Thursday, March 05, 2009

Tainted witnesses




Luzerne County Judge Ann Lokuta is still fighting her removal from the bench. She asked the state Supreme Court to stop the state from putting her judge seat on the May primary election ballot because she not exhausted her appeals. If her petition is successful it would put the kibosh on some of our wanna be jurists because there would only be 2 seats up for election instead of 3.
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I think she has a good case because Juvie Brother Judge Conahan orchestrated the charges against her and some of the key witnesses were his fellow felon Judge Mark Ciavarella, admitted thief (Conahan's cousin) Bill Sharkey and former and Prothonotary Jill "I was used" Moran. Some of the other witnesses were beholden to the Judges for their jobs or were attorneys that are now under scrutiny for their involvement in the possible fixing of civil cases.
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She claims Conahan went after her because she was cooperating in the federal corruption probe of the Juvie Brothers but couldn't offer evidence to support that claim because it would have jeopardized an ongoing investigation. She also points out that one of the people that sat in judgement of her was Richard Sprague who was a lawyer for Robert Powell who was one of the people paying off the Judges. Powell is a law partner and business partner of Jill Moran. Powell, Moran, Conahan and Ciavarella are also business partners.
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At the very least the Supreme Court should order a new hearing and stay her removal from the bench.



2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Supreme Court is bought and paid for

Anonymous said...

She had county workers running personal errands and mowing her lawn etc., etc. Was that actually proven? If so, even though it's on a lower level than Ciavarella and Conahan, it is a valid reason to keep her off of the bench