WRITING & REPORTING » NEWS THE CITIZENS' VOICE, TUESDAY, AUGUST 25, 2009
Potential corruption backlash casts doubt on future of two veteran judges
Normally, a judicial retention election would be nothing more than a formality — a rubber stamp from voters allowing a judge another decade on the bench.
In Luzerne County, where the court system continues to operate beneath the cloud of an ongoing corruption investigation, a pair of retention elections in November will test the ability of two judges to survive in an atmosphere of public skepticism and mistrust.
The votes for or against Judges Peter Paul Olszewski Jr. and Thomas F. Burke Jr. will serve as a referendum on their records and a measure of the court’s ability to recover from the corruption scandal that broke in January with charges against two former judges.
Recovery Mission: More than six months after corruption cast a dark cloud over the Luzerne County court system, President Judge Chester B. Muroski and his colleagues are still working to regain public trust and ensure the court remains transparent for years to come.
Model Citizens: The democratic approach used to govern the Luzerne County court system in the wake of the corruption crisis could serve as a model for courts throughout the state.
Retention Deficit: With two judges facing retention, two new judges being elected, another a year from retirement and two seats in limbo, the current makeup of the court could shift dramatically in the next two years.
With three candidates vying to fill two seats in January, another judge a year from retirement and two other seats unfilled pending an appointment by Gov. Ed Rendell and a decision by a state court, the retention elections could also be part of a dramatic two-year shift in the makeup of the court.
If both judges were to lose, the number of unfilled positions would grow to four and the number of judges would drop to six in a county expanded in 2007 to 10 judicial seats.
Olszewski, 49, and Burke, 62, face arguably the most pressure of the five judicial candidates on the ballot, King’s College political science professor David Sosar said. They served alongside the two judges charged with corruption, Mark A. Ciavarella Jr. and Michael T. Conahan, and their election will come at a time when the scandal is still fresh in voters’ minds.
“The two gentlemen that are running right now have to be tremendously scared,” Sosar said. “People can’t do anything about Ciavarella and Conahan. The only thing they have to lash out on are the two judges who are running right now.”
Federal prosecutors charged Ciavarella and Conahan in January with accepting $2.6 million in kickbacks to facilitate the development of a pair of juvenile detention centers. They pleaded guilty in February, but withdrew their pleas Monday after a federal judge rejected plea agreements that would have guaranteed them prison sentences of 87 months each.
The prolonged legal process, and continuing media coverage of Ciavarella and Conahan, has kept public attention fixed on the corruption scandal, Sosar said, coloring the retention vote the way the economic meltdown last September became a key influence on the presidential election.
“When you have black clouds like this over the courthouse, it doesn’t bode well for the two guys running for retention right now because that’s going to be thrown in the face of the average voter,” Sosar said.
Campaigning against ‘no’
Three weeks before the corruption scandal broke, in the midst of a budget battle between Ciavarella and county officials, county Commissioner Stephen A. Urban was telling constituents to vote “no” on retention.
“Vote them all out,” Urban said. “They’re all part of the system.”
Steve Corbett, the host of a talk show on WILK-AM, has advocated against retention, suggesting judges only be permitted to serve one 10-year term and that Luzerne County “clean house” and “start fresh” in the wake of the destruction from Ciavarella and Conahan.
Olszewski said he considered the anti-retention arguments “guilt by association.”
“I want people to judge me on my record, on what I’ve done and how I’ve administered justice and how I’ve lived up to my oath of office,” Olszewski said. “I think this retention election is terribly important. I think it’s terribly important to the public and to our court system to judge the judges on what we do individually.”
Olszewski served as Luzerne County district attorney for eight years prior to his election to the Court of Common Pleas in November 1999.
Burke was appointed by former Gov. Tom Ridge in May 1998 to fill the seat vacated by Judge Correale Stevens’ election to the state Superior Court, and won election to a 10-year term the following November.
“I’m mindful that the public continues to be justifiably angry about the court corruption scandal, and mindful that those matters continue to be ongoing in some respects,” Burke said, asking voters to judge him on his service and contributions to the bench and during his legal career.
“If people do that open-mindedly, I am hopeful that I will have an opportunity to continue to serve the justice system to which I have committed myself totally throughout my career,” Burke continued.
Corbett directed criticism at Olszewski for a visit he made to the so-called “condo of corruption,” a condominium owned by Ciavarella and Conahan at a Jupiter, Fla., yacht club.
Olszewski said he made the visit in June 2005, “having known no information at all” that Ciavarella and Conahan “had done anything wrong.”
“I don’t see it as an issue,” Olszewski said. “I’m sure that the 30-to-40,000 people who voted for Michael Conahan for judge and the 30-to-40,000 people who voted for him for retention would not have voted for him if they knew he was involved in something illegal. I was fooled just like they were.”
A sure thing, mostly
Over the last eight years, a retention victory has been all but a guarantee for sitting judges throughout the state. Of the 226 Common Pleas judges who faced the “yes” or “no” vote since 2001, only two have lost: Norman D. Callan, of Blair County, in 2001; and John C. Mott, of Bradford County, in 2007.
Callan fell to an opposition movement organized by a former district attorney who had been angling to replace him. The former district attorney described Callan’s attitude in the courtroom as “arrogant” and “demeaning,” and the anti-retention campaign translated in a 52-percent victory for “no.”
Mott’s retention bid was foiled by scandal and an opposition campaign that capitalized on the rhythmic slogan, “Not Mott.” Critics chided Mott for choosing to run for retention instead of exposing himself to challengers in a primary, as he had after his first term on the bench. They also attacked him and his wife for her 2005 conviction on four felony counts for embezzling more than $520,000 from a municipal authority.
Neither Olszewski nor Burke have been accused of any wrongdoing, but the weight of the scandal that crushed their former colleagues could leave them as collateral damage, Judge Joseph J. Musto said.
Musto, who was appointed last October to fill the vacancy left by Conahan’s mid-term retirement, finished fourth overall in the May judicial primaries, the first elections held since the corruption scandal broke.
“I certainly was concerned about it when I was running, and I was only here since October,” Musto said. “I was concerned about the public perception and I did my best to try to get the message out there that I really wasn’t part of any illegality that might have gone on.”
Musto portrayed himself in campaign commercials as the only candidate “already working to clean up the mess” left by the allegations of corruption.
The effort translated into a third-place finish on the Democratic ballot, behind the party’s nominees Magisterial District Judge William H. Amesbury and former Assistant District Attorney Tina Polachek Gartley.
“There has to be a time when the federal government comes to an announcement, at least as far as they’re concerned, the investigations are done and as many people that have been charged are all that will be charged,” Sosar said.
Without that kind of closure, Sosar said, speculation and skepticism will remain, following otherwise clean candidates on the campaign trail and onto the retention ballot.
“The only thing that you do is remind them of your record,” Sosar said. “It’s a very hard thing to try and talk about. You can’t talk about cases that you have decided. All you can talk about is generalities and say, ‘Hey, I’m fair.’”
