Tag Archives: #LarryKrasner

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Philly ADA Paul George disbarred from federal court, but so far, his boss, Larry Krasner, has skated

When an attorney of many years experience gets disbarred by a court, it is not a trivial thing, but a serious, serious punishment, and not something judges take lightly. But, congratulations to Philadelphia’s George Soros-sponsored, criminal-loving and police-hating District Attorney, Larry Krasner, for getting one of his minions kicked out of practice for deliberate lying to a a federal district court. From The Philadelphia Inquirer:

A supervisor in Philly DA Larry Krasner’s office has been disbarred in federal court

A panel of judges said Paul George “lied repeatedly” while seeking to overturn the death sentence of Robert Wharton, who killed a Mount Airy couple and left their 7-month-old baby behind to die.

by Chris Palmer | Thursday, December 11, 2025 | 12:33 PM EST

A veteran lawyer in the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office has been disbarred in the region’s federal courts after a panel of judges concluded he “lied repeatedly” while seeking to overturn the death sentence of a man who killed an East Mount Airy couple in their home and left their infant daughter inside to die.

Paul George, an assistant district attorney who handles appellate cases, was a key player in his office’s attempts to have Robert Wharton’s death penalty reversed so he could serve a life sentence instead.

U.S. District Judge Mitchell Goldberg denied that request, but not before finding that District Attorney Larry Krasner’s office had provided incomplete and misleading information in its efforts to free Wharton from death row.

After Goldberg made his decision, George and a colleague who handled the case faced federal disciplinary proceedings to examine whether their conduct — which was also criticized by an appeals court — was intentionally deceptive.

We get it: Mr Krasner is a long-time opponent of capital punishment, having campaigned on, among other things, never seeking a death sentence in a capital murder case.

But this paragraph, from the same article, shows the ridiculousness of Mr Krasner’s moves:

Krasner says his defense work doesn’t make him soft on crime, but rather someone who can differentiate between redeemable defendants and hardened criminals.

Mr Krasner and his minions are not seeking to have Mr Wharton released, or be granted a new trial, but simply to convert his death sentence to life in prison. We fail to understand how the District Attorney could consider Mr Wharton, now 62 years old, to be a “redeemable defendant” and still want to keep him locked up for the rest of his miserable life. Mr Wharton was tried and convicted in 1985, forty years ago. Here is Judge Goldberg’s memorandum opinion from May 11, 2022, noting all of the appeals filed in Mr Wharton’s behalf to save him from execution.

There’s also a particular degree of stupidity in all of this. Despite the current case being federal, as Mr Wharton’s attorneys, now joined by Mr Krasner’s office, sought relief under the Sixth Amendment, the killer was tried and sentenced in Pennsylvania’s state courts; he’s under a Pennsylvania capital sentence, not a federal one. The Commonwealth has executed exactly three men since the restoration of capital punishment in 1976, all in the late 1990s, and all having voluntarily dropped all of their appeals. Pennsylvania’s governors do not have the authority to commute sentences or pardon criminals on their own, but the two most recent governors, Tom Wolf and Josh Shapiro, the current Governor, have declared moratoria on executions, and refuse to sign death warrants. Ed Rendell, Governor from 2003 up until 2011, signed 78 death warrants, and his successor, Republican Tom Corbett, signed 48, but none were actually carried out due to various stays and legal appeals. The chances that Mr Wharton will actually be executed are slender, and Mr Krasner as well as Mr George have to know this. Why lie to the court, why deceive the court, why risk the legal sanction Mr George has now received, for this?

Maybe they’ll try next for Lewis Jordan, who’s only 39, and was sentenced to death for killing Philadelphia Police Officer Charles Cassidy, since Mr Krasner hates the police.

Remember: Mr Krasner wanted to find state charges he could bring against the January 6 Capitol kerfufflers after President Trump pardoned them, even though most had already served their federal sentences.

There is an issue of culpability here. Yes, Paul George and Nancy Winkelman were the ADAs making the appeals on Mr Wharton’s behalf, but Larry Krasner is their boss, should have known what they were doing, and taken action against it. If anyone should be disbarred, it’s Mr Krasner, but instead he was just re-elected for another four miserable years as District Attorney, to continue a previous eight years of lax and lenient prosecution, eight years which may have influenced the eight young gentlemen who thought they could rob a Dick’s Sporting Goods store in Polk County, Florida, and get the same no-consequences treatment in the Sunshine State, a story which made the national news as well as two Philadelphia television stations, but somehow, some way, never made the Inquirer.

