Al­le­gheny Co PA Com­mon Pleas Judge Donna Jo McDaniel gets booted from resentencing hearing of SO

An appeals courts rules against your court ruling and remands the case for resentencing. What do you do? If you're Donna Jo McDaniel, you respond by making the same ruling in defiance. This worthless excuse of a judge needs to be removed from the bench.

https://www.post-gazette.com/news/crime-courts/2018/11/28/allegheny-county-judge-donna-jo-mcdaniel-sex-offender-superior-court-remand/stories/201811280162

Superior Court removes Allegheny County judge from sex offender's resentencing 

PAULA REED WARD
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
pward@post-gazette.com
 NOV 28, 2018

The state Su­pe­rior Court, in a rare move Wed­nes­day, or­dered Al­le­gheny County Com­mon Pleas Judge Donna Jo McDaniel to be re­moved from a case, find­ing that there was “sub­stan­tial ev­i­dence” that she “demon­strated bias and per­sonal an­i­mus” against both the de­fen­dant and the pub­lic de­fender’s of­fice rep­re­sent­ing him.

The three-judge panel of the ap­pel­late court wrote a blis­ter­ing 13-page opin­ion that also or­dered that An­thony McCau­ley be sen­tenced again by a new judge. It is one of a se­ries of opin­ions by the Su­pe­rior Court dat­ing to Jan­u­ary 2017 in which Judge McDaniel has been ques­tioned for her sen­tenc­ing of sex of­fend­ers.

“The trial court’s an­i­mus and hos­til­ity to ap­pel­lant’s coun­sel and the [Al­le­gheny County] Pub­lic De­fender’s of­fice ap­pears to be deep, un­wav­er­ing and dem­on­strates an un­jus­ti­fied bias against the Pub­lic De­fender’s of­fice,” wrote Su­pe­rior Court Judge Alice Beck Dubow.

The Su­pe­rior Court also crit­i­cized Judge McDaniel for us­ing in­ap­pro­pri­ate sar­casm in her writ­ten opin­ion; for de­ny­ing McCau­ley a fair and con­sti­tu­tional sen­tenc­ing hear­ing; and for fail­ing to fol­low pre­vi­ous Su­pe­rior Court or­ders, there­fore wast­ing ju­di­cial re­sources.

Ordered to redo an 'unreasonable' sentence, judge responds by imposing the exact same punishment. In a foot­note, the ap­pel­late court also chas­tised her for in­clud­ing the full name of the child vic­tim in McCau­ley’s case in her opin­ion.

“Not only do we dis­ap­prove of this prac­tice, but it is also con­trary to [Penn­syl­va­nia law], which makes it a crim­i­nal of­fense for an of­fi­cer or em­ployee of the court to re­veal the name of a mi­nor vic­tim of sex­ual abuse in doc­u­ments avail­able to the pub­lic,” Judge Dubow wrote.

Although the pros­pect of re­fer­ring Judge McDaniel to the Ju­di­cial Con­duct Board was raised by the pros­e­cu­tion dur­ing oral ar­gu­ment on McCau­ley’s case in April, the Su­pe­rior Court opin­ion does not men­tion the dis­ci­plin­ary or­ga­ni­za­tion.

Judge McDaniel could not be reached for com­ment.

Amie Downs, the county’s spokes­woman, de­clined com­ment on be­half of the pub­lic de­fender’s of­fice.

The most re­cent case to bring scorn from the Su­pe­rior Court was an ap­peal of a sec­ond sen­tenc­ing pro­ceed­ing for McCau­ley, 45. He was con­victed in 2014 of rape and years-long abuse of a girl.

Ini­tially, Judge McDaniel sen­tenced McCau­ley to 20 to 40 years in prison. On ap­peal, McCau­ley’s de­fense at­tor­ney ques­tioned whether that pen­alty was man­da­tory or dis­cre­tion­ary.

The Su­pe­rior Court sent the case back to Judge McDaniel in Oc­to­ber 2016 and told her to clar­ify that ques­tion.
At re­sen­tenc­ing in Decem­ber 2016, she did not ad­dress that is­sue, the court found, and in­stead changed the pen­alty only slightly — to 20 years less two days to 40 years less four days.

Judge McDaniel did not al­low McCau­ley to speak, did not re­view a new pre-sen­tence re­port for him, and did not pro­vide any of the due pro­cess that is re­quired for a crim­i­nal sen­tenc­ing, the Su­pe­rior Court con­cluded.

That prompted new ap­peals from the pub­lic de­fender’s of­fice, which rep­re­sented McCau­ley, and a re­quest that Judge McDaniel re­cuse her­self.

She re­fused.

In its opin­ion Wed­nes­day, Su­pe­rior Court wrote that it did not like Judge McDaniel’s be­hav­ior in the case.

“In par­tic­u­lar, the trial court’s opin­ion is filled with gra­tu­itous com­ments den­i­grat­ing ap­pel­lant’s coun­sel and the Pub­lic De­fender’s of­fice,” the panel wrote.

The three judges said they be­lieve she made a “veiled threat” ques­tion­ing the at­tor­ney’s and of­fice’s cred­i­bil­ity and im­plied that their con­tin­ued ap­peal of her sen­tence could be “harm­ful to other crim­i­nal de­fen­dants who may ac­tu­ally have mer­i­to­ri­ous claims.”

The panel also crit­i­cized Judge McDaniel for sar­casm it said she used in her opin­ion.

“This sar­casm is dis­re­spect­ful to ap­pel­lant, coun­sel and the se­ri­ous­ness of the sen­tenc­ing pro­cess,” they wrote.

Four times in the opin­ion, the panel said it was ei­ther “trou­bled” by Judge McDaniel’s ac­tions or found them “trou­bling.”

The court cited her fail­ure to fol­low its in­struc­tions on re­mand, in­clud­ing on two sex of­fender cases in which she was or­dered to re­sen­tence the de­fen­dants and gave them the same pen­al­ties she’d pre­vi­ously im­posed.

“This has re­sulted in an ex­ten­sive de­ploy­ment of ju­di­cial re­sources to re­view, an­a­lyze, and rec­tify the court’s de­fi­cient sen­tenc­ing hear­ings,” the panel wrote.

In both of those cases, Judge McDaniel sen­tenced the de­fen­dants to twice what guide­lines rec­om­mended.

At both hear­ings, Judge McDaniel said from the bench that she con­ducted a statis­ti­cal anal­y­sis of her cases from 2012 to 2016, claim­ing that her sen­tences for sex of­fend­ers were com­pa­ra­ble to those of other judges.

In its opin­ion Wed­nes­day, the Su­pe­rior Court noted that Judge McDaniel did not in­clude any of her anal­y­ses in the cer­ti­fied record, mak­ing it im­pos­sible for the panel to con­sider her con­clu­sions.

Still, it con­tin­ued, “a statis­ti­cal anal­y­sis would not com­pel a dif­fer­ent re­sult.”

Pres­i­dent Judge Jef­frey A. Man­ning said late Wed­nes­day that he had not seen the opin­ion and could not com­ment on it.

“Judge McDaniel is an ex­tremely bright and ded­i­cated judge who has for many years pro­tected the rights of the ac­cused and at the same time guarded the rights of the vic­tims and wit­nesses in very se­ri­ous, of­ten vi­cious, sex of­fender cases which can spark sig­nifi­cant dis­agree­ment be­tween coun­sel and the court,” Judge Man­ning said.

“I will re­view the opin­ion and abide by the law­ful or­ders of the ap­pel­late court.”

PA: Allegheny County Judge Donna Jo McDaniel caught redheaded... er, "redhanded," regularly exceeding sentencing guidelines

Supporters of specialized "sex offender courts" should take notice, as this corrupt judge has been caught abusing her powers by exceeding state sentencing guidelines. Of course, she isn't going to be punished despite showing a pattern of this behavior. She shouldn't even have a job at this point.

http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2017/01/15/Pennsylvania-Superior-Court-questions-whether-Allegheny-County-Common-Pleas-judge-is-over-punishing-sex-offenders/stories/201701120030

Superior Court questions whether Common Pleas judge is over-punishing sex offenders
January 15, 2017 12:00 AM
By Paula Reed Ward / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The Pennsylvania Superior Court questioned whether a veteran Allegheny County judge is meting out overly harsh sentences in sex assault cases in a strongly worded opinion ordering that a defendant be resentenced.

In the 36-page opinion last week, the appellate panel suggested that Common Pleas Judge Donna Jo McDaniel, who presides over sex offender court, has shown a pattern in those types of cases. 

“We note our awareness of a possible emerging pattern in this particular sentencing court of routinely sentencing sex offenders in the aggravated sentencing range and/or outside the guidelines,” wrote Superior Court President Judge Emeritus John T. Bender. 

The opinion then cited in a footnote another of Judge McDaniel’s cases, that against Gabino Bernal, who last month also was awarded a second new sentencing hearing on charges of unlawful contact with a minor, indecent assault of a person less than 13 and corruption of minors. The Superior Court panels in both cases included the same members, Judge Bender, Judge Lillian Harris Ransom and Senior Judge John L. Musmanno.

Judge McDaniel did not respond to a request for comment.

In Bernal’s appellate brief, filed by the Allegheny County Public Defender’s office, his attorneys listed 14 cases currently on appeal — 10 for sexual offenses —  in which Judge McDaniel sentenced the defendants to serve the maximum possible penalty and ran multiple sentences consecutively. 

“There will always be cases where circumstances call for, if not practically compel, sentences which exceed the standard guideline recommendations,” Judge Bender wrote, noting that trial judges have wide discretion. “However, we expect that sentencing courts understand that a standard range sentence is the norm and, consequently, that sentences which exceed (or fall below) the standard recommendation should be relatively infrequent by comparison.

“The appearance of bias, and doubt regarding a court’s commitment to individualized sentencing, both rationally emerge when such a pattern of routine deviation from sentencing norms is demonstrated by adequate evidence.”

In the most recent case, captioned as the Commonwealth vs. A.S., the defendant, now 21, pleaded guilty on Feb. 17, 2015, in two separate cases to four counts of indecent assault of a child less than 13, two counts of unlawful contact with a minor, two counts of endangering the welfare of children, two counts of corruption of minors, sexual assault, indecent assault and incest.

The charges involved his siblings, which is why he is identified in the opinion only by his initials.

At sentencing on June 24, 2015, Judge McDaniel ordered A.S. to serve 7½ to 15 years in prison.

However, under the sentencing guidelines in the case, the standard range on the first case would have been 3 to 12 months incarceration -— she gave him 30 to 60 months, which was outside of the aggravated sentencing range.

In the second case, the standard recommended range was 36 to 54 months, and Judge McDaniel gave A.S. 60 to 120 months, which was in the aggravated range.

A.S. challenged the sentence, arguing that Judge McDaniel relied on information not present in the case to support the punishment she meted out. 

Among the statements made by Judge McDaniel at sentencing that the defense -— and subsequently the Superior Court -— said were untrue were: 

• That the defendant had prior sexual contact with the victims, as well as with another minor, several years earlier.

The Superior Court said that the record in the case does not substantiate that claim, and that the pre-sentence investigation showed that the defendant had no prior convictions as a juvenile or adult, and there was no evidence he was ever charged with another offense.

• That the defendant did not seek psychiatric help for his sexual misconduct until after he was arrested.

The appellate panel found that the court record directly contradicted that finding, and that it was A.S. who went to an area hospital with depression and suicidal ideation and disclosed what he had done, prompting the investigation to begin.

Then, when interviewed by the police, A.S. again admitted his crimes, the court found.

“The clear impression given by the sentencing court was that [A.S] only self-servingly sought mental health treatment for his sexual dysfunction after he was arrested. This is a clear misrepresentation of the record,” Judge Bender wrote.

• That the impact of the crimes on the victims must be “absolutely horrendous.”

At sentencing, Judge McDaniel received letters from the two victims in the case, who wrote that they have forgiven their brother and miss him. Both wrote that they did not want him to go to jail and that they would like him to continue treatment.

“I think in spite of the letters that your brother and sister sent me, that the impact on them must be absolutely horrendous,” Judge McDaniel said at sentencing. “I can’t imagine a child of that age, children of that age going through being attacked by someone that they loved and trusted.”

But the Superior Court wrote that outside of those letters, there was nothing in the record concerning the impact of the crime.

Most concerning, the opinion continued, all of those impermissible factors considered by Judge McDaniel, appeared to guide her sentence above the recommended guidelines. 

The court found a “disconnect” in evidence presented in the case which “told a wildly different story” than the sentence crafted by Judge McDaniel. 

A.S. is a young man with no prior record of any kind, Judge Bender wrote, who has admitted his crimes and is seeking treatment. He has a supportive family that has forgiven him and wants to assist him in continuing his treatment.

Referencing the possible trend presented by the Bernal case, Judge Bender wrote that Judge McDaniel’s sentence of A.S. tends “to match such a pattern, given the extreme dissonance between the circumstances of this case and the sentence(s) imposed. This invites the obvious question: if the circumstances at issue here do not warrant a standard or mitigated range sentence, when, if ever, will such a sentence be warranted?” Judge Bender wrote. 

Although the court did not go so far as to remove Judge McDaniel from the case against A.S. -— saying it did not have the authority to do so on its own -— it did suggest that he is able to ask for her to recuse herself from the resentencing. “in which context he may seek to develop a record of a pattern of bias, if one can be demonstrated by competent evidence.”

The Superior Court made a similar recommendation in its Dec. 19 opinion on Bernal, which it remanded for resentencing a second time.  

Bernal was first sentenced by Judge McDaniel in 2013 to serve nine to 18 years in prison. However, the Superior Court found that punishment to be in error and ordered a new sentencing hearing. 

Judge McDaniel then resentenced Bernal in 2015. Although the defense said at that hearing the guidelines called for three to 12 months incarceration in the standard range for the felony count, and probation for the misdemeanors, Judge McDaniel ordered Bernal to serve a total of six to 17 years in prison. That punishment included the statutory maximum for each count and stacked each one to run consecutively. 

Bernal argued in his second appeal that Judge McDaniel abused her discretion and used the sentence as “retribution” for the crime.

“[T]he record reflects that the sentencing judge was determined to impose the maximum sentences permitted by statute, regardless of the guidelines,” the Superior Court wrote. 

Paula Reed Ward: pward@post-gazette.com, 412-263-2620 or on Twitter: @PaulaReedWard.