Kids-for-Cash Judges Ordered to Pay More Than $200 Million

Kids-for-Cash Judges Ordered to Pay More Than $200 Million
Former Luzerne County Court Judges Michael Conahan (front L) and Mark Ciavarella (front R) leave the United States District Courthouse in Scranton, Pa., on Sept. 15, 2009. Mark Moran/The Citizens' Voice via AP
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Two former Pennsylvania judges who orchestrated a scheme to send children to for-profit jails in exchange for kickbacks were ordered to pay more than $200 million to hundreds of people they victimized in one of the worst judicial scandals in U.S. history.

U.S. District Judge Christopher Conner awarded $106 million in compensatory damages and $100 million in punitive damages to nearly 300 people in a long-running civil suit against the judges, writing the plaintiffs are “the tragic human casualties of a scandal of epic proportions.”