Candidates for judge hope to restore gov’t

NANTICOKE – Judicial candidates – those seeking election or retention to the bench – answered a variety of questions during a candidates forum Thursday night at the Luzerne County Community College.

The candidates – Republican Richard Hughes and Democrats William Amesbury and Tina Polachek Gartley – and two retention candidates Judge Peter Paul Olszewski Jr., 49, and Judge Thomas Burke participated in the event hosted by the South Valley Chamber of Commerce.

Each answered a series of five questions ranging from campaign contributions to what did they know about the mishandling of justice in the juvenile justice system before the scandal broke earlier this year.

All the candidates acknowledged the public’s faith in the judicial system has been severely tarnished and must be restored by making the government more open and transparent.

Hughes, 48, and Amesbury, 61, admitted to taking campaign contributions from people involved in the FBI probe of the courthouse and school districts in Luzerne County.

Both men said in most cases they took the money before the contributors were tangled up in the corruption probe. Hughes said he has returned the money to Bill Maguire and Jerry Bonner.

McGuire, a member of the Wilkes-Barre Housing Authority, plead guilty Thursday to taking money from a contractor for a trip he took regarding authority business.

Bonner, a county jury commissioner and fellow Wilkes-Barre Housing Authority board member, was indicted in September for taking a bribe. He maintains his innocence.

“I decided I didn’t want my campaign to benefit from those individuals, so I took $200 and gave it to United Way,” Hughes said.

He later decided to send Bonner and Maguire back their $100 donations when asked a few days ago about whether the $200 donation to the United Way might unduly influence a United Way supporter to vote for him.

Hughes wishes there was a way to appoint judges just based on a merit selection basis, but he noted since that is not the case money is needed to campaign so he can spreading his message.

Amesbury, a former social worker, said he accepted money from Bonner and Jimmy Height.

Height, a former Wilkes-Barre Area School Board member, plead guilty in May for accepting cash in exchange for helping a contractor receive support for a contract.

Amesbury used to play golf with Bonner and said he’s known Height for years, as both their fathers were bricklayers. After consulting with his campaign committee, he donated the money to a nonprofit baseball group. He said he and his wife have been the main contributors to his campaign. He accepted a donation from Kim Mericle, who is the wife of Robert Mericle. He said he took her donation because she has been a longtime friend of 35 years and she did not have any dealings with her husband’s business.

“I don’t treat Kim as an appendage of her husband. I treat her as a human being. She is not a pariah. She is a human being. She did absolutely nothing wrong. I accepted that money from a friend,” Amesbury said.

Gartley, 43, and the two judges seeking retention said they have not accepted money from anyone involved in the scandal.

Gartley has like, Hughes and Amesbury, accepted money from attorneys, but says by far most of her contributions are small amounts. She did note she received $1,000 from an attorney she has worked with for the past seven years in the Barbara J. Hart Justice Center in Scranton, where she’s represented the survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault in civil cases.

She said she has not accepted or been offered any money from anyone connected in the corruption probe.

The largest contributors to Olszewski’s campaign have been himself, his wife and father, he told the crowd. He said he has not taken any money from attorneys or anyone involved in the corruption probe.

Burke, 62, said he is running a grassroots campaign and has not raised any money from outside sources.

All expressed frustration that the state does not have a campaign finance law regarding judicial candidates.

Each candidate and retention judge also named ways they would like to improve the judicial system in Luzerne County.

Gartley felt strongly that review panels consisting of attorneys, community advocates and regular people to look over certain data to see how particular courtrooms are operating.

“You could see there are people being represented without counsel way too many times, to raise a red flag before it became the situation it did…There would be some way to look at things and be able to see and stop and be on top of anything that was leading us down the wrong path,” she said.

During his last 10 years on the bench, Olszewski has introduced an anti-nepotism hiring policy, but each time it was denied. If re-appointed, he said he will re-introduce it again in hopes of it passing.

Amesbury vowed if elected he would not vote to hire either of his children or the family members of any other judges.