Thirteen DAs Support Rafferty for Attorney General

john-raffertyState Senator John Rafferty unveiled another list of endorsements today.

Thirteen District Attorneys are backing Rafferty’s campaign.

“Those of us on the front lines protecting our communities in the streets and in the courtroom know how important it is have an attorney general with experience and integrity. John Rafferty is that man,” Lebanon County DA Dave Arnold said. “John Rafferty has not only been a prosecutor but he has been a leader in the legislature passing laws that protect our citizens. We’re proud to stand with John Rafferty for attorney general.”

“I’m honored to receive the endorsement of so many district attorneys,” Rafferty responded. “I will restore the relationships with the district attorneys that have deteriorated over the past four years. When I’m attorney general, the district attorneys will be my partners in protecting our citizens.”  

The full list of Rafferty’s new supporters is as follows: Bedford County District Attorney Bill Higgins; Blair County District Attorney Richard Consiglio, Bradford County District Attorney  Daniel Barrett; Chester County District Attorney Thomas Hogan; Columbia County District Attorney Thomas Leipold; Crawford County District Attorney Francis Schultz; Dauphin County District Attorney Ed Marsico; Delaware County District Attorney Jack Whelan; Lancaster County District Attorney Craig Stedman; Lebanon County District Attorney David J. Arnold; Schuylkill County District Attorney Christine Holman; Snyder County District Attorney Michael Piecuch and Wayne County District Attorney Janine Edwards.

Rafferty is running against prosecutor Joe Peters in the GOP primary. The election is set for April 26th.

UPDATE: Adams County DA Brian Sinnett is also backing Rafferty.

17 Responses

  1. The world’s fattest superintendent
    By Mike Ference

    Pat Risha may be a glutton for any food not nailed down, but when a crowd gone wild compares the political power broker to the private parts of the male anatomy, the West Mifflin Area School Superintendent has but one response; to meet him “after the meeting.” That’s according to a story in the August 27th edition of the Pittsburgh Post Gazette.

    Risha has a long and checkered career in Pennsylvania public education – and that’s putting it mildly – all in Southwestern Pennsylvania’s Mon Valley, aka Mob Valley. According to my sources, Risha wiggled out of gambling charges when a coffee shop manager agreed to accept responsibility for the crimes in exchange for his yearly salary of 20 grand at the time. The coffee shop was listed in the name of Risha’s wife and another partner’s wife, say my sources.

    But it was Risha who ran the place. One of my sources identified the bag man – a local mob guy and parishioner at St. Clare of Assisi Parish, in Clairton, PA. This is the same parish where former diocesan priest John Wellinger was assigned from 1985 to 1987.

    Click on the link below or cut and paste into your browser for the rest of the story
    http://www.examiner.com/x-12613-Pittsburgh-In

    For the record, my sources include a former West Mifflin teacher who also coached for Risha on the Clairton High School football team – on the team of another deMOBocrat-controlled town. Another source was a life-long resident of the Mon Valley who made rounds occasionally with the bag man described above. He also verified the details provided by the teacher/coach informant. Also for the record is the fact that there are more sources. Risha’s shenanigans are common knowledge.

    Another source who knew Risha during his stint at the South Allegheny School District recalled how Risha booked numbers and took gambling bets while in his superintendent’s office. That may be one of the reasons why Risha now prefers to earn his $137,606 salary in the comfort of his Belle Vernon home.

    Perhaps he needs multiple telephone lines to properly conduct his regular business.

    Sounds far-fetched? Not according to a former West Mifflin Police Chief who confided to me that Risha reported to a mob-like figure in the town of Glassport. Yes, still another Mon Valley mob town.
    Is this the best that Pennsylvania residents can expect when it comes to educating their children – a superintendent with no Ph.D. and highly questionable degrees & credentials, according to a well-informed source? How is this possible?

    Let’s take a look at Risha’s network of pals. Whatever school district is forced to hire Patrick Risha, there stands not far behind him lawyer Jack Cambest. He’s a partner in the law firm of Dodaro, Cambest, and Associates. One of the firm’s specialties is earning great sums of money for tying up school districts in litigious court battles.

    School districts with large annual fiscal budgets are candy stores for unscrupulous public serpents who traditionally award low-bid or no-bid contracts to friends and other associates who then kick back money to the desired parties. It’s all planned out in advance, and it’s one way to keep the right elected officials in office year after year. More on this topic at a later date.
    James Dodaro is the other partner in the law firm. This is the same James Dodaro known for handing out jobs to politically connected nitwits on the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission. Dodaro serves on that commission as one of the politically appointed chairpersons.

    It is a government agency labeled corrupt by a conservative watchdog group.

    The Commonwealth Foundation launched an advertising campaign that shows connections between commission officials mentioned in a Post-Gazette article which happens to describe them as “the Capitol’s original godfather” and “the globetrotting chief who hired a web of family and friends.” The commission needs to go, said Matthew Brouillette, president of the foundation. “It’s clearly one of the most scandalous, patronage-laden agencies that exists.”

    Dodaro, protégé of former Supreme Court Chief Justice Stephen Zappala, grew up playing with the judges children. According to author William Keisling, it was Steve Zapalla who mentored Dodaro while he attended Duquesne University Law School, next established Dodaro in the family law firm, and finally sponsored Dodaro’s appointment to the PA Turnpike Commission.

