A. Leon Higginbotham Social Justice Champion Marsha Levick
The Juvenile Law Center co-founder has spent 50 years advocating for the rights of youth in the legal system, taking on corrupt judges, changing policy and contributing to victories in the U.S. Supreme Court.
In December, when President Joe Biden commuted the sentence of former Luzerne County judge Michael Conahan — one of two elected officials implicated in the infamous Kids for Cash scandal — anger bubbled up across Pennsylvania.
There was outrage in local op-ed pages. Family members of the more than 2,300 victims spoke out. Governor Josh Shapiro, in a rare dig at a fellow Democrat, called the clemency of Conahan “absolutely wrong” while insisting he “deserves to be behind bars.”
Kids for Cash remains one of the worst examples of judicial corruption in the history of the country. Conahan and fellow judge Mark Ciavarella received millions of dollars in kickbacks from a private detention facility in exchange for issuing draconian sentencing and imprisonment for minor offenses by teenagers and kids as young as eight years old.
But there was one person to hear the news who wasn’t among the aggrieved: The lawyer chiefly responsible for uncovering the scandal and prosecuting the judges in the first place.
“My best friends are upset about it, and this is what I say to each of them,” says Marsha Levick, co-founder of the Juvenile Law Center. “Do you believe in compassion and mercy?”
