Verdict

A federal court jury yesterday found that lawyer Richard Glanton sexually harassed and defamed Kathleen Frederick, an associate lawyer he supervised, but awarded her only $125,000 in damages. The jury of five men and five women deliberated about 13 hours over three days before returning with a verdict that appeared to be a compromise. Frederick was seeking more than $2 million in damages. The damages were awarded to Frederick not for the sexual harassment but for the defamation - for statements that Glanton, a former aide to Gov. Dick Thornburgh and president of the Barnes Foundation, made to reporters in January 1992 after he learned of Frederick's suit.

For more than three decades, Kermit Barron Gosnell made his name providing abortions in the most difficult cases - the poor, the uninsured, and women pushing the 24-week threshold when abortion becomes illegal in Pennsylvania. Now the 72-year-old West Philadelphia physician has to save a life - his own - after a Common Pleas Court jury found him guilty Monday of killing three babies born alive during illegal late-term abortions. Gosnell appeared as placidly enigmatic as ever as the jury of seven women and five men came into court at 2:50 p.m., the ninth full day of deliberations, and said he was guilty of three counts of first-degree murder.

The jury has spoken in the murder trial of Wilfredo Santiago. Unless or until an appeals court overturns that verdict or new evidence is produced, Wilfredo Santiago stands convicted by a jury of his peers of assassinating Philadelphia police Officer Thomas Trench as the officer sat in a patrol car early on the morning of May 28, 1985, at 17th and Spring Garden Streets. It always is risky for anyone who has not been in court for every minute of a trial to second-guess a jury - especially one that was sequestered throughout the trial.

ICAN'T BELIEVE the jury in the Shannon Schieber case found in favor of the city. The police didn't just drop the ball in handling the "serial rapist" case, they threw the ball out of the court. While I acknowledge that a cash award would never bring Ms. Schieber back, it would have shown the city that such substandard law enforcement practices would not be tolerated. We certainly can't count on the department to discipline its own - they proved they feel themselves beyond reproach when they panned the recent report critical of their procedures.

LET US PRAY that last week's decision by Common Pleas Judge Pamela Dembe puts an end to the right-wing cause celebre created when the district attorney's office charged antigay protesters with felonies. Let us pray that it absolves us from ever again having to say that Michael Marcavage and his Repent America group were in the right. And they were, even though the anti-gay protesters weren't participating in a protest "march," but instead were engaged in insulting people attending a fair with a city permit.

Thomas and Dianna Rogalski reacted bitterly to what they considered leniency given to their 17-year-old son's killer. Both left a courtroom shaken yesterday after Common Pleas Judge Renee Cardwell Hughes rejected Assistant District Attorney Jodi Lobel's request for "at best a first-degree murder verdict; at worst, second-degree murder" for the slayer of Steven Rogalski on Oct. 10, 1998. Hughes convicted Felipe Garcia, 19, of third-degree murder. She acquitted him of the higher degrees and three counts of attempted murder and robbery.

City officials scrambled yesterday to quell rumors of an acquittal during the first day of deliberations in the trial of a Hispanic police officer charged with manslaughter in the deaths of a black motorcyclist and his passenger. A six-member jury deliberated six hours yesterday in the case of Officer William Lozano, 31, who shot to death Clement A. Lloyd, 23. Lloyd's passenger, Allan Blanchard, 24, was thrown from the motorcycle and died the next day. Lozano is charged with two counts of manslaughter and faces a maximum of 60 years in prison.

RE COVERAGE of the shootings on the 33 Bus: You mentioned that Cornelius Kelsey had been charged with the shooting of Arnold Grissom on a 33 Bus a couple of years ago, but you failed to mention that Mr. Kelsey had been found not guilty of all charges relating to that incident, and his family would appreciate it if you would do so. Gwen Brown, Philadelphia

A day after winning a $12.8 million federal jury verdict against the city, many of the 24 remaining homeowners on the former MOVE block of Osage Avenue in West Philadelphia were resolute, if not festive. "It feels good," Gerald W. Renfrow, president of the Osage/Pine Community Association, said yesterday. "After 20 years, it's hard to jump for joy. Our lives, as we knew it, were destroyed; 1985 has continued for 20 years for us. " "We're not gloating over it," said Robert Ford, who has lived on the 6200 block of Osage Avenue - which burned after police dropped a bomb on the MOVE compound on May 13, 1985 - for more than 40 years.