OK, OK, that last sentence violated all sorts of run-on sentence rules, but it’s the truth nevertheless.

Larry Krasner is all about politics, not about justice, and not really about the law. He uses the law as a tool where he can, but he’s still nothing but a partisan hack.

 

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You in a heap o’ trouble, boys! Apparently, no one told them that you can't get away with crime outside of Philly!

It is of absolutely no surprise to me that a site search of The Philadelphia Inquirer’s website for “Polk County” turned up exactly nothing on these eight fine but misunderstood young men from the City of Brotherly Love being so unjustly arrested in Polk County, Florida. But, Alas! the newspaper’s lack of coverage was not able to keep the story from Philadelphians, as both 6ABC and NBC10 News did cover it:

8 Philadelphia youth football players face charges in Fla. theft case

By Corey Davis | Tuesday, December 9, 2025 | 9:05 AM EST

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) — Eight teenagers from the Philadelphia area are facing felony charges in Florida after authorities say they stole more than $2,000 worth of merchandise from a sporting goods store.

Neither 6ABC nor the NBC 10 News story named or showed mugshots of the arrested teens, but the Polk County Sheriff’s Office did. Sheriff Judd is rather famous for naming and shaming criminals arrested in Polk County, something this website absolutely supports. You can click on the image to the right to enlarge it to fill screen. The video of Sheriff Grady Judd’s news conference on this is embedded below, below the fold. Continue reading →

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Another victory for Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner!

Another victory for Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner! Mr Krasner just loves to put Philadelphia Police Officers in jail, and to release bad guys who are in prison.

Homicide detective Philip Nordo was clearly a bad cop, as The Philadelphia Inquirer reported:

A former Philadelphia homicide detective was arrested Tuesday and accused of grooming and sexually assaulting male witnesses during criminal investigations, then intimidating them to keep them silent — part of what prosecutors concluded was a pattern of misconduct during nearly a decade in one of the Police Department’s most prestigious units.

The accusations against Philip Nordo, 52, who was fired in 2017 after 20 years on the force, were unveiled in a grand jury presentment following a long-running probe into the ex-detective’s conduct. The charges include multiple counts each of rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, and sexual assault.

Mr Nordo was convicted on multiple charges and then sentenced to 24½ to 49 years in prison, which at his age 56, at the time of sentencing, is effectively a life sentence.

The District Attorney then began investigating convictions in which Mr Nordo had been involved, including the conviction of Arkel Garcia, then 21, for the murder of Christian Massey. Mr Krasner then got that conviction overturned:

A Philadelphia judge on Friday overturned a 2015 murder conviction after prosecutors said they believe the lead detective — who has since been charged with raping and sexually assaulting male witnesses during his time on the force — built a questionable case while also attempting to groom potential witnesses as sexual targets.

The District Attorney’s Office said in court documents that it no longer believes the defendant, Arkel Garcia, is guilty of killing Christian Massey, a 21-year-old man with special needs who was shot dead in Overbrook in 2013 over a pair of headphones.

Instead, prosecutors wrote, they believe ex-Detective Philip Nordo obtained a false confession from Garcia — the main piece of evidence supporting an otherwise weak case — as he simultaneously tried to pursue sexual relationships with two men he interviewed as part of the investigation.

“Nordo had ulterior motives during this investigation that had nothing to do with solving this murder,” Assistant District Attorney Michael Garmisa said in court Friday.

So, Mr Garcia was freed after 11 years in the big house. Great thing, right? Well, maybe not so much.

A man whose murder conviction was overturned for its connections to a disgraced ex-detective is now wanted for another murder

Arkel Garcia is suspected of beating an elderly acquaintance to death inside an apartment in Northwest Philadelphia.

by Ryan W. Briggs and Chris Palmer | Saturday, November 15, 2025 | 11:01 AM EST | Updated: 1:45 PM EST

A man whose murder conviction was overturned because of its connection to disgraced former Philadelphia homicide detective Philip Nordo is now suspected of committing another homicide, according to police.

