The state Superior Court said in an unpublished decision issued Thursday that a business partner in the juvenile detention facilities at the center of the Luzerne County judicial scandal cannot sustain his malicious prosecution claims against the Juvenile Law Center and the law firm of Hangley Aronchick Segal Pudlin & Schiller.
Gregory R. Zappala was a business partner in Mid-Atlantic Youth Services with Robert Powell, who colluded with former Luzerne County Court of Common Pleas Judges Michael T. Conahan and Mark A. Ciavarella Jr. to confine juveniles in two juvenile detention facilities by paying the judges close to $3 million, according to the opinion in Zappala v. Hangley Aronchick Segal & Pudlin .
