Among the 1,499 people granted clemency by President Biden on Thursday was a disgraced county judge who was denied early release in federal court not five months ago.
“Defendant held a position of power and trust, he abused both when he schemed over an extended period of time to personally benefit from children being sentenced to a private detention facility,” the July 15 ruling in Pennsylvania federal court said of President Judge Michael Conahan of the Court of Common Pleas of Luzerne County.
Conahan had hoped to be spared the last two years of a 17-and-a-half-year sentence for joining juvenile court Judge Mark Ciavarella in pocketing $2.8 million in a “kids for cash” scheme. The two jurists had conspired with a real estate developer and a lawyer to shut down the existing county juvenile detention facility and built two new private, for profit lock-ups, PA Child Care and Western PA Child Care.
