WILKES-BARRE — The U.S. Supreme Court has once again declined to take up the case of a former northeastern Pennsylvania judge convicted in what prosecutors said were juveniles wrongly sent to a detention center.
The denial Monday by the nation’s highest court was the second for 69-year-old former Luzerne County judge Mark Ciavarella Jr.
Ciavarella was convicted in 2011 of accepting bribes in exchange for ordering kids to a for-profit detention center for a wide range of relatively minor infractions. Sentenced to 28 years, he has denied wrongdoing.
A federal appeals court threw out an honest services mail fraud charge but upheld the other charges and the verdict. In 2014, the Supreme Court denied Ciavarella’s first petition for review. Last year, a judge threw out racketeering and money laundering conspiracy convictions.
