Luzerne County Judges

January 25, 2010

UPDATE: Juveniles who still owe restitution get clean slate

Mark Guydish

Juveniles who still owe restitution and now have their cases dismissed because of the judge corruption scandal will not have to pay the remainder of what they  owe, Senior Berks County Judge Arthur Grim said this morning. Grim said the court and attorneys will meet to work out other ways to fulfill restitution orders.

The announcement came after Luzerne County District Attorney Jackie Musto Carroll said she would not retry any of the 27 juveniles who had still been under review after the state Supreme Court vacated some 5,000 cases as a result of corruption charges against former judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan.

The news was relief to Anthony Brennan, one of the juveniles leaving the building after court was adjourned. Brennan said he had been in three different placements for a year followed by four years of probation, and had only managed to repay $1,000 of $4,000 ordered by Ciavarella when he and two other juveniles were caught for breaking into an abandoned Jewish Community Center in Hazleton.

"I was the only one who did time," Brennan said, "I guess because I was in trouble before then."

Brennan said he had earned his high school equivalency diploma while in placement, and had been struggling to find and keep jobs despite a court order barring him from getting his driver's license. He and his mother said he had to rely on friends and relatives to get him to and from his jobs as he worked to repay the restitution.

 'The only thing I worried about for the last year was paying it off." Brennan and his mother said the building had been damaged before the three juveniles broke in to play some basketball, and that the owners had admitted as much, but that Ciavarella ordered him to pay for all the damage anyway.

Grim dismissed all remaining cases "with prejudice" following a 90 minute meeting behind closed doors with Musto Carrol and Juvenile Law Center Legal Director Marsha Levick. The JLC is a Philadelphia-based juvenile advocacy group that has been pushing for dismissal of the cases, and has been involved in civil suits filed on behalf of many of the juveniles who appeared before Ciavarella. 

The retrials were being considered as a result of an Oct. 29 ruling by the state Supreme Court that vacated the convictions of an estimated 6,500 juveniles who appeared before Ciavarella from 2003 to 2008. That ruling was based on a report issued by Grim, who was specially appointed to review Ciavarella’s cases after Ciavarella and Conahan were arrested last January.

The Supreme Court forbid retrial for any juvenile who appeared before Ciavarella without an attorney or if the juvenile was committed to the two private detention and treatment centers at the hub of the scandal. Ciavarella and Conahan are accused of accepting $2.6 million from the owner and developer of the centers in exchange for court rulings that helped the centers prosper.

The Supreme Court further limited retrials only to juveniles who are currently incarcerated, on probation or still owe fines or restitution. After review, Musto Carroll came up with a list of about 50 who seemed to meet the criteria, then further whittled it to27. Grim was scheduled to begin retrials on five of those Tuesday, though that's now moot.

Musto Carroll said the decision to drop all efforts at retrial was not a case of changing her mind, but simply the result of extensive review of the cases her office initially though fit the Supreme Court's criteria. She stressed that one of the key issues was to make sure that any juveniles still in placement or receiving treatment continue to get appropriate services, and that an agreement had been reached to have other social agencies assume those responsibilities, even though the juveniles are no longer within the justice system.

"The needs of these children are being met," Musto Carrol said. "We are closing a chapter on our juvenile justice system that I think everyone will agree was the worst in our county's history."

Levick praised Musto Carrol's office, Grim, other county departments involved and the parents and children for the work and patience in closing the matter. She noted it has been one year almost to the day since Ciavarella was first charged, then detailed the process by which the decision to dismiss all cases was reached.

"One of the incredible lessons we learned was the importance of transparency," Levick said as she noted the initial list of potential retrials suggested by Musto Carrol was "fraught from the beginning," and that research showed even when it was trimmed to 27, all but five of those had spent at least several weeks in the detention facilities, disqualifying them under the Supreme Court rules. Three of the remaining five, she added, "had their adjudication hearings off the record," meaning there were no transcripts to review. 

Levick called the decision to dismiss all cases "stunning and historic. ... I would say the scales have been righted. This is a community that can now come together."

Grim called the whole situation "tragic," and praised Musto Carroll and other county officials for all their work. "This could have taken years instead of 11 months and 17 days," he said, then adding with a smile "but who's counting."

Grim acknowledged there is still a lot of work to do, particularly in expunging the records of thousands of juveniles, but said "We have balanced and restored justice."

He stressed that, while any restitution owed is no longer the responsibility of the juveniles, neither will any victims be required to repay restitution they may have received.

"The news is good, the news is good," Grim said. "This chapter is complete."

 

 

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