Court Chief: Fellow Pa. Justice Exchanged Porn Emails

A scandal involving pornographic emails circulated within the Pennsylvania attorney general's office widened at the highest level of the judiciary Wednesday when the state's chief justice said 234 emails with sexually explicit material or pornography were sent or received by a fellow justice.

Chief Justice Ron Castille said in a news release that Justice Seamus McCaffery sent most of the emails to a now-retired agent with the attorney general's office, who then forwarded them to others. Castille said the seven-member court is reviewing the matter further.

Neither McCaffery nor his lawyer, Dion Rassias, responded to requests for comment. Rassias told The Philadelphia Inquirer earlier this month that he wondered "why a half-dozen private emails, allegedly from Justice McCaffery's personal computer, are front-page news."

Justice Corry Stevens, a Corbett appointee and the court's newest member, said the high court has no specific plans to meet to discuss the emails, and he suggested it would not be the Supreme Court's role to investigate further. He said it would be up to McCaffery to decide whether to step down or not.

"I think there's some fact-finding that needs to be done and that would really not be the Supreme Court, I would think," Stevens said.

The new details were disclosed after Castille was provided with the emails, at his request, by the attorney general's office Friday. Castille said neither he nor the other five justices was implicated.

McCaffery, 64, was elected as a Democrat seven years ago, after serving as a Philadelphia municipal judge and a member of the state Superior Court, an intermediate appeals court. A former Philadelphia police officer, he also presided over the so-called Eagles Court that operated inside Veterans Stadium on NFL game days.

The circulation of pornography within the attorney general's office from late 2008 until early 2012 has led three former members of that office to leave their government jobs, including a member of Gov. Tom Corbett's Cabinet, and a fourth former member to announce Wednesday he would resign at the end of this month.

The announcement by Randy Feathers, appointed by Corbett to the state Board of Probation and Parole, follows claims by Attorney General Kathleen Kane that he sent more than three dozen pornographic or sexually explicit emails and received more than 400.

Feathers, who supervised agents who investigated Jerry Sandusky, said in a news release that he will retire from the $116,000-a-year job at the end of the month.

Feathers said his retirement — after Corbett pressured him to resign — "should not be taken as an acknowledgement of the degree of wrongdoing."

"I never initiated any of the referenced pornography nor did I ever view any pornographic videos," wrote Feathers, who did not respond to an email request for an interview. "These accusations date back more than five years and my efforts to hire an independent forensic expert to exonerate myself have not been answered."

He said his decision to retire Oct. 30 was prompted because he can no longer be effective in the job.

His written statement said he has had a "difficult" relationship with Kane, who uncovered the emails during a review of how the office handled the Sandusky investigation, a probe that she had promised while running for attorney general in 2012.

That investigation found no direct evidence electoral politics influenced any important decision in the Sandusky child molestation case, which led to a 45-count conviction in 2012 for which the former Penn State assistant coach is serving 30 to 60 years in prison.

"I became certain that ... Kane's priority was not an objective overview of our years of hard work, but rather a politically motivated effort to smear reputations during an election year," Feathers wrote.

Corbett, a Republican, has been trailing badly in the polls heading into the final weeks of a re-election effort. Kane is the first elected Democrat to serve as attorney general.

Corbett has said he was unaware of the pornographic emails, and there have been no allegations he received or sent any.

Environmental Protection Secretary Chris Abruzzo and a lawyer in his department, Glenn Parno, resigned Oct. 2, and a Lancaster County prosecutor, Rick Sheetz, stepped down last week. Sheetz had led the attorney general's criminal division before Kane took office.

Feathers initially resisted Corbett's call for him to resign.

Kane has not disclosed the names of her office's current employees who forwarded or received the emails, citing confidentiality rules under union contracts, and because the state's open records law does not require it. Current employees have been told they are subject to discipline, she has said.