I am sure these judges are going to enjoy their new accommadations

yep no problems with privatization

I still can't see how anyone can be for privatization of the prison system when it is so ripe for corruption of this sort. These are peoples lives that are being ruined all in the name of cash.

This was a public Judge and Democrats who pulled this crap off, this is a failure of government as much or more that the private sector.

"Powell's sudden chain of public hirings generated cries of politics from some taxpayers, who questioned whether his selection was linked to political campaign donations. In 1996, then-county commissioners Tom Makowski, Frank Crossin and Joseph "Red" Jones hired him as county planning commission solicitor. ...Powell was also hired as West Hazleton and Hazleton City solicitor and as bond counsel for a Hazleton Area School District construction/renovation project and the Luzerne County Convention Center’s proposed arena project. By ...2002, Powell and his firm had been paid more than $150,000 for county legal work. He and his firm contributed $12,400 to the campaigns of Democratic majority county commissioners from 1995 through 2002.

Powell's involvement in PA Child Care ...was discovered by a reporter through mortgage documents in 2002 - nine months after the court sent county commissioners the original proposal to lease the building. Powell ignored repeat written and verbal notices from county officials â€" including the county solicitor - to file financial disclosure forms as required by the state Ethics Commission covering his years of solicitorship employment with the county. These forms are supposed to publicly disclose information about real estate interests, creditors, significant gifts and direct and indirect income. County officials said Thursday that Powell never filed the reports...Commissioner Greg Skrepenak and former Commissioner Todd Vonderheid approved a $58-million, 20-year lease of the Pittston Township center in October 2004.

Powell showed signs of his growing wealth. He owned a 56-foot yacht named "Reel Justice," and a 12-seat Rockwell International jet... In 2005, Powell and his wife, Debra, built a 7,100-square-foot home ... valued at $1.46 million. A new moniker â€" John Doe â€" was attached to Powell in 2007 when The Times Leader discovered that county Prothonotary Jill Moran â€" his law partner â€" switched Powell’s name in her office database so he wasn’t linked to an IRS tax lien filed against him...Experts said her action was illegal."

WHy do libs love private prisons?

WHy do libs love private prisons?
#4 | Posted by glasshouse

Because they know that at some time in their miserable crooked lives they will be in one and they are hoping it will be run by one of their lib friends.

#4 | Posted by glasshouse
#5 | Posted by paneocon

Together = Simple Simon

"This was a public Judge and Democrats who pulled this crap off, this is a failure of government as much or more that the private sector."

Democrats? Not here in Florida, but fortunately here even enough of the Republicans recognized how evil the basic idea of private prisons is to vote it down. Gov. Rick Scott belongs in a private prison for the rest of his evil life. Paneocon is just your run of the mill moron BTW.

#7 | Posted by danni

What are you blabbering about. This case is not about Florida or privatization, it is the same old story of a bunch of good old boy Dem's putting it to the folks and getting caught.

yea.. only democratic politicians are crooks..

ignore the republican scandals.

idiots you partisans are.

.
.....there have been at least five judges around the country who have been convicted of taking bribes from private prisons.....
.
........how many have not been caught ?.....who knows.?.....
.
.........private prisons are just wrong.......

The guillotine once served a logical purpose of deterring crime because just the idea of it kept officials honest. I totally concur that it is needed to instill fear into such officials who are corrupt to the core such as this crooked judge.

In LA you get in a bar fight and you are likely to be charged with attempted murder, ADW and everything else down to aggravated mopery. This wasn't a bribery case. This was a case of child abuse, kidnapping, torture, and yes murder.4000 cases?What about civil rights violations. Get real. 2% of the population is in custody but apparently not the right ones.

I am sure these judges are going to enjoy their new accommadations

yep no problems with privatization

#1 | Posted by truthhurts

And you don't think there is corruption in the state run facilities??

OMG--it's all corrupted.

**** I hope they don't corner this Judge in in prison...and cut his FUCKING NUTS OFF!!!

Death Penalty.

The entire juvenile justice system is corrupt.
Everything from secret testimony, to hiding the identity of accusers from children and their families, to protecting the child abusers and pedophile they employ.
All to protect children, so the authorities say. But the truth is, it has always been about money, and employing people whom would not otherwise have jobs, and many of those would themselves be sitting in adult prisons, should the citizens of this nation get pissed enough to change this.
Not to mention it is a magnet for child abusers and pedophiles.
Allowing it to be privitized is nothing short of criminal.