    How could such high-level Pennsylvania government officials get involved with a scumbag like Pat Risha? How is it that Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen Zappala Jr. has never managed to get downwind of Risha’s stench?

    Maybe if we had a real district attorney, things would be different.

  2. Demobocrats get caught doing the devil’s work
    Mike Ference

    It was late afternoon; mid-week, if I recall correctly. It was unseasonably warm for late January or early February. That was the time when I received a call from former Clairton Public Safety Director Bill Scully. It was the break in the case that my family and I had been praying for – or so I thought.

    My son Adam had been the victim of an attempted homicide, while on a school bus that had just crossed into Serra Catholic High School grounds, in McKeesport, PA. The shooter held a gun inches away from my son’s skull and fired one shot directly into the back of his head. The shooter then turned the gun on himself and fired one shot into his head, probably dying instantly, as he slumped downward with his gun falling into one of his jacket pockets. This occurred on December 5, 1989.

    According to Scully, the case had been quashed. This new development, transpiring literally weeks after the attempted homicide of my son, should have clinched the case – if only Bill Scully were a decent human being. Scully proceeded to tell me that the two Pennsylvania State Troopers who were assigned to patrol Clairton, on account of the city having no police force, somehow stumbled upon two boys climbing out of an abandoned underground mine shaft in a wooded area known as the flats. According to Scully, the shooter and his gang of alleged devil worshipers loafed in this area. Also according to Scully, it was the same area where neighbors complained about animal sacrifices – of neighborhood cats and dogs being killed, with their moans and cries being heard, mostly at night. Needless to say, if Scully and the suspicious parents in the area were correct, there’s no telling what might have been found in miles of underground mines.

    According to Scully, the two boys who were observed crawling out of the mine shaft were Robert Lasich and Jonah Dusi. Both were good friends the shooter who tried to kill my son.

    Here’s what Scully planned to do, or maybe what someone else had planned for Scully to do: The Bureau of Mines was contacted, so that it could send out a field representative the next day, in order to safely explore the underground mine and hideout. Nothing would be done to secure the sight except to place a steel plate over the hole and then to drop a bucket load of dirt in front of it, according to Scully. I immediately protested, telling Scully that it would never prevent teenage kids from shoveling the dirt away, then lifting the steel plate, and removing whatever incriminating evidence might be stashed in the gang’s hideout. Scully assured me that I was wrong. Muzz DiLonardo was the city employee who ran the heavy equipment and who also was a member of the St. Clare of Assisi Church where John Wellinger was once its pastor. He was also related to Bill Scully through marriage. Scully’s sister and DiLonardo’s wife are sisters-in-law.

    According to my sources, it was Muzz Dileonardo who allegedly was the bagman (picked up gambling slips and bets) for the Pat Risha coffee shop that was in his wife’s name and that was raided the week of the Super Bowl back in the 1990s (see my article The World’s Fattest School Superintendent for more details).

    After hanging up the phone with Scully, I immediately put in a call to Al Yates, the attorney my wife and I retained to represent my son’s interests following his handgun attack on the Serra Catholic bus. Yates was out of town, in Erie, according to his secretary. I called Scully back and half-threatened to police the area that night with my oldest son and a pair of shotguns. I knew better and could not have risked another family tragedy.

    When my attorney got back in town, I relayed the happenings. Yates said he would have hired a security firm to guard the area for the 12 hours or so before the Bureau of Mines inspector would have arrived. By now it was too late. Scully called the next day, in order to report that the dirt had been shoveled away, the steel plate removed from the opening of the mine shaft, and whatever was in the hideout was removed, except for a few cigarette butts and some other trash. Scully indicated that it was obvious that whatever was stored in the mines had been removed.

    Hindsight is always 20/20. But even an elementary school patrol guard could have come up with a better plan than Scully did. For starters, why wasn’t the media notified? That would have guaranteed no trespassing by anyone – and for a city suffering hard financial times – no financial charge. Why weren’t the investigating officers from the McKeesport police department called in? If they were, why didn’t they respond? Why wasn’t PA State Trooper Corporal Robert Griffin called? He was the expert brought into the case, to investigate the satanic and occult side of the case. Over a year later, I would meet with Griffin and his facial expression would show his disgust and disdain toward Scully for not making him aware of this event as I relayed the details. And finally, teenaged kids had been going in and out of the mine shaft probably for years. Just how unsafe would it have been to go inside? I would have gladly gone in and I should have.

    A sidebar to this story: In a lengthily Pittsburgh Post-Gazette exposé written by Joe Grata and published on November 24, 1996, Pat Risha’s checkered career was closely examined by the seasoned Post Gazette reporter. Here’s a quote from Grata’s report that may explain some of Scully’s less than admirable performances as a Mon Valley lawman, along with Scully’s connection to Pat Risha.

    Robert Weimer, former Alcosan director of administration,
    said Risha invited him to a private meeting at Ciccanti’s Risto-
    rante in Jefferson in April 1992, when Risha was aligned with
    Democratic county Commissioners Tom Foerster and Pete
    Flaherty. Weimer said Risha told him he would be fired by the
    end of the year “if I didn’t start piping Mon Valley people into
    jobs.” (Risha) “said I could have a good life if I wanted to coop-
    erate with him and be his inside guy at the authority,” Wiemer
    said. “I said no thanks. From that day on, he tