Misconduct

A Lower Moreland district justice was accused of eight counts of judicial misconduct yesterday, including allegations that he pressured police to drop a drunken-driving case against a family friend and summarily convicted a juvenile who didn't wear a tie to his courtroom. District Justice Stephen H. Silverman was named in a complaint prepared by the Judicial Conduct Board in Harrisburg, which investigates allegations of ethical misconduct by judges in the state. The board receives more than 500 complaints alleging misconduct each year, but formal charges are rare.

CAPE MAY COURT HOUSE - Wildwood Mayor Gary DeMarzo pleaded not guilty Wednesday to official misconduct. Cape May County prosecutors have charged that DeMarzo and lawyer Samuel Lashman improperly used public funds to pay for DeMarzo's defense in a conflict-of-interest case in 2009 and 2010. Lashman also entered a not-guilty plea Wednesday. DeMarzo is a former Wildwood police officer who took a leave of absence after being elected a city commissioner in May 2007. He became mayor in December 2009.

Temple University President Peter Liacouras has decided not to charge outgoing African-American studies chairman Molefi Asante with "grave misconduct" for his actions toward an untenured assistant professor who claimed he plagiarized her work. But Liacouras did conclude that soured business dealings between Asante and his onetime star pupil, assistant professor Ella Forbes, "sufficiently tainted" the review of Forbes' application for a permanent faculty position. "Once Dr. Asante entered into the external business relationship with Dr. Forbes . . . a potential conflict of interest within the university was created," Liacouras wrote in his decision.

An administrative hearing for a police officer who was acquitted of charges that he made obscene phone calls to the Deptford Mall has gotten underway, with both sides arguing over procedure. Michael Gallo, 30, faces charges of misconduct that may result in the loss of his job as a police officer, even though a municipal court judge dismissed harassment charges against him early this month. A two-hour hearing Tuesday was closed. Afterward, Stuart J. Alterman, Gallo's attorney, said he had asked the township manager, Bradley Blubaugh, to remove himself as the hearing officer because of an alleged friendship with Police Chief Raymond Milligan.

The last thing you expect when you put your money in a bank is to have it rob you. But robbed is how thousands of Wachovia Bank customers must be feeling today. Wachovia, the biggest bank in the Philadelphia region, engaged in a "pattern of misconduct" that enabled fraudulent telemarketers to steal millions of dollars from unsuspecting customers, according a probe by the federal Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. The telemarketers targeted mainly elderly people, offering them identity protection, medical discounts, grants and other products in return for a fee that the telemarketers would obtain directly from the customer's bank account.

A Chester County judge yesterday admitted that he fraternized with law- enforcement officials at his favorite restaurant at lunch time, but denied that he committed "extra-judicial misconduct" by allowing jurors in a controversial murder case to see him doing so. Judge Leonard Sugerman was testifying during an unusual hearing on an appeal by Andrew Byrne of his murder conviction on charges of killing his wife. The defense alleges that the jurors, who also ate lunch at La Cocotte in West Chester, saw Sugerman socializing with a key prosecution witness during the trial.

The Coatesville Police Department has suspended a high-ranking officer amid allegations of misconduct, according to the Coatesville City Council president. Joseph Hamrick said Wednesday that the council received word of the probe after the officer was put on paid administrative leave Aug. 22. Sources familiar with the investigation but who are not authorized to comment identified the officer as Lt. Chris McEvoy. They said he was accused of fraternizing inappropriately with a subordinate.

Accusing the judge on the case of misconduct, Kenneth Powell's attorney has asked that his case, scheduled to go to trial tomorrow in Superior Court in Salem County, be dismissed. Defense attorney Carl Roeder said he had filed a letter of complaint with the U.S. Attorney's Office in Camden on Friday charging Superior Court Judge William Forester with judicial misconduct and destruction of evidence during an Oct. 4 plea hearing. Neither Forester nor the U.S. Attorney's Office could be reached for comment last night.

A panel of federal judges, including Gov. Rendell's wife, has been appointed to conduct a judicial-misconduct inquiry of a well-known California judge caught up in a flap about sexually explicit images on a Web site bearing his name. The investigation will focus on Chief Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which handles federal appeals for Western states, Hawaii, and Alaska. Kozinski asked for the inquiry after the Los Angeles Times reported last week that sexually explicit photos and videos were on the Web site, http://alex.