Authorities have issued an arrest warrant for Arkel Garcia, 31, for the fatal beating of an elderly acquaintance on Wednesday inside a fourth-floor apartment in the city’s Stenton section in what authorities believe was a robbery, according to law enforcement sources.

Shortly before 11 a.m. Wednesday, 35th District officers responded to a report of a person with a weapon at an apartment unit on the 4900 block of Stenton Avenue, according to a police report. After a maintenance worker let officers into the unit, they discovered David Weinkopff, 68, in a wheelchair, with blunt force trauma to his face and stomach, his apartment ransacked.

Paramedics pronounced him dead a short time later.

Further down:

After Krasner’s office charged Nordo with sex crimes, it began reinvestigating more than 100 cases the detective helped build, and prosecutors later moved to overturn at least 15 convictions tied to him. Some reversals were considered exonerations — instances in which a conviction was overturned and charges dropped — while others were overturned and resulted in guilty pleas to lesser charges.

The District Attorney decided not to prosecute Mr Garcia again after the conviction was overturned.

Garcia’s impending arrest marks at least the second time that a person whose case was overturned due to Nordo’s misconduct was accused of committing another crime.

James Frazier was sentenced to life in prison after he confessed to being an accomplice in a 2012 ambush slaying of a man and his girlfriend. But he later appealed, arguing Nordo had coerced him into signing a false statement of guilt.

Frazier’s conviction was overturned in 2019. But he was later charged with shooting a man twice in the leg in 2021, apparently as part of a botched drug deal. He pleaded guilty the next year and was sentenced to 11½ to 23 months in jail, court records show.

If Mr Garcia is actually the man who murdered Mr Weinkopff — and he is presumed innocent until proven guilty — then it is obvious: the criminal-loving prosecutor’s efforts to release Mr Garcia are directly responsible for Mr Weinkopff’s death. Mr Garcia had previously confessed to assault in the killing of Mr Massey, a young man with ‘special needs,’ though he denied being part of the killing, but the throwing out of the convictions meant the assault to which he had confessed was also thrown out. He did assault several sheriff’s deputies in the courtroom, witnessed by the judge and everyone else in that room, and was sentenced to 5 to 10 years for aggravated assault, which is why he was not released from prison until about a year ago.

That former Detective Nordo is a bad guy does not mean that all of the cases he investigated were bad ones. But when the city’s chief prosecutor apparently believes all non-police officers are helpless and innocent little lambs, that’s what the City of Brotherly Love gets.

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Hold them accountable! How many officials' inactions and ineptitude contributed to the murder of Kada Scott?

Communications between Philadelphia law enforcement agencies.

Given that warrants and communications between the courts, the District Attorney’s Office, and the Philadelphia Police Department are done via quill pens and parchment paper, and sent between each other by messengers on foot, it is perfectly understandable that sometimes messages just don’t get delivered in a timely manner. And if the days are cloudy, sometimes it’s difficult for the recipients to read their ledger books clearly by just the light of their oil lamps. All of that makes what happened in the Keon King/Kada Scott case completely understandable!

Months before Kada Scott’s killing, Keon King was wanted for kidnapping his ex, but no one arrested him — even in court

by Ellie Rushing | Thursday, October 23, 2025 | 4:35 PM EDT

A month after Keon King was charged with breaking into his ex-girlfriend’s home and attempting to strangle her, police say, his violence escalated: In January, he returned to her home with a gun, then kidnapped and assaulted her.

A warrant for his arrest was issued days later.

In the weeks that followed, King twice appeared in Philadelphia court and stood before a judge in the initial strangulation case. But no one in the courtroom seemed to know he was wanted for kidnapping.

So both times, King walked out.

Clearly, the city was at fault for relying on messengers on foot, rather than providing a horse on which the messengers could get their pieces of parchment to the right people in a timely manner.

In February, despite the warrant for King’s arrest, prosecutors — seemingly unaware that police said he had recently attacked their key witness — withdrew the burglary and strangulation case when the victim failed to appear in court.

Police did not go to either hearing to take him into custody, and do not appear to have alerted the prosecutor about the new arrest warrant.

The messenger on foot must not have made it to the District Attorney’s Office on time.

And King was not formally charged with the kidnapping until April, when, for reasons that are unclear, he turned himself in.

Turned himself in to whom? Normally, a criminal suspect would have turned himself in at a police station, but reporter Ellie Rushing was not specific about that. But, regardless of where he surrendered, he was out on the streets again twenty days ago.

The shortcomings in those earlier cases came into focus this month after police said King abducted Kada Scott from outside her workplace Oct. 4, then killed her and buried her body in a shallow grave behind an East Germantown school. The death of Scott, 23, of Mount Airy, has unnerved a community and drawn national attention.

Naturally, in his attempt to win re-election, the District Attorney tried to shift blame onto someone else:

District Attorney Larry Krasner has said it was a mistake for prosecutors to withdraw the charges in the alleged kidnapping of King’s ex — and his office has since refiled them. He said the decision not to proceed with the case was made by a young assistant district attorney who was new at handling such prosecutions and who saw the victim’s absence as a fatal flaw, even though there was video evidence of the attack.

Also read: Ben Mannes, “Ideology over justice — How Larry Krasner’s policies failed Kada Scott“

Can we really say that the distinguished Mr Krasner threw a “young assistant district attorney” under the bus, given that there were no buses during the days of quill pens and inkwells?

Or perhaps it was the Republicans who control the state Senate who are to blame, for not funding SEPTA and its buses adequately?

If this “young assistant district attorney . . . was new at handling such prosecutions,” shouldn’t the District Attorney himself, or at least one of his more senior prosecutors have been supervising the “young assistant district attorney”? Shouldn’t someone more senior in that office been teaching him what he ought to do, for what he ought to check? Shouldn’t someone in the District Attorney’s Office other than the “young assistant district attorney” now squished under the wheels of a SEPTA bus he held accountable for his mistakes? Shouldn’t the DA himself bear the responsibility for the “missteps” which put Mr King out on the streets to (allegedly) have kidnapped and murdered Miss Scott?

Kada Scott, victim, and Keon King, alleged murderer. Photos via WPVI TV, because, naturally, the Inquirer would never publish them.

The rest of Miss Rushing’s article details the missteps and miscommunications between the police and prosecutors, something the District Attorney blamed on “their digital information systems (being) decades old.” Really? Microsoft stopped support for Windows XP a couple of decades ago; is the DAO still using that? I was using dispatching systems in the 1990s, the early 1990s, when our Dispatch office was able to send delivery tickets to satellite plants via modems. That was over thirty years ago.

But it needs to be said: if the accusations against Keon King are accurate, then a lot of other people contributed to Miss Scott being murdered. Under Pennsylvania Title 18 §2504(a), “A person is guilty of involuntary manslaughter when as a direct result of the doing of an unlawful act in a reckless or grossly negligent manner, or the doing of a lawful act in a reckless or grossly negligent manner, he causes the death of another person.” Were the inactions of the District Attorney’s Office, including the District Attorney himself grossly negligent?

I’m dreaming, of course: no judge would allow a charge of involuntary manslaughter against a government official for gross neglect of his duty, because such could be turned around against the judge himself. But it’s clear that somebody, a lot of somebodies, need to lose their jobs over this. Mr Krasner himself doesn’t have enough of a sense of shame to resign over this, but he should be overwhelmingly defeated in the upcoming election. Whoever was supposed to supervise the “young assistant district attorney” needs to resign or be fired. Whoever is responsible for communication between the police and prosecutors, at both ends of that, needs to join the unemployment line. Should the Police Commissioner, Kevin Bethel, resign? And whoever is responsible for informing judges of other judges’ cases and acts needs to start tending bar somewhere on South Street.

At least as of this writing, the Editorial Board of The Philadelphia Inquirer have not yet published their endorsement for District Attorney. We can only hope they endorse Pat Dugan and not again support soft-on-crime Larry Krasner.