Steven Spielberg was employed at one such Ohio facility between August 1973 and May 1974.
Just ask the Ohio Dept. of Youth Services. Or the FBI. The Ohio Highway Patrol. Even the Ohio Supreme Court. They all know what that parasite, that predator and his boy George did.
And they still protect him.

That wrestler kid looks like a good kid. He was huge and losing a potential scholar-ship must have been devastating. Too bad we couldn't give him 5 minutes alone with that judge.

I like Robson's idea of the guillotine for public-servant's. They should be held to a higher standard.

WHy do libs love private prisons?
#4 | Posted by glasshouse
Because they know that at some time in their miserable crooked lives they will be in one and they are hoping it will be run by one of their lib friends.
#5 | Posted by paneocon at 2012-02-22 07:53 AM

You mean that the 12k campaign "donation" makes this a Democrat conspiracy and bribery? I agree. Hang them all high. These are parasitic Republican-behaving Dems anyhow.

Just a guess, but a nation-wide census will prove the privatization of prisons is a clearly Republican agenda. Putting kids in prison merely swells their redistricting and the taxpayers are bilked both ways.

Also, this story happened last year.

What's funny is that the investigation didn't really include much of the financial mischief and only found the ex-judge 12 of 39 counts. The prosecutors were undoubtedly paid off to a great extent - obviously Republicans protecting their wicked inhumane fuckwits in positions of power.

Sometimes I wonder why these assholes aren't seen to be on the take building a multi-million dollar mansion on a justice salary. Then I imagine in a year or so mobs burning these "homes" and lynching the residents. It appears that is what the Republican agenda is solely after.

And you don't think there is corruption in the state run facilities??

OMG--it's all corrupted.

Nobody is bribing judges to send prisoners to state-run facilities.

Privatization introduced a new vector for corruption. This is the undeniable truth.

Yes it's all corrupt. But there are degrees of corruption. Trying to get rid of all corruption is a Fool's Errand. But that doesn't mean we can't take obvious steps to limit corruption.

a nation-wide census will prove the privatization of INSERT ANY PUBLIC SECTOR FUNCTION HERE is a clearly Republican agenda

Some examples:
Mercenaries in Iraq
Social Security
Postal Service
Roads
Airport Security (pre 9/11)
National Helium Reserve
Space exploration
Health care

And you don't think there is corruption in the state run facilities??

Who in the state is paying judges to send inmates?

Postal Service

They are close on this one.

a nation-wide census will prove the privatization of INSERT ANY PUBLIC SECTOR FUNCTION HERE is a clearly Republican agenda
Some examples:
Mercenaries in Iraq
Social Security
Postal Service
Roads
Airport Security (pre 9/11)
National Helium Reserve
Space exploration
Health care
#20 | Posted by snoofy at 2012-02-23 06:40 PM

They are parasitically after every aspect of society that government has been created to protect. Many conservative justice are merely abetting the destruction of the society they serve by inventing criminals who are otherwise guilty of no crime. Police and Federal SWAT teams focusing on the big bad medical grow operations is not helping society at all - and generally further damages their image, making us all resent or distrust police authority. Guarding our state interests we need more local power to combat the externalization of resources into monopolies that government answers to, like the "right to work" schema. Obliterate it.

The prisons are not effective at rehabilitation and should not be forced to undergo changes that negatively impact their obligation towards society. So, marijuana decriminalization at minimum would eliminate the non-violent offenders, free resources, increase the plausible work pool, and attract new forms of economic incentives nationwide. We need to starve the prisons from incarcerating our decent citizens, who are precisely the resource that prison privatization depends upon.

If the wrestler had been my son, I'd have been tempted to shoot the judge outside the courtroom instead of just yelling at him.

The time has come for corrupt public servants to literally start losing their heads.

And I really don't know why it has started happening regularly already. It will though, it will.

Tell me you wouldn't derive great pleasure from blowing this fucker away?

Or maybe go over to his house and fuck a bunch of shit up. His dog? His wife? Does he have any kids? Grandchildren?

Or maybe go over to his house and fuck a bunch of shit up. His dog? His wife? Does he have any kids? Grandchildren?
#26 | Posted by BloodSacrafice at 2012-02-24 07:28 AM

I was considering this is a possible outcome from the inequity - there is an effort to invent national poverty by the 1%.

The privatization of government functions is always a surefire pathway to more corruption and waste. It provides a natural ultimate incentive for corruption and wasted government.....where politicians are rewarded by corrupt businesses for giving them gobs of other people's money (our taxes).

It is as surely a pathway to corruption as the law of gravity, convection and hot air rising.