CMYK THE TIMES LEADER www.timesleader.com
NEWS
IN
BRIEF
BILL TARUTIS/TIMES LEADER FILE PHOTO
Zachary Shoemaker of Trucksville, left, is with his great grandmother Priscilla Coolbaugh of Larksville at a fundraiser two years ago.
➛ timesleader.com
SATURDAY, JULY 14, 2012
LOCAL Schneider gets sole source status Service was selected by W-B to install surveillance cameras in Intermodal Center.
NANTICOKE
By BILL O’BOYLE boboyle@timesleader.com
WILKES-BARRE – When Schneider Electric was selected to install surveillance cameras in the Intermodal Transportation Center Thursday night by City Council, it marked the second time the company was chosen as a “sole source provider.” In December, 2008, the city had rejected bids it received for cameras in Coal Street Park, citing the “incompatibility” of systems of seven companies
Dodgeball to aid child
thatsoughttheworkwiththecity’sothercameras. Rather than re-bid the contract with exact specifications of what was needed, the city awarded the contract to Schneider (formerly TAC) as a “sole source provider.” The low bid received in 2008 was $84,884 from Triguard Security Systems of Avoca. TAC/ Schneider did not bid on the work. A year later, the city awarded the contract to Schneider for $168,000 – nearly double the Triguard bid.
“For the Coal Street Complex, the city wanted compatibility between the facility security system and the citywide network,” city Administrative Coordinator Drew McLaughlin said Friday. “This capability was invaluable during the September flood emergency when the city established the emergency operations center at the Coal Street Complex and was able to monitor the entire camera system as effectively as the See ELECTRIC, Page 7A
Son of board member is hired
A FINAL GOODBYE
T
he Fifth Zachary Shoemaker Dodgeball Tourney will be held on July 29 at noon at the National Guard Armory. The tournament is a fundraiser to help pay the medical expenses of Zachary Shoemaker, 7, who suffered brain damage in a car accident in 2008. Forty teams will compete this year in the event organized by Zachary’s godmother, Stef Sikora. Sikora first held the tournament in 2008 to help support the boy’s parents, Traci and Jason Shoemaker, as they were at his bedside and unable to work. But after seeing the success of the first tourney, she made it a yearly event. This year alone, she has already raised $8,000, and has set a goal of $10,000.
Activist Bob Kadluboski had questioned the possible summer hiring of John Quinn.
LONG POND
By MARK GUYDISH mguydish@timesleader.com
Speedway sets car wash
Pocono Raceway will host the 2012 Charity Car Wash, which will include the opportunity for donors to take their personal vehicles around their 2.5-mile Superspeedway, on July 28 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. All proceeds will benefit the United Way of Monroe County. For a donation of $10, per vehicle, individuals can choose from two options. For more information, visit www.poconoraceay.com/carwash12. PLAINS TWP.
Fourth man is charged
A fourth man was charged in the burglary and theft of copper pipes at the former Valley Crest Nursing Home. Police said they found four men in a basement crawl space of the main building with pipe cutting tools, flashlights and several garbage cans filled with copper pipe just before 10:30 p.m. Wednesday. Steven Michael Young, 31, of Young Wilkes-Barre, along with Brandon Bookwalter, 21, of Kingston, Michael Derousie, 36, and Donald Guthrie, 40, both of Scranton, were charged with burglary, criminal trespass and criminal conspiracy. They remained jailed at the Luzerne County Correctional Facility on Friday for lack of $15,000 bail each. SCRANTON
Prostitution plea gets OK
A man charged with driving Asian women to massage parlors for the purpose of promoting prostitution has agreed to plead guilty in federal court. John Vincent Ferraro, 46, of Bartonsville, filed a plea agreement Thursday indicating he will plead guilty to interstate commerce with intent to engage in prostitution. Ferraro was among five people indicted by a federal grand jury in May 2011 in a multi-state prostitution network involving women from China, Korea, Taiwan and other Asian countries, according to federal court records. Ferraro picked up women at the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport and often transported women from massage parlors in Plains Township, Moosic, Tannersville, Bartonsville, and in Maryland and New Jersey. Federal and state investigators alleged in the indictment that Ferraro drove the women to different massage parlors on a weekly or biweekly basis to avoid suspicion. A federal judge has not approved Ferraro’s guilty plea.
PAGE 3A
BILL TARUTIS/FOR THE TIMES LEADER
P
eople file into the Davis-Dinelli Funeral Home in Nanticoke for the viewing of homicide victim Bradley James Swartwood on Friday evening. Also killed in the Saturday shooting in Plymouth were Lisa Abaunza, 15, and Nicholas Maldonado, 17. A fourth victim, Daniel Maldonado, 19, remains in the hospital. Two men, Sawud Davis, 16, and Shawn Hamilton, 18, have been charged in the shootings.
Probers want gun victim’s phone records A district judge signs a search warrant in the case of a man shot in Wilkes-Barre eight days ago. By EDWARD LEWIS elewis@timesleader.com
WILKES-BARRE – Investigators want cellphone and text message records from a man who suffered two gunshot wounds in the middle of Jay Street eight days ago. A search warrant was signed this week by District Judge Martin Kane in WilkesBarre for AT&T Wireless in Florida seeking all transmissions for a cellphone belonging to Kenyatta Hughston. Hughston, 22, of Trethaway Street, Wilkes-Barre, was shot just before 1 p.m. on Jay Street, a residential neighborhood in the Parsons section of the city. Police said Hughston was shot in the
head and neck and shoulder. He was transported to Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center in Plains Township where he remained in critical condition on Friday. A paramedic found a cellphone in Hughston’s pocket while he was being treated. The cellphone was turned over to city police. Police are seeking incoming/outgoing calls and text messages and pictures on Hughston’s cellphone from 6 a.m. July 6 to 6 a.m. July 7, a day after he was shot. It remains unknown what type of firearm was used in the shooting. A shell casing was recovered at the scene, police said. District Attorney Stefanie Salavantis and state police Lt. Richard Krawetz, commander of the criminal investigation unit for Troop P, said earlier this week they don’t believe the shooting on Jay Street was connected to a deadly shooting of
three people inside a First Street apartment in Plymouth on Saturday. Hughston is a relative to the two homicide suspects, Sawud Davis, 16, and his half brother, Shawn Hamilton, 18, authorities said. Davis and Hamilton are charged with criminal homicide in the shooting deaths of Lisa Abaunza, 15, of Duryea, Nicholas Maldonado, 17, and Bradley Swartwood, 21, and criminal attempt to commit homicide in the shooting of Maldonado’s brother, Daniel Maldonado, 19. Daniel Maldonado remained in critical condition Friday at Geisinger Wyoming Valley. Investigators allege in arrest records that Davis shot the three multiple times with a .40-caliber handgun during an exchange of heroin and marijuana. See PHONE, Page 7A
2 positions cut at W-B North Penn Legal Services Free civil legal services provider closes Jim Thorpe and Mansfield offices. By SHEENA DELAZIO sdelazio@timesleader.com
Northeastern Pennsylvania’s only free civil legal services provider has closed two offices and cut staffing after a $1 million budget shortfall. The closures and cuts came after state and federal funding was reduced early this year, forcing the organization to lay off 15 percent of its staff and close offices in Jim Thorpe, Carbon County, and Mansfield, Tioga County, effective June 30. Locally, the Wilkes-Barre office saw two positions cut, a spokeswoman said. “Funding has not increased with the need and, although we have been able to maintain services by ‘tightening the belt’ over the past few years, continual reductions in our federal and state funding from the Legal Services (Corp.) has finally
worn us out to the point where we had to make very difficult decisions,” executive director Victoria Coyle said. North Penn Legal Services provides free civil legal assistance to low-income families, individuals and groups, including individual representation, legal education and other matters. The cuts mean 1,538 fewer cases will be handled and will leave one legal aid advocate available for every 10,000 people living in poverty in the 20-county service area. In Wilkes-Barre, a legal secretary and receptionist were cut from the office, while the Hazleton office will remain as is, spokeswoman Alison Norton said. Norton said a private attorney donates office space in Hazleton, and assistance there is made by appointment only. That attorney, who Norton did not identify, also assists North Penn Legal Services in Carbon County. According to a press release, at the beginning of the 2012 fiscal year on July 1, 2011, state funding for the program was re-
ABOUT NORTH PENN 2 East Broad Street, Hazleton, hours by appointment only: (570) 455-9512 15 Public Square, Wilkes-Barre, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.: (570) 825-8567 Visit northpennlegal.org for more information
duced by 10 percent and another 10 percent in January 2012. That same month, federal funding was reduced by 14 percent. The impact has contributed to an increase in the number of low-income people who are turned away for services, the release says. “Unfortunately, low-income people face a barrier in their efforts to access justice. These days, that barrier increases at a rate that neither NPLS nor our clients can overcome,” Coyle said. Coyle said there is currently no way to absorb the funding loss without cutting staff, which has forced the organization to run a “lean operation.”
WILKES-BARRE – The son of Wilkes-Barre Area School Board member John Quinn was hired as a summer school math teacher this week, Superintendent Jeff Namey confirmed Friday, two days after frequent board critic Bob Kadluboski had asked Quinn at the school board’s monthly meeting if he was lobbying for his son to get a district job. Quinn did not answer Kadluboski, but after the meeting said he did not know if his son, in his 40s, had applied for a district job. Namey said Quinn’s son, also named John, was hired along with other summer school teachers without a board vote because board policy is to allow administrators to fill summer teaching positions without bringing the issue to the board. Summer teaching jobs, which run about six weeks, are offered first to fulltime district teachers, then to substitutes who have taught in the district, Namey said. The younger Quinn is certified in secondary math, Namey said, and has substitute taught in the district on and off for more than a decade – “long before his father was elected to the board.” Namey said that at one point, the younger Quinn was filling in daily for a teacher who was unable to work for a month or two, but was not hired full-time. The district previously offered summer school for high school students through Luzerne County Community College, but last year opted to start offering the courses directly. Namey said there is typically a shortage of teachers willing to do the work. “We never get enough applications,” Namey said. This year, the lack of math teachers willing to teach summer school forced the district to give one job to a German teacher who also had math certification, he added. “We needed math teachers and his name was on the list,” Namey said of Quinn’s hiring. “I had to put a teacher in front of that classroom, and that’s what we did.” Summer school began Monday, Namey said. It’s the second relative of a board member hired this week for summer work. At Wednesday’s meeting, the board voted to hire Mary Ann Susek and two other people for part-time cleaning and maintenance work for eight weeks. Susek is the wife of board member James Susek, who abstained from the vote. She works for Nutrition Inc., the company contracted to provide food service in district cafeterias. The part-time summer position is a district job. Mark Guydish can be reached at 829-7161