Click here to subscribe today or Login.
Felony charge carries up to 3 years in prison
By Terrie Morgan-Besecker [email protected]
Law & Order Reporter
SCRANTON – In the end it was Robert K. Mericle’s silence that garnered the prominent real estate developer a far less noble title: convicted felon.
Mericle, 46, of Jackson Township, pleaded guilty Wednesday to a federal charge of withholding information on a crime for his role in the juvenile justice corruption scandal that also led to charges against former judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan and attorney Robert Powell.
It is a charge Mericle could have avoided entirely had he been more forthcoming with federal investigators who questioned him in 2007 about a “finder’s fee” he paid Ciavarella, Assistant U.S. Attorney Gordon Zubrod told a federal judge.
Zubrod said there is no evidence that Mericle had any knowledge that Conahan and Ciavarella were allegedly receiving kickbacks from Powell in connection with their placement of juveniles at two detention centers Powell owned.
Mericle’s crime was limited to his failure to disclose certain information he had, Zubrod told Senior U.S. District Judge Edwin Kosik, who presided over the hearing.
The charge, a felony, carries a maximum sentence of three years in prison. But Mericle likely faces no more than four to 10 months based on federal sentencing guidelines. He also could be eligible for probation if he continues to cooperate with prosecutors.
Speaking at the plea hearing, Zubrod detailed the actions Mericle took that led to the charges against him.
According to Zubrod, Mericle approached Ciavarella around 2002 and offered to pay Ciavarella a “finder’s fee” for his assistance in helping Mericle obtain the contract to build the PA Child Care juvenile detention center.
Ciavarella had introduced Mericle, a longtime friend, to Powell. The finder’s fee, which equaled $997,600, was a legitimate business transaction that is common place in real estate transactions, Zubrod said.
“This is not a kickback or a bribe in any sense,” Zubrod said. “Mr. Mericle simply paid a finder’s fee to the judges in accordance with standard practice. To him, his payment of the fee was what he had done hundreds of times before and was not related to the office that the judges held or any decisions by the judges.”
The problem for Mericle, Zubrod said, arose in November 2007, when he was questioned by an IRS agent.
Mericle, at Ciavarella’s request, had paid the fee to Powell, who then transferred the money to Ciavarella and Conahan. At some point, Mericle became aware that Ciavarella and Conahan had made that request so they could disguise the source of the income, Zubrod said.
But Mericle did not disclose that information to the agent, Zubrod said.
Had Mericle simply paid the money to Powell and let Powell distribute it as he saw fit, “there would have bee no prosecution of Mr. Mericle,” Zubrod said.
“The crime came when the Internal Revenue Service approached Mr. Mericle and asked about the finder’s fee. Mr. Mericle failed to disclose to the IRS that he knew that the money was intended to be paid to judge Ciavarella,” Zubrod said.
Mericle compounded his situation in December 2007 when he appeared before a federal grand jury that was investigating Ciavarella, Conahan and Powell.
By that time, Mericle had paid a separate finder’s fee of $1 million to the judges in connection with the construction of the Western PA Child Care center in Butler County, which he also built.
Zubrod said Mericle again failed to disclose that he knew the fees were for Ciavarella and Conahan, and that the men had taken steps to disguise the source of the income.
“The failure to disclose made him an accessory after the fact to the tax fraud perpetrated by judges Conahan and Ciavarella,” Zubrod said.
Zubrod’s comments support, at least in part, the version of events Ciavarella has stated in several interviews and statements he made at an unrelated court hearing in which he insisted Mericle voluntarily offered to pay him the finders fee.
But Zubrod also reiterated prosecutors’ claim that Ciavarella and Conahan extorted Powell into paying them kickbacks – allegations Ciavarella has vehemently denied.
Zubrod said Powell, who paid the former judges more than $700,000, did so because he was made to believe he “would not get juveniles anymore if he didn’t pay up,” Zubrod said. Those payments had no bearing on Mericle’s case.
Mericle was accompanied at the hearing by his wife, Kim. He and his attorneys, including William Winning, declined to comment after the hearing. He remains free pending sentencing, which will be scheduled following the completion of a pre-sentence investigation.
As part of his plea agreement, Mericle has also donated $2.1 million to a fund that will be used to benefit the health and welfare of children in Luzerne County.
That fund has already been established, Winning said. Distributions will be made via court order based on recommendations that will be made at a later time.
Meanwhile, the cases against Powell, Conahan and Ciavarella are continuing.
Powell pleaded guilty in July to charges of failing to report a felony and being an accessory after the fact to tax evasion. His sentencing is pending.
Conahan and Ciavarella initially agreed to plead guilty to charges of tax evasion and depriving the public of their honest services, but they withdrew the pleas last month after Kosik rejected the terms of their plea agreement. The men now have the option of taking the case to trial, or trying to negotiate a new deal.