A former Camden police officer who pleaded guilty to official misconduct was spared a prison term yesterday after an emotional outpouring of support by friends and family members. Superior Court Judge Frank M. Lario Jr. said he was impressed by the pleas for mercy, as well as by the many letters he received in behalf of Carmen Santiago, of Camden. He ordered her to be put on the sheriff's supervised work program for 270 days, serve 600 hours of community service, and be on probation for four years.

WASHINGTON - Senators investigating the Secret Service prostitution scandal said Wednesday that dozens of reported episodes of misconduct by agents point to a culture of carousing in the agency and urged Director Mark Sullivan to get past his insistence that the romp in Cartagena was a one-time mistake. The disconnect between the senators and Sullivan reappeared again and again throughout the two-hour hearing, even as the Secret Service chief for the first time apologized for the incident that tarnished the elite presidential protection force.

Archbishop Charles J. Chaput said Friday that he had permanently removed five priests from active ministry for sexual abuse or misconduct with minors, and reinstated three others after an investigation could not substantiate similar claims against them. The decisions, which followed a 14-month review, marked one of the largest ousters of active priests in the archdiocese's history. It also validated a February 2011 grand jury report that accused local church leaders of ignoring evidence of clergy sex abuse and stirred new outrage among area Catholics.

Archbishop Charles J. Chaput plans to meet Wednesday with hundreds of Archdiocese of Philadelphia priests, stirring hopes that he may announce the fates of nearly two dozen clergy suspended last year over child sex-abuse or misconduct allegations. The e-mail invitation sent to priests Monday did not disclose the purpose of the afternoon gathering at Cardinal O'Hara High School in Springfield, Delaware County. Archdiocesan officials did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

WASHINGTON - A Secret Service scandal involving prostitutes in Colombia that has overshadowed President Obama's diplomatic mission in Latin America probably isn't an isolated incident, and the agency should ensure that it doesn't happen again, a leading House Republican said Sunday. California Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of a House investigative panel, said that he wasn't certain whether Congress would hold hearings on the misconduct. But lawmakers will be looking "over the shoulder" of the Secret Service, he said, to make sure that the agency's method for training and screening agents isn't endangering the nation's VIPs.

THE FLYERS-PENGUINS series finally displayed the snarl everyone expected in the first period of Game 3, when the teams combined for 72 penalty minutes. The biggest series of altercations came with 12:02 gone in the period. The craziest thing was not how Sidney Crosby started the whole thing - first by banging away at goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov's glove after he made a save, and then later by knocking away Jakub Voracek's glove as Voracek was bending over to pick it up - and still left the Flyers with a man disadvantage after all of the calculations were made.

The 19-page letter from the U.S. Department of Education to colleges and universities across the nation last April made already-busy Philadelphia lawyer Gina Maisto Smith even busier. The letter emphasized that colleges had to respond to any complaint of sexual misconduct, even if the victim didn't want to press charges or otherwise pursue it. Some colleges hadn't been investigating such complaints even though a 2001 Education Department document recommended it, said Smith, a former sex-crimes prosecutor who now specializes in law involving sexual misconduct on college campuses and other institutions.

An internal investigation by the University of Pennsylvania found no evidence of research misconduct or plagiarism by two psychiatry professors - one of whom is the chair of the department - who were accused by a colleague of putting their names on a ghostwritten paper in 2001. The report said that though current standards would have required Dwight Evans, chair of Penn's psychiatry department, and Laszlo Gyulai, now an emeritus associate professor of psychiatry, to acknowledge that they had received "assistance from a medical writer," guidelines in effect in 2001 did not. Last summer, Jay D. Amsterdam, a Penn professor who also had been involved in the study of the effect of the antidepressant Paxil on depression in patients with bipolar disorder, filed a complaint with the federal Office of Research Integrity about the study.

After a yearlong investigation, the state Judicial Conduct Board has filed a formal complaint against a Chester County district judge, accusing her of giving preferential treatment to a son with a long rap sheet. Judge Rita Arnold was escorted by sheriffs Wednesday from the Downingtown District Court, and ordered to relinquish her keys and avoid contact with any employees "pending prosecution," said an order from Chester County Court President Judge James P. MacElree 3d. Arnold's attorney, Dawson R. Muth, did not return telephone calls seeking comment.