News

June 25, 2007

Court briefs: LIU employee reaches settlement in discrimination case

WILKES-BARRE – A longtime employee at the Luzerne Intermediate Unit has reached a tentative settlement of a gender discrimination and retaliation lawsuit she filed against the agency, according to court records.

An attorney for Barbara Law on Friday filed notice that a settlement had been reached.

U.S. District Judge A. Richard Caputo issued an order that same day, giving the parties 60 days to complete the settlement.

Details of the settlement were not available Monday.

Law filed suit in federal court in 2005, claiming administrators retaliated against her and a co-worker, Lynn Makar, for filing a separate discrimination complaint years earlier.

That complaint, against then executive director Kevin O’Connor, was settled in 1999, but Law alleged the discrimination against her continued.

WILKES-BARRE – Double homicide suspect Hugo Selenski has asked the state Supreme Court to hear an appeal of a lower appellate court ruling that reinstated charges connected to his escape from the Luzerne County Correctional Facility.

Selenski’s attorney, Michael Senape, on Friday filed a motion before the state’s high court.

The court is not obligated to hear the case, however.

Whether it will agree to review the challenge likely won’t be known for several months.

Selenski is appealing a Feb. 6 ruling by the state Superior Court that overturned Luzerne County Judge Peter Paul Olszewki’s ruling that dismissed the escape charge.

Olszewski had ruled prosecutors failed to bring Selenski to trial within 365 days, as required by law.

Selenski, who is awaiting trial on homicide charges in the deaths of Michael Kerkowski and Tammy Fassett, escaped from the county prison in October 2003, but later surrendered.

At the time of the escape, he was awaiting trial on separate homicide charges in the deaths of Adeiye Keiler and Frank James.

All four victims were found buried at Selenski’s Kingston Township home in May 2003.

A pre-trial ruling in the Keiler/James homicide case delayed that trial.

But Selenski’s attorney argued prosecutors should have proceeded with the trial in the escape case.

Prosecutors maintained the two cases had been consolidated, but Olszewski ruled they had not because the prosecution failed to file a document in county court.

In its ruling, the Superior Court said Olszewski had held prosecutors to too strict a standard, noting the rule does not require perfect adherence.

The notice of appeal filed by Senape does not detail the basis of his legal argument.

That will be filed in a legal brief at a later date.

WILKES-BARRE – Two men accused of using guns to try and rob a man outside a city restaurant will stand trial on the charges.

District Judge Joseph Halesey on Monday, after a hearing in Luzerne County Central Court, ruled Assistant District Attorney Tim Doherty has enough evidence to take Frank Weber and Nicholas Morrissey to trial.

Wilkes-Barre Detective David Sobocinski said the two men on April 10 pointed guns at William Shaw as Shaw and a group of others left the Frog Pond restaurant on Coal Street.

At a preliminary hearing in the case Monday, Shaw testified that Morrissey demanded he empty his pockets.

Shaw, who knew both men, refused, leading to Morrissey striking Shaw in the head with a gun before both men fled.

Weber and Morrissey will now face their charges, which include criminal attempt to commit robbery and criminal conspiracy, in Luzerne County Court of Common Pleas.

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