Extra context (from Wikipedia but somewhat buried):
The two judges receiving bribes were sentenced to 17.5 & 28 years in prison respectively.
The bribing company is still in operation today. One of the co-owners was sentenced to 18 months in prison for "failing to report a felony". The other co-owner at the time is now the sole owner and was not charged. His brother was and still is the District Attorney.
The fact that the bribing company is still operating and the owners or executives haven't been locked up for a long time, is plain disgusting. Executives should get locked up for the crimes they and their companies commit. Same with HSBC that only got a fine for massive money laundering.
In America, corporations are people but only when it comes to tax breaks. When it comes to criminal law, corporations are instruments of funding for lawmakers.
I don't get this. HOW do you get to this conclusion?
Directly involved:
* the District Attorney
* 2 judges
* the director of ... of the Juvenile Probation Office
* the brother of the District Attorney, who ran the prison (he was convicted, NOT because he paid off corrupt judges, but because he lied about that)
* a supreme court lawyer
Indirectly involved:
* a supreme court justice personally
* the whole Pennsylvania supreme court
* the governor of Pennsylvania
* Pennsylvania's Judicial Conduct Board
* the FBI
Clearly the problem is "corporate america". Which means, Facebook and ExxonMobil, I guess? Seriously?
All were at the very least presented with evidence this was happening (most participated in it), all refused to help obviously wrongfully convicted children.
And when this was finally dealt with? What was the problem that needed fixing? What got the ball rolling you ask? Hundreds of complaints about improper sentencing? No. The district attorney realising obvious wrongdoing happening for years, quite literally right in front of them? No.
A childish squabble over who has to do what job, by court employees, resulting in judges accusing each other. One accuses the other of "conspiring" to remove her, and infighting over shared ownership of a Florida condo ... which lead to press coverage of what one judge was accusing others off ...
Needless to say, the justice system, judges, public prosecutor, the county and the state of Pennsylvania, needed to put the blame somewhere. Somehow, not a SINGLE dollar of damages has to come from them. One might add that had this in fact been private sector wrongdoing that there would be no question that the justice department, as the employer, would have been responsible for damages caused by their employees, the judges.
So: yes, clearly everything that's wrong with America is corporations and the private sector ... not at all corrupt government, who then even refuses to take responsibility for the actions of their employees, and then used parts of the damages to fund their own operations ...
Lots of other problems, such as the crime of treating the children so badly in the juvenile facility EVEN IF they would have been correctly convicted are still, shall we say "open problems". No convictions, no attempts at fixing anything. Everything from access to medical care to the temperature of the facilities is still illegal. To save the government a buck.
Clearly capitalism is what's to blame here ... that the public sector might do enormous damage due to corruption is apparently not possible, yet it's absurdly clear this is exactly what happened here on a very large scale (thousands of children). That they're still just openly violating the law in the very same place this happened, they're still mistreating juveniles (and adult convicts for that matter).
Frankly I'd argue power needs to be taken away from these people JUST based on the pathetic childish accusations between the judges that brought this to light.
You are looking at it wrong. Everyone you mentioned there are merely following the law. It is the LAW ITSELF that fails to hold corporations accountable.
If you are still having trouble getting it, imagine corporations were called by some other name, say Mafia, and see if you'd want your law to prosecute then.
Have you read the list of people responsible? Just about every county, state and some federal law enforcement organisations were responsible. They outright refused to police themselves or other government organisations, at minimum. Mostly they actively damaged children and when they saw crimes happen, did nothing.
And here 1 private organisation (relatively small, minuscule compared to the public organisations, and with literally zero control on what happens to kids)
The private organisation was THE ONLY organisation that was held responsible to any extent at all. For the long list of public organisations that were 10x as responsible as the private company, only employees were sued.
The problem is not law, the problem is not corporations or "failing to hold corporations accountable". The problem is that law enforcement organisations don't see any need for themselves to respect the law, even when it's being blatantly violated right in front of them. And when they do get caught, they find a scapegoat employee, a few employees, that then get destroyed, guaranteeing that nothing is done for the victims of these organisations and absolutely NO effect on the organisations themselves.
The problem is failing to hold GOVERNMENT accountable when it blatantly violates the law on a large scale. And yes, they used a company as a tool in violating the law. Sorry but that's a detail.
The damage done here was estimated at $150 million. How about that amount gets paid AGAIN, this time to the victims, 50/50 out of the budget of the justice department (GREATLY impacting the district attorney's office and the court, for obvious reasons) and out of youth services' budget. That will greatly "hold the corporation accountable", no worries. This will in fact mean the victims actually get something, and the people that are guilty, that actively worked to damage those kids, get punished.
I’m sure this had no bearing whatsoever on the fact that they weren’t charged but their father just so happened to have been a Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice who (coincidentally, I’m sure) retired the same year the scheme began.
One kid was locked up by these evil people for a minor drug paraphernalia charge. He spiraled after that and ended up committing suicide. The video is the mom confronting the corrupt judge and the river of BS from his lawyer.
The two judges receiving bribes were sentenced to 17.5 & 28 years in prison respectively.
The bribing company is still in operation today. One of the co-owners was sentenced to 18 months in prison for "failing to report a felony". The other co-owner at the time is now the sole owner and was not charged. His brother was and still is the District Attorney.