<story><title>Former judges who sent kids to jail for kickbacks must pay more than 200M</title><url>https://www.npr.org/2022/08/18/1118108084/michael-conahan-mark-ciavarella-kids-for-cash</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>hayst4ck</author><text>Rule of law means, more than anything else, that there are consequences for the rich and powerful.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Other major figures in the case settled years ago, including the builder and the owner of the private lockups and their companies, in payouts totaling about $25 million.&lt;p&gt;When you can settle for &amp;quot;just the cost of doing business&amp;quot; prices, the rule of law is clearly weak enough that you know corruption is accelerating.&lt;p&gt;Nothing has made America&amp;#x27;s lack of rule of law more apparent to me than the &amp;quot;rule of law&amp;quot; party&amp;#x27;s 2nd most powerful person standing in front of news cameras and confidently saying &amp;quot;My husband and I have a right to trade stocks with insider information, despite numerous professionals being restricted from doing so. Rules for thee, but not for me, because I&amp;#x27;m a congresswoman.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;How are we supposed to fight corruption, systemic or otherwise, when the people most equipped to fight it won&amp;#x27;t even look at themselves?&lt;p&gt;Our leaders are failing to lead by example.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>cortesoft</author><text>The two judges were sentenced to 28 years and 17.5 years in prison, so it is more than just the cost of doing business they ended up facing.</text></comment>
<story><title>Former judges who sent kids to jail for kickbacks must pay more than 200M</title><url>https://www.npr.org/2022/08/18/1118108084/michael-conahan-mark-ciavarella-kids-for-cash</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>hayst4ck</author><text>Rule of law means, more than anything else, that there are consequences for the rich and powerful.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Other major figures in the case settled years ago, including the builder and the owner of the private lockups and their companies, in payouts totaling about $25 million.&lt;p&gt;When you can settle for &amp;quot;just the cost of doing business&amp;quot; prices, the rule of law is clearly weak enough that you know corruption is accelerating.&lt;p&gt;Nothing has made America&amp;#x27;s lack of rule of law more apparent to me than the &amp;quot;rule of law&amp;quot; party&amp;#x27;s 2nd most powerful person standing in front of news cameras and confidently saying &amp;quot;My husband and I have a right to trade stocks with insider information, despite numerous professionals being restricted from doing so. Rules for thee, but not for me, because I&amp;#x27;m a congresswoman.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;How are we supposed to fight corruption, systemic or otherwise, when the people most equipped to fight it won&amp;#x27;t even look at themselves?&lt;p&gt;Our leaders are failing to lead by example.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>kelnos</author><text>Seriously; the people involved on the private prison side should also see jail time.  And if the scheme was pervasive or high-up enough, the government should have dissolved the companies entirely.</text></comment>