WOW...these judges need some seious punishment.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20090211/courthouse-kickbacks/

Wait, when you insert a profit motive into a system ...

I'm shocked.

Haha, I just tried to hit this link, and while I can get to borderline porn sites from my workplace with no problem, the Huffington Post has, of all things, been blocked...

CCC (Corrections Corporation of America) has been plagued with mismanagement (especially with regard to inmate healthcare), corruption, and scandal for at least 15 years now, but someone want to paste the salient parts of this article for me?

Regards,
nydia

Pretty good summation in the first two paragraphs:

WILKES-BARRE, Pa. — For years, the juvenile court system in Wilkes-Barre operated like a conveyor belt: Youngsters were brought before judges without a lawyer, given hearings that lasted only a minute or two, and then sent off to juvenile prison for months for minor offenses.


The explanation, prosecutors say, was corruption on the bench.
In one of the most shocking cases of courtroom graft on record, two Pennsylvania judges have been charged with taking millions of dollars in kickbacks to send teenagers to two privately run youth detention centers.


Let's give them a trial that lasts a minute or two...then hang 'em....OR liquidate everything they own, every pension plan, every resource that could possibly generate cash...and divide up amongst the victims.

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.

{snip}

If the court agrees to the plea agreement, both judges will serve 87 months in federal prison and resign from the bench and bar. They are expected to be sentenced in the next several months. Lawyers for both men declined to comment.

Since state law forbids retirement benefits to judges convicted of a felony while in office, the judges would also lose their pensions. Source (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/13/us/13judge.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=all)

Nice that they plead guilty. I bet the private prison gang will be losing contracts real soon.

For the first time in a long time, I feel a small twinge of faith in our system.

No charges have been filed against executives of the detention centers. Prosecutors said the investigation into the case was continuing.


Once I see these guys in the company go down it will go a long way in restoring my faith in the system. I will say this, after spending most of my life in the NYC area I was a bit amazed at the very obvious and not really hidden corruption in these areas of PA when I moved here. They really put NY and NJ to shame.

Thanks for the Ammo. have been in a long running dispute from some friends about privitized prisons.
They just don't seem to get the point that if the Gov. is going to order you locked up it should be the Gov. that does so. not the person who managed to come in as the "lowest Bidder" who is intent on a tidy profit.

It never ceases to amaze me that people think they can get away with this stuff. It makes me wonder just how much people are/can get away with that we don't know about.

Yegods, that is horrendous.

Just goes to show you that these Judges were idiots. The proper way for politicians to run graft is to ask for donations to non profit organizations that they control.