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Killadelphia: I check Bluesky so you don’t have to! The last thing the criminal-loving and police-hating Larry Krasner wants is more law enforcement

According to the Census Bureau, the population of Philadelphia was 1,573,916 as of July 1, 2024, while the Philadelphia Police Department reported that there had been 269 homicides in the city during all of 2024. According to my precise calculations[1]269 ÷ 15.73916 = 17.091128116112931058582541889148, that meant the City of Brotherly Love had a homicide rate of 17.09 per 100,000 population. Apparently, District Attorney Larry Krasner thinks that’s just hunky-dory, a perfectly acceptable figure.

In a skeet on Bluesky, the city’s George Soros-sponsored, criminal-loving and police-hating District Attorney, Larry Krasner, posted a bit from an interview with CNN, saying:

The 10th Amendment says he cannot take over the Philadelphia Police Department as he is doing in D.C. D.C. is different. It’s not a state. Pennsylvania is a state, and Philadelphia is its biggest city. Our police department is controlled by the mayor. And oh, trust me, this mayor does not work for Donald Trump, and neither do we.

So, we will stand on this constitutional right that has been there forever. We will stand on the reality that you cannot claim, It is an emergency, when Philadelphia, as of today, has the lowest number of homicides in over 50 years. We may set the record, the record, for lowest crime overall in Philadelphia for more than 50 years, and at the same time we have some of the lowest incarceration. That’s not an emergency. Continue reading →

References

References
↑1 269 ÷ 15.73916 = 17.091128116112931058582541889148
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Poor, poor Larry Krasner is tearfully upset that he couldn’t lock up another cop for longer

Larry Krasner, Philadelphia’s George Soros-sponsored, criminal-loving and police-hating District Attorney, recently renominated for a third term, as the city’s chief prosecutor, is just spittle-flecking angry that he cannot keep a former Philadelphia Police Officer in jail any longer, and, of course, the denizens at The Philadelphia Inquirer have been outraged all along. Columnist Helan Ubiñas waxed wroth when the charges against former Officer Mark Dial were initially dismissed, because Mr Krasner’s minions didn’t do their jobs properly. The Inquirer’s long-time columnist, Helen Uniñas, waxed wroth that the charges were dismissed, calling it a “welcome and rare reminder that police are not above the law when Officer Mark Dial’s bail was revoked” last week, to jail him before trial, and yesterday was pissed because “prosecutors apparently did not present evidence that (Officer Dial) had committed a crime.” Shouldn’t her ire be reserved for the District Attorney and his minions, who failed to “present evidence that he had committed a crime”? Does Miss Ubiñas believe that all criminals should be held behind before bars before they are tried and convicted? How else can one interpret that revocation of bail was a “welcome and rare reminder that police are not above the law”?

The District Attorney was able to get the charges reinstated, but not the First Degree Murder charge he wanted. In Pennsylvania, a defendant can be held without bail is the charge carries a potential term of life imprisonment. The DA refiled on Title 18 §2502, “Murder generally,” but Third Degree Murder usually does not result in a life sentence. Mr Krasner still wanted Mr Dial kept in jail before he was tried and convicted of anything, and succeeded to the tune of ten months behind bars.

Former Philadelphia Police Officer Mark Dial sentenced — and immediately paroled — for killing Eddie Irizarry

Continue reading →

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Larry Krasner beclowns himself Once again, his spittle-flecked hatred for Republicans comes to the fore

Oddly enough, I couldn’t find anything in The Philadelphia Inquirer on this story, despite paying $5.49 per week for my digital subscription. But not to worry, several other news organizations carried it:

After January 6th pardons, DA Larry Krasner looks to state charges

Continue reading →

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To the surprise of no one, The Philadelphia Inquirer again endorses softer-than-Charmin-on-crime Larry Krasner Virtually nothing they wrote has to do with actual crime on the city's streets

Philadelphia Police Officers and FOP members block District Attorney Larry Krasner from entering the hospital to meet with slain Police Corporal James O’Connor’s family, because it was the District Attorney who had not kept Cpl. O’Connor’s killer in jail when he could have.

I wrote, on May Day, that I would be “completely unsurprised if The Philadelphia Inquirer in general, and far-left columnist Will Bunch individually endorse(d)” the city’s George Soros-sponsored, police-hating and criminal-loving District Attorney, Larry Krasner, for re-nomination. Well, I am completely unsurprised! Continue reading →

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Man, that Larry Krasner and his office are really stupid!

This site has previously noted the charges against former Philadelphia Police Officer Mark Dial. Officer Dial shot and killed criminal Eddie Irizarry when he believed that Mr Irizarry was reaching for a weapon.

The city’s George Soros-sponsored, police-hating and criminal-loving District Attorney charged Officer Dial with “first-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter, aggravated assault, and related offenses,” though, as you can see from Pennsylvania Title 18 §2502 above, first-degree murder was never an appropriate charge.

An at least reasonable case could be made for charging PA Title 18 §2503 Voluntary Manslaughter, a first degree felony, but there’s a high bar for the prosecution to surmount.

  • 18 §2503(b) Unreasonable belief killing justifiable. — A person who intentionally or knowingly kills an individual commits voluntary manslaughter if at the time of the killing he believes the circumstances to be such that, if they existed, would justify the killing under Chapter 5 of this title (relating to general principles of justification), but his belief is unreasonable.

Mr Krasner would have to prove that Officer Dial had an “unreasonable” belief that he was justified in shooting Mr Irizarry. Mr Irizarry had been driving erratically, and when he finally pulled over, he kept the car window up, was non-compliant, and raised his hand while holding a knife.

A Philadelphia judge dismissed all charges against Officer Dial, ruling that the prosecution had not presented evidence that a crime has been committed, so naturally the Usual Suspects decided that a riot was in order. Naturally, Mr Krasner refiled the charges, including first degree murder, and Mr Dial was rearrested, and denied bail.

Now, after nearly a year in prison, without having been convicted of anything, the former Officer is once again free on bail.

Mark Dial was released on bail after the Philly DA’s office dropped his first-degree murder charge

Dial had been in custody since last fall after he was charged with fatally shooting Eddie Irizarry in a traffic stop in Kensington.

by Chris Palmer, Ellie Rushing, and Rodrigo Torrejón | Thursday, August 9, 2024 | 10:50 AM EDT

The District Attorney’s Office has withdrawn a charge of first-degree murder against former police officer Mark Dial, a decision that prosecutors were effectively forced to make by a judge after failing to tell Dial’s attorneys about a key piece of evidence they intend to use against him at trial.

The decision, made Thursday, allowed Dial to be released from jail on bail to await a new trial date, now with a lead charge of third-degree murder. His case — which had been scheduled to begin in September — will now go before a jury in May 2025.

Dial’s bail was set at $200,000, and he paid the required 10% to secure his release shortly after noon Thursday, court records show.

The development served as the latest twist in the high-profile case, one that has taken an unusually circuitous path through the courts. Dial is accused of fatally shooting Eddie Irizarry during a traffic stop in Kensington last year, and his prosecution has now been tossed out, reinstated, and downgraded over the last 11 months.

Just what kind of ineptitude infests the District Attorney’s Office that they first made a mistake which got the charges dismissed, and now, if the first paragraph in the Inquirer’s story is accurate, they f(ornicated) up again. “(A)n unusually circuitous path”? That’s a polite way of saying that the DAO has been completely inept.

What was this whole charade other than an effort by Mr Krasner to punish Mr Dial pre-emptively, in case he couldn’t actually win a conviction?

Prosecutors months ago had hired an expert to prepare a report on whether Dial violated Pennsylvania’s use-of-force law for police when he shot Irizarry, a question that goes to the heart of the case and will determine whether Dial should be convicted. But prosecutors told Dial’s attorneys about the expert’s report only this week — something Dial’s lawyers said was unreasonable, and didn’t give them enough time to prepare a rebuttal.

Common Pleas Court Judge Glenn B. Bronson agreed, and said he did not want to delay the case and keep Dial incarcerated for months over an issue that prosecutors had effectively created.

“Why didn’t you tell them you were hiring an expert?” he said in court this week, later adding: “You sat on this for 10, 11 months.”

Judge Bronson offered the compromise, to reduce the top charge to third degree murder, which made Mr Dial eligible for bail. Prosecutors then urged the judge to restrict Mr Dial to house arrest, to punish him further, but the defense noted, to the judge’s satisfaction, that Mr Dial did not pose a flight risk.

All of the charges should be dropped, and Mr Dial compensated for the time he spent behind bars unjustly, and that compensation should come from Mr Krasner’s personal wealth.