So, we have a verdict in the matter of the beef barons vs. Oprah. Sizzle trumped steak. Celebrity trumped geography. And free speech, even with an imperfect champion, trumped free enterprise. There were two verdicts, really. One came yesterday in an Amarillo courtroom, as a jury ruled several Texas cattle breeders hadn't proved Oprah Winfrey slandered and damaged their business with a 1996 show on mad cow disease. The show included a vow by the daytime diva never to eat another hamburger.

CHRISTINE Flowers has long been an advocate for the unborn. For all the common ground that so-called pro-choice and pro-life advocates found in the case of the Gosnell house of horrors, it took a historic jury verdict to make everyone face facts. As Ms. Flowers correctly states in her column "This jury saw the truth," this was a case of infanticide. The only defense that Gosnell had was that the abortion-inducing drug did not properly kill those babies while they were still in utero.

UPDATE: Dr. Kermit Gosnell on Tuesday agreed to wave all of his appellate rights and will serve life in prison without the possibility or parole. He was sentenced for two of the three murders Tuesday and will be sentenced on the remaning charges Wednesday morning. ON THE 10TH DAY of deliberating the fate of West Philadelphia abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, a Philadelphia jury yesterday found him guilty of three counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of three babies, called Babies A, C and D. The jury found Gosnell not guilty of murder in the death of a fourth baby, known as Baby E. He was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the 2009 drug-overdose death of abortion patient Karnamaya Mongar, but not guilty of third-degree murder in her death.

No one on either side of the intractable abortion debate was sorry Monday to learn that Kermit Gosnell was found guilty of first-degree murder. And in their reactions to the verdict, both opponents of abortion and advocates for abortion rights agreed that the Gosnell case was indicative of a problem. They defined that problem, however, in completely different ways. Michael Ciccocioppo, executive director of the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation, said in an e-mailed statement: "For the sake of all Gosnell's victims, let us never forget the rampant disregard for life that was allowed to continue for decades in our state.

For more than three decades, Kermit Barron Gosnell made his name providing abortions in the most difficult cases - the poor, the uninsured, and women pushing the 24-week threshold when abortion becomes illegal in Pennsylvania. Now the 72-year-old West Philadelphia physician has to save a life - his own - after a Common Pleas Court jury found him guilty Monday of killing three babies born alive during illegal late-term abortions. Gosnell appeared as placidly enigmatic as ever as the jury of seven women and five men came into court at 2:50 p.m., the ninth full day of deliberations, and said he was guilty of three counts of first-degree murder.

Archbishop Charles Chaput, speaking for the first time since abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell was convicted of murder, said Tuesday the verdicts in the case "will surprise very few. " Although the church opposes capital punishment, Chaput in a statement said nothing about the possibility that Gosnell could be sentenced to death for his three first-degree murder convictions. The head of the archdiocese of Philadelphia instead focused mainly on the church's opposition to abortion.

A Philadelphia jury is to resume its apparently methodical analysis of the case against abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell on Friday after learning that the task ahead may be bigger than it thought. Among the long list of charges against Gosnell, 72, are 227 counts of violating the state's 24-hour waiting period before a woman can have an abortion. Late Thursday, the Common Pleas Court jury of seven women and five men asked if an earlier stipulation involving medical records for those abortions meant it could return one mass verdict.

THE JURY IN the Kermit Gosnell capital-murder trial ended a fifth day of deliberations yesterday without reaching a verdict. The panel of seven women and five men will resume work this morning, Common Pleas Judge Jeffrey Minehart said. Earlier yesterday, the jurors asked Minehart to re-read the definitions of the charges of first-degree murder, third-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and infanticide. They also asked for the definition of malice. Minehart also asked the jurors whether any of them had seen a Fox News documentary about Gosnell that aired Friday and over the weekend.

THE JURORS in the Kermit Gosnell capital-murder trial ended a fourth day of deliberating yesterday without reaching a verdict, but they indicated that they had begun to focus on the doctor's charges after spending several days dealing with his co-defendant's. The panel of seven women and five men is scheduled to continue deliberations Monday morning. Gosnell, 72, is charged with more than 250 crimes, including the first-degree murders of four fetuses allegedly born alive then killed at his West Philadelphia abortion clinic.

A Philadelphia judge has affirmed the guilty verdict - and her own handling - of last year's landmark trial of the first Catholic Church official criminally charged for his role supervising priests accused of child sexual abuse. The opinion, filed April 12 by Common Pleas Court Judge M. Teresa Sarmina, was required by Superior Court in its review of Msgr. William J. Lynn's appeal of his child endangerment conviction. Sarmina's response was anything but routine: a 235-page opinion bristling with quotations, citations, and footnotes, and an eight-page index.