13 ms·
Former judges who sent kids to jail for kickbacks must pay more than 200M
- bastardoperator 4y agoDoes this person have 200M to pay back? If not, put him back in jail. It's insane someone would put kids as young as 8 years into detention, let alone profiting from it.
- cortesoft 4y agoWell, one of them is still in jail and has been since 2011. He is scheduled to be released in 2035, when he is 85 years old. The other guy was also sentenced to prison in 2011, and was set to be released in 2026. However, he is currently on house arrest since 2020 because of Covid or something.
- CWuestefeld 4y agoIt's hard to imagine a practical example of evil more clear than this judge.
- RachelF 4y agoIt is probably because judges don't want to send their colleagues to jail. Same with big corporations, they can sign a "deferred prosecution agreement" pay a fine and CEO ever goes to jail.
- ars 4y agoIt's in the article. Not only did they send them to Jail, one of them is still in jail, and the other is in home confinement. Given their age it may end up being a life sentence.
- cortesoft 4y agoWell, one guy was sentenced to 28 years in prison in 2011 and is still in jail. The other guy got 17.5 years in 2011 and is currently on house arrest since 2020. So I am not sure what you are talking about?
- xxpor 4y ago>Does this person have 200M to pay back? If not, put him back in jail The US doesn't have debtor's prisons. They should be in jail, but not because they can't pay fines.
- ALittleLight 4y ago
- calvinmorrison 4y agoWell the US government jailed the kids, they should be paying out.
- eastbound 4y agoYes, as usual, everyone in the chain of hierarchy of the judge should be jailed. If they didn’t know, it was their job to.
- Ekaros 4y agoAnd if they were elected. I'm also all for throwing every voter in with the rest.
- calvinmorrison 4y agoDo moral culpability when it comes to our failings as a nation, precisely because we have a democracy? Or, do we even really have a choice? With the coercive system in place one can hardly not interact with the government. Throwing a name in a hat to elect your local jailer doesn't make you morally culpable when you are essentially forced to participate. Eg, jury duty. You are threatened to show up under threat of fines or jailing. How can you say a jury is unbiased when they've been forced under threat of death to appear?
- DiggyJohnson 4y agoYou’d throw the clerk’s intern in jail? Seriously?
- notsapiensatall 4y agoFTA: >Another plaintiffs' attorney, Sol Weiss, said he would begin a probe of the judges' assets, but did not think they had any money to pay a judgment. Still, I find it hard to believe that two high-profile judges nearing retirement age could possibly be broke. Especially considering that they spent a significant part of their career taking kickbacks.
- ada1981 4y agoThey won’t be able to pay the $200MM so it’s largely a publicly sentence. I’d think the state should be liable for not negligence for allowing these two to operate. Why do the kids have the burden here?
- Rackedup 4y agoThe US justice system is sad... ending private prisons would probably help fixing it.
- ars 4y agoPeople always like to blame private prisons for everything, despite them being a tiny fraction of prisons (8%). It helps no one to blame the wrong thing.
- eweise 4y agoIn this case, how are private prisons not to blame?
- Broken_Hippo 4y agoThe article was literally about judges getting kickbacks from private prisons. They aren't blaming the wrong thing: This wouldn't have happened without the private prisons existing (and even more issues solved for taking away other financial incentives in the system).
- thelock85 4y agoWrong thing or just not the main thing? The prevalence of private prisons is unrelated to whether or not they should be closed, never mind that they still operate within and are funded by a public system.
- Rackedup 4y ago
- mbreese 4y agoNote, this is a civil case against these judges. There was already a different criminal case where they were found guilty. (this is all in the article)
- AH4oFVbPT4f8 4y agoThe punishment should be more than a fine it should be jail. If you can pay for the consequences then there are no laws. Take away their freedom and make them lose time in their life.
- chaps 4y agoThere is prison time. Arguably a small amount. Ciavarella, 72, is serving a 28-year prison sentence in Kentucky. His projected release date is 2035.
- robotnikman 4y agoodds are he will be dead before his sentence is up
- googlryas 4y agoHe's actually serving prison in his own home since 2020, due to covid.
- cortesoft 4y agoNo, Ciavarella is the one still in prison. Conahan is the one on house arrest.
- Animats 4y ago> It should be jail. Federal prison. From the Bureau of Prisons inmate locator.[1] MARK A CIAVARELLA Register Number: 15008-067 Age: 72 Race: White Sex: Male Located at: Ashland FCI Release Date: 06/18/2035 MICHAEL T CONAHAN Register Number: 15009-067 Age: 70 Race: White Sex: Male Located at: Miami RRM Release Date: 08/19/2026 [1] https://www.bop.gov/inmateloc/ https://www.bop.gov/inmateloc/
- 420official 4y ago`Miami RRM` isn't quite a federal prison. These two would die in a supermax prison if there were any justice.
- eweise 4y agoI don't see anything about the prison being sued, just the judges. [Edit] Oh I see it now. No need to keep on downvoting :)
- muricula 4y agoTo quote the last sentence of the article: > Other major figures in the case settled years ago, including the builder and the owner of the private lockups and their companies, in payouts totaling about $25 million.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- mbg721 4y agoWe don't have a really effective way to make this kind of corruption stop. Increasing the fines won't result in the money getting collected. We used to have social and religious ways of dealing with those near the end of their lives who just want to burn the world for personal gain.
- johnchristopher 4y ago> We used to have social and religious ways of dealing with those near the end of their lives who just want to burn the world for personal gain. Can you elaborate ? All I am thinking of is a pharaoh being offered a cup of poison or an old chieftain sent to a last hunt...
- mbg721 4y agoEven as late as the 60s, we'd at least deny them pride of place in the parts of communities that dealt with family and spiritual needs. "Prosperity Gospel" shamelessness came later.
- johnchristopher 4y agoI still don't understand. I know what the prosperity gospel is but I am not connecting the dots. What's "pride of place in the parts of communities that dealt with family and spiritual needs" ? Could you provide an example ?
- trasz 4y agoHistory shows that in many cases the community would blame the victim instead.
- bergenty 4y agoPeer shaming. It’s incredibly effective but hard to do in a society without a common, prescribed culture.
- 420official 4y agoIf prisons didn't generate profit there wouldn't be an incentive or cash flow to pay kickbacks.
- adamsmith143 4y ago
- Wistar 4y agoWithout hyperbole, these two are monsters.
- Wistar 4y agoThis is known as the "Kids For Cash" scandal. There is a 2013 documentary by that title. I saw it, and it portrays a truly ugly tale. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal
- lrobinovitch 4y agoNice. There's also a great podcast series on this. First episode here: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/part-one-the-cash-for-kids-92013545/ https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236...
- Wistar 4y agoGood find. [EDIT]: I just listened to the entire episode. Although the presentation was a little too… busy for my tastes, there were quite a few details related that I hadn't heard before. (Busy isn't the right term but close).
- currency 4y agoI love the presenters, but I can't listen to too many BtB episodes. They are very bleak.
- more_corn 4y agoWhy are thy smiling?
- phkahler 4y agoThis breach of duty and public trust is on par with the cancer guy: https://www.cnn.com/2015/07/10/us/michigan-cancer-doctor-sentenced https://www.cnn.com/2015/07/10/us/michigan-cancer-doctor-sen...
- brundolf 4y agoChrist this is dark
- hayst4ck 4y agoRule of law means, more than anything else, that there are consequences for the rich and powerful. > Other major figures in the case settled years ago, including the builder and the owner of the private lockups and their companies, in payouts totaling about $25 million. When you can settle for "just the cost of doing business" prices, the rule of law is clearly weak enough that you know corruption is accelerating. Nothing has made America's lack of rule of law more apparent to me than the "rule of law" party's 2nd most powerful person standing in front of news cameras and confidently saying "My husband and I have a right to trade stocks with insider information, despite numerous professionals being restricted from doing so. Rules for thee, but not for me, because I'm a congresswoman." How are we supposed to fight corruption, systemic or otherwise, when the people most equipped to fight it won't even look at themselves? Our leaders are failing to lead by example.
- moneywoes 4y agoDid they ban that congressional trading yet?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- onlyrealcuzzo 4y agoIIUC, insider trading your own corporate stock is illegal (depending on your position at the company). This doesn't apply to what you're talking about, though. The more common crime is giving insider information. Not acting on it - which would be what congress does. Am I wrong? Assuming Pelosi is giving her husband insider info (and come on - why NOT assume) - congress has pretty clear laws on things that cannot be shared. IIUC - giving INSIDER info is only illegal when you either 1) work at the company or 2) obtain the info illegally. Congress people do not work at these companies, and they also are not getting the info illegally. Is anything we're assuming she's sharing breaching any law? I can get behind banning Congress from trading - but what about their spouses? What about their cousins and friends? Where do you draw the line?
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- mrtweetyhack 4y ago
- insane_dreamer 4y agoprivate prisons should be abolished; they create perverse incentives (for one). It's inconceivable that we even have such a thing.
- onlyrealcuzzo 4y agoI'm for banning private prisons. But you can, theoretically, have private prisons without perverse incentives - just like you can have private grid operators and power plants without perverse incentives. It just requires regulation. Pretty much everything does. We can't even have medicine without regulation to make sure people aren't filling pills up with nothing (or toxins) just to make an extra couple percentage points. We don't have private justice, or private law enforcement. Why private prisons?
- insane_dreamer 4y agoI see your point, but I'm not sure the perverse incentives can be regulated away the way they are with grid operators because of the inherent differences in the models.
- r-w 4y agoI agree with the gist, but have an issue with your takeaway: > We don't have private justice, […] Then what do you call arbitration causes? > […] or private law enforcement. But the laws are enforced differently based on race and economic status. It may not be private, but “rich white people” basically have an entirely different class of protection than anyone else does.
- onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago> Then what do you call arbitration causes? 1. Binding arbitration only applies to a very, very small subset of all possible things that you can sue over. 2. Even binding arbitration can be overturned for fraud or bias. > It may not be private, but “rich white people” basically have an entirely different class of protection than anyone else does. Explain to me how this differs from literally anything else. If it's a reason we should ban private prisons, why isn't it a reason we should ban private everything else? Don't tell me it's because prison is important and it majorly impacts people's lives - so do hospitals and schools and housing and many other things.
- mensetmanusman 4y agoA few years ago there was a dentist nearby apparently getting kickbacks to pull the teeth from children living in poverty: https://www.twincities.com/2018/05/12/hudson-la-petite-dentistry-investigated-needlessly-pulling-kids-teeth-and-overusing-gas-surrenders-license/amp/ https://www.twincities.com/2018/05/12/hudson-la-petite-denti... The love of money and all…
- bmau5 4y agoAwful, just awful. Unfortunately "overproduction" (actual term in the dental industry) is too real of an issue. The Atlantic has a great piece on it: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/05/the-trouble-with-dentistry/586039/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/05/the-tro...
- HarryHirsch 4y agoThe recommendation is to get treatment from students at the dental school - they will work according to best practices and will not take shortcuts or overtreat.
- jcmontx 4y agoExcuse me, but what the hell? This guy belongs on the chair.
- defen 4y agoI'm glad these guys are being punished for their actions, but the wildest part to me is that if they hadn't been taking kickbacks - if they were just Law and Order types who thought sending a 14 year old to boarding school for 9 months was an appropriate punishment for stealing change from unlocked cars, or that sending a 15 year old to wilderness camp for mocking an assistant principal on MySpace - then nothing would have happened and it would still be business as usual. In other words, the issue wasn't wildly punitive sentences for minors committing trivial crimes (or non-crimes); it was that they got paid outside the confines of the system.
- kelnos 4y agoDo we know why these kids were convicted? Was it for petty stuff like you mention or was it for worse crimes? (I'm sure it was a mix; 4,000 kids... damn.) And, regardless of their (possibly not even real) crimes, we can't be certain that they would have been convicted if the judges' profit motive hadn't been there. I agree that the police are involved in ridiculous ways when kids misbehave at school, but I don't think it's fair to assume that all of these kids would still have had their lives ruined if it wasn't for some corrupt judges.
- sofixa 4y agoThe "crimes" mentioned in the article are as minor as it gets: > Ciavarella ordered children as young as 8 to detention, many of them first-time offenders deemed delinquent for petty theft, jaywalking, truancy, smoking on school grounds and other minor infractions.
- spoils19 4y agoPerhaps controversial, but I agree with kelnos in that in order for a safe and secure society, sometimes we need to set examples and be stricter with our punishments.
- actionfromafar 4y agoOh, jaywalking. Lock them up.
- bastawhiz 4y agoI grew up in Luzerne county (I'm here now, actually, staying with my parents). Ciavarella visited my high school to give a presentation about his zero tolerance policy. It was almost mocking. He knew exactly what he was doing and had zero shame. Kids got sent away to "juvy" and never came back. Parents were ashamed and moved away so the kids didn't have to come back after their sentence was up. Nobody talked about what was happening and it stayed quiet for a long time.
- polotics 4y agoFrankly. Only in the US of A. This is such a stain on the country. How did these not get capital punishment? How did the ones paying the bribes not get capital punishment? How does anyone involved in the crime still have money left?
- ada1981 4y agoI think that the State should be held liable in the event they can’t pay it personally. The financial burden should be on the Justice system, not on the victims.
- spoils19 4y agoI'm usually a believer in the free market, but in instances like these, I struggle with my faith. I can only pray that this was part of God's plan and that these kids will henceforth be enlightened throughout their lives.
- DethNinja 4y agoHumanity has to find a way to make individuals with psychopathic traits ineligible for positions of authority. Otherwise, cases like this will keep happening, and potentially end the civilisation some time soon.