I know… I'm an Ohio and Penna person.
Jonathan… both judges may have been democrats, however it has been and continues to be the Republican/Libertarian agenda to privatize schools, prisons, and other institutions historically run by state governments. 'Cause there's $$$ to be made. Besides, many Penna democrats really should be Republicans ("Republicrats" as my aunt would say) according to their political alignments and platforms. I know… I'm an Ohio and Penna person.
Jonathan… both judges may have been democrats, however it has been and continues to be the Republican/Libertarian agenda to privatize schools, prisons, and other institutions historically run by state governments. 'Cause there's $$$ to be made. Besides, many Penna democrats really should be Republicans ("Republicrats" as my aunt would say) according to their political alignments and platforms. I know… I'm an Ohio and Penna person.
Jonathan… both judges may have been democrats, however it has been and continues to be the Republican/Libertarian agenda to privatize schools, prisons, and other institutions historically run by state governments. 'Cause there's $$$ to be made. Besides, many Penna democrats really should be Republicans ("Republicrats" as my aunt would say) according to their political alignments and platforms. I know… I'm an Ohio and Penna person.
Jonathan… both judges may have been democrats, however it has been and continues to be the Republican/Libertarian agenda to privatize schools, prisons, and other institutions historically run by state governments. 'Cause there's $$$ to be made. Besides, many Penna democrats really should be Republicans ("Republicrats" as my aunt would say) according to their political alignments and platforms. I know… I'm an Ohio and Penna person.
What goes around comes around,remember that karma is a mug!!