Judge who sets low bonds clashes with sheriff, courts
Two of his recent cases under review
Allegheny County court administrators are investigating the conduct of District Judge Mikhail Pappas after his recent handling of bond in two separate cases — including a Florida fugitive who was given a $1 bond and ordered to be released and a Chinese man who was given a non-monetary bond in a sexual assault case and has returned to China.
Common Pleas President Judge Jeffrey A. Manning said Tuesday that he asked Magisterial Court Administrator Angharad Stock to review District Judge Pappas’ recent actions and make a referral to him for action. Judge Manning said that action could range from “a stern talking-to to a referral to the Judicial Conduct Board.”
“I don’t necessarily like the idea of reporting a judge, so I intend to handle this without doing so,” Judge Manning said.
District Judge Pappas said Tuesday that he stood by his decisions, and he expressed frustration with both law enforcement and colleagues in the court system.
“I stand by my track record,” he said. “I think it demonstrates sound discretion.”
District Judge Pappas, a
Democratic Socialist, was elected in an upset victory in November and has raised the ire of prosecutors and defense attorneys alike for his lengthy court sessions, decisions on bail matters, and what they see as his overstepping of his judicial role.
In July, District Judge Pappas gave 58-year-old Yan Mo a non-monetary bond in his sexual assault case and then ordered the man an Uber so he could get home after he was released.
Mr. Yan was arrested by Bethel Park police July 12 after a woman was assaulted at South Hills Village Mall, according to a criminal complaint.
Mr. Yan worked at Home Spa, which provides massages. A woman who went to the business that day with her teenage daughter said Mr. Yan rubbed against her inappropriately during her massage, unhooked her bra and began to pull down her pants, according to the complaint.
She reported the incident to the police, and a detective arrested Mr. Yan on charges of indecent assault, a misdemeanor, and harassment, a summary offense.
According to the criminal complaint, Mr. Yan, who does not speak English, had only been in the United States for a week, did not have a permanent address and had a Chinese passport.
Bethel Park Detective Giles Wright wrote in the complaint that he believed Mr. Yan was a potential flight risk. But when Mr. Yan appeared for his preliminary arraignment July 13, District Judge Pappas granted him a non-monetary bond and ordered his release.
“It was a tough decision, I have to admit,” District Judge Pappas said Tuesday. “Because on one side, he is charged with a misdemeanor, which is not a situation in which I’d be inclined to use a coercive bond condition like money or lots of non-monetary conditions. But on the other side, he is from another country and he doesn’t understand the process. So the question is, does that mean he should then sit in jail until his case is heard?”
District Judge Pappas also said Mr. Yan had no known priorcriminal history.
“Maybe in the future, given those circumstances, I might think about it another way, given what happened in this case,” District Judge Pappas said. “It’s one of those that slipped through the cracks.”
After granting Mr. Yan bond, District Judge Pappas then sat in the gallery until the man was released and called the man an Uber to get home, an Allegheny County Sheriff’s official said.
“He had no idea how to take a bus or any of that,” District Judge Pappas said. “I thought it was the more humane thing to do. It’s not like I bought him a plane ticket back to China. We’re just trying to make sure this person was not out on the street.”
He said he did not consider it to be a conflict of interest at the time.
“I thought about it and I didn’t at the time,” he said. “Obviously that discussion needs to be had. It’s a rare thing. I was sympathetic to this individual.”
Ms. Stock said District Judge Pappas’ decision to order the Uber is under review.
“It could raise the appearance of a lack of impartiality and impropriety,” she said.
Mr. Yan appeared for his preliminary hearing July 19, but after it was continued, the sheriff’s official said, Mr. Yan returned to China. That, the official said, was confirmed through immigration officials.
Inthe second case being reviewed, the sheriff’s fugitive taskforce was asked by Pinellas County, Fla., officials to serve a protection-fromabuse order on Wayne McKenith, 36, of McKeesport. When officers ran McKenith’s background, they found that he also was wanted on a June 21 warrant from Florida for unemploymentcompensation fraud.
McKenith was arrested Aug. 22 on the fraud charge and appeared before District Judge Pappas for his preliminary arraignment the next day.
District Judge Pappas grantedthe man a $1 bond and orderedhim to be released. He said Tuesday he was not aware of the protection-fromabuse order, and that he felt the nominal bond would ensure the man’s attendance at futurecourt dates.
“He made me a promise he’d satisfy this matter,” District Judge Pappas said.
After the $1 bond was granted, fugitive task force members, who were alerted to the judge’s actions by others in the courtroom, rearrested McKenith as soon as he walked out the front doors of the jail.
Because the Florida warrant was never cleared since McKenith never made it back to that jurisdiction, it meant that, technically, McKenith was still considered to be a fugitive.
“He let the guy go like it’s a joke,” Allegheny County Sheriff William Mullen said. “We don’t know what Pinellas County has on him.”
It will cost thousands of dollars to have McKenith extradited, he continued, meaning that to Florida officials, the case is important.
“I don’t think it’s up to a magistrate to assume this is trivial,” Sheriff Mullen said. “It’s offensive. It defeats our purpose that we have to go back and arrest them again and again.”
District Judge Pappas said he disagreed with the sheriff’s actions in this case.
“What impression does it create in the eyes of the defendant in terms of the fairness of the process?” he said. “He’s promised to a judge, an issuing authority, that he will self-report in two weeks. He is given bond conditions by the court. And then those bond conditions aren’t acknowledged or respected by the sheriff.”
District Judge Pappas added that he recently reviewed roughly 100 cases in which he had set bond for defendants since May — excluding cases where defendants were released on their own recognizance — and found that only about eight defendants either re-offended or failed to report.
“I have a pretty good track record with these cases,” he said. “It’s easy to cherry-pick certain cases that did fall through the cracks, but how about reporting on the much larger majority in which non-monetary conditions were imposed and were helpful?”
After McKenith was arrested the second time, Ms. Stock said, he was given a $100,000 straight bond. County officials confirmed Tuesday that he remained in the Allegheny County Jail awaiting extradition to Florida.