Conahan and company

Sheppton is a small community in Schuylkill County with just 30 or so acres of ground, a few hundred residents, and one busy post office box on Center Street.

PO Box 218 is a mailing address for Beverage Marketing of PA, one of the companies former Luzerne County judge Michael T. Conahan listed on financial interest statements he filed with the state.

Byrnco Inc. – which is not on Conahan’s disclosure forms but has listed him as treasurer – also used PO Box 218, even though its physical address was on New Rodgers Road, Bristol Township in Bucks County. That was the location of The Golden Slipper Lounge go-go club. Conahan held a $300,000 mortgage on the property in the 1990s.

Learco Inc., the owner of the Beer Express distributorship in Harrisburg, listed PO Box 218, Sheppton as an address. Conahan is not listed as an officer or stockholder in that company. His sister Paula DeJoseph, however, was listed as a stockholder.

The Sheppton address also was listed by Busy Bee Beverage Co. Inc. The company was connected to a Brewers Outlet store in York, but it had no direct connection to Conahan.

The postal service won’t say who leases the post office box. It won’t say what businesses or how many companies receive mail there. But the various businesses that listed PO Box 218 are components of a collection of a small group of people, common addresses and an array of what appears to be interrelated companies.

Income under scrutiny

Conahan’s income had been under scrutiny before he was charged in a 48-count indictment on racketeering charges with former Luzerne County judge Mark A. Ciavarella in U.S. District Court in Scranton. On his financial disclosure statements, Conahan has listed many sources of income, including his salary and businesses including Trans-Med and Beverage Marketing of PA. Documents on file with the Pennsylvania Department of State indicate Conahan is the president, secretary and treasurer of Beverage Marketing, which was created in 1989. Conahan included the company on statements of financial interest filed with the state Supreme Court as recently as 2006 and 2007 and listed the Sheppton post office box as the mailing address for his company.

The Times Leader has been researching Conahan’s financial interests and discovered several business and financial interests that he has not disclosed.

Conahan did not list on his financial disclosure forms his position as treasurer of Byrnco Inc., or the $300,000 he lent – at 10 percent interest – to 3025 M&M Inc., operators of the Bucks County go-go club.

He also did not divulge his relationship with a company named Grandpa David Inc. State records showed that Grandpa David was incorporated in September 1990 while Conahan was a district judge in Hazleton and did business as a Brewers Outlet at 808 East Carey Street in Allentown. Conahan was listed as president and treasurer of Grandpa David Inc.

Byrnco, created in August 1985, noted the Sheppton mailing address on its corporate information on file with the state; Grandpa David did not.

Link to beverage companies

Former judge Conahan’s direct link to beverage companies appears to end there but his connections continue.

His wife, Barbara Conahan, is a shareholder in 21st and Vine Streets, which operates the Beer Store in Hazleton.

Conahan’s sister, Paula DeJoseph, is a stockholder in Learco Inc., the owner of the Beer Express distributorship in Harrisburg.

Learco’s president, attorney Edward P. McNelis, shared office space with Conahan in Hazleton in the early 1990s. He also represented Conahan in a legal dispute over campaign financing in his race for the bench in 1993. McNelis represents Barbara Conahan and Cindy Ciavarella in a class action suit that is related to the criminal charges pending against the former judges.

And Learco included Post Office Box 218 as a contact address while Conahan’s Beverage Marketing uses the box as a business address.

The connections continue. Learco stockholder Judy Lynch is the ex-wife of William Hanley, who was listed as the chief executive officer of Michael Conahan’s Beverage Marketing. Hanley is now an aide to U.S. Rep. Tim Holden, D-Schuylkill County.

And Lynch is the daughter of the late William J. Paulosky, the man some speculate may be at the center of this labyrinth.

Another company connection

Sheppton is on Route 924, midway was between the Conahan family home in Hazleton and Minersville, home to Paulosky, the president of the former General Programming Inc.

General Programming, founded in 1969 by Maurice Hepps, managed real estate for beer distributorships, said its former secretary, Marilyn Condrack. She described her role as a bookkeeper for the Pottsville company. A federal grand jury investigated General Programming for its alleged ties to organized crime in the late 1970s. But Hepps dismissed the allegations, saying other beer distributors were responsible for the investigation that did not result in any charges being filed.

Hepps would later become a key figure in libel law, when in 1986 the U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling in a case arising from stories in The Philadelphia Inquirer that attempted to link General Programming to organized crime. The court ruled the person suing for libel had the burden to prove defamatory statements were false.

Hepps said he went into business with Paulosky, who had at one time owned a brewery in Shenandoah. Through General Programming, the company would lease space in shopping centers for people who had licenses to sell beer and beverages.

“He (Paulosky) and Mike (Conahan) were friends and Mike was his attorney,” Hepps said.

In 1995 Paulosky and Hepps ended their business relationship in General Programming. “I traded my stock to Billy,” Hepps said.

He acknowledged knowing Conahan but said there was no connection between General Programming and Beverage Marketing.

Still more connections

Conahan’s Allentown company Grandpa David was connected to the beer store operated by the in-laws of Hepps.

The contact address for Grandpa David was Suite 400 in Courthouse Square Towers in Wilkes-Barre, across the street from the Luzerne County Courthouse. The suite housed the offices of Zavada Associates, which were Hepps’ accountants. A message left with Zavada Associates, which has since moved to Forty Fort, was not returned.

William F. Hanley, who was affiliated with the Allentown beer store, said he does not know why he is listed as chief executive officer of Beverage Marketing of Pa. and Conahan as treasurer.

Sounding a similar note, Hepps said he did not know why his mother-in-law, Goldie Schwarzbarth (previously Goldie Fried who had the maiden name, Goldie Smulovitz) was named as a stockholder in Learco, which does business as the Beer Express at 4949 Queen Ave. in Harrisburg.

Goldie Schwarzbarth, formerly of Harveys Lake, is alive but unable to speak for herself. Her brothers, the late Harry and Joseph Smulovitz, operated two Brewers Outlet stores in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

Originally Hepps was to be an investor in Learco but as the owner of property housing a beer distributor he was precluded by state liquor laws, he said. He referred his mother-in-law to the company, but she did not invest, he said. “She never got anything out of that company,” Hepps said.