Posted on 09/16/2009 6:46:34 AM PDT by Born Conservative
SCRANTON - Federal prosecutors fear former Luzerne County judges Michael T. Conahan and Mark A. Ciavarella Jr. have tried to hide some of their assets to protect them from forfeiture in the racketeering case against them.
Prosecutors unsuccessfully sought new bail conditions - including the posting of a $500,000 bond and a requirement that the judges wear electronic monitors - when Conahan and Ciavarella appeared in U.S. District Court to plead not guilty to a 48-count indictment Tuesday.
Read the indictment
When they pleaded guilty to fraud and conspiracy in February for allegedly taking $2.8 million in kickbacks, the judges were released on $1 million bail. The bail was secured by a Florida condominium purchased by a company nominally controlled by their wives for $785,000 in 2004. The judges withdrew their pleas last month after a federal judge rejected the 87-month jail terms called for in their plea agreements.
Now that they face bribery, racketeering, money laundering and other charges that carry combined maximum sentences of nearly 600 years in prison and millions in potential fines, the judges pose a greater flight risk and have a greater incentive to hide assets, Assistant U.S. Attorney William Houser told U.S. Magistrate Thomas Blewitt on Tuesday.
"This is a different situation with much more at risk," Houser said. "The risk of flight has changed."
Houser also said the condominium is heavily mortgaged and the government "has no idea" how much could be recovered if it was forfeited.
"The government has some concerns that the defendants have engaged in secreting their assets," Houser said.
In a secretly recorded conversation in July 2008, Conahan said he was "judgment proof" because "I don't have anything in my name," Houser told Blewitt.
Ciavarella sold his Mountain Top home in June 2008 and transferred a "large sum of cash to his daughter," Houser said.
Attorneys for the judges said both of them had fully revealed their assets to the government as part of their original plea agreements. If the government wanted to pursue assets transferred to the judges' relatives, it would have no problem tracking them, they said.
Conahan's attorney, Philip Gelso, said his client had previously complied with all the bail restrictions placed upon him.
"He is not a flight risk in this case," Gelso said.
William Ruzzo, one of Ciavarella's attorneys, said the case has received such widespread international media coverage that his client couldn't hide.
"Where is he going to go without being detected?"
Ruzzo also disputed that Ciavarella was trying to hide assets by giving money to his daughter.
He said the money was intended to help her buy a home after her marriage.
"Any father would have done that," Ruzzo said.
County records show that Ciavarella and his wife Cindy sold their home in Mountain Top in June 2008 for $457,500. The Ciavarellas subsequently paid off two mortgages on the home that originally totaled $337,000. It couldn't be determined from the documents how much was still owed on those loans.
In July 2008 their daughter, Lauren Stahl, and her husband paid $225,000 for a townhouse in Kingston. The Ciavarellas and Stahls reside in the townhouse, which has a $180,000 mortgage.
Ciavarella, 59, and Conahan, 57, stood shoulder to shoulder flanked by their attorneys before Blewitt's bench during Tuesday's arraignment. They declined comment when leaving the courtroom.
Blewitt continued the conditions of their previous bail agreement, including a restriction on traveling outside the 33 counties in the U.S. Middle District of Pennsylvania without prior approval by federal probation officials.
Their arraignment was the first of three federal court hearings scheduled for individuals with links to an ongoing corruption probe in Luzerne County.
In addition to the judges, 12 people have been charged in the probe. They include the builder and former co-owner of two for-profit juvenile detention centers who have pleaded guilty to paying the judges $2.8 million for steering county contracts and juvenile detainees to their centers.
Why do these elitists get monitoring devices when so many real victims of injustice are denied such accouterments?
Too bad we don’t have the death penalty for such corruption. At least the Federal Court had the decency to reject the wholly inadequate sentences that were negotiated. Put them in jail until they die, tar their skeletons and hang them for all to see.
ping
These creeps should be charged under 18USC242 as there would be the very real possibility of a death sentence under that Statute.
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