

In 2009, I wrote about Judge Mark A. Ciavarella, one of two Pennsylvania judges who was paid bribes by a private prison contractor to send black children to prison and keep the for-profit prisons full. Ciavarella, who once sent an African-American child to jail for three months for posting negative comments about her assistant principal on MySpace, has been sentenced to 28 years in prison. He was convicted of racketeering, and has been stripped of his state pension.

But after a federal investigation, it was discovered that Ciavarella and his colleague, Judge Michael Conahan, received more than $2.6 million from privately run youth centers owned by PA Child Care. In 2011, Ciavarella was convicted of racketeering and sentenced to 28 years in prison. He was also forced to pay $1 million in restitution.

Once Ciavarella was convicted, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court tossed out 4,000 convictions issued by the judge.

Ciavarella appealed to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia to have his 28-year sentence overturned. On July 25, the court denied his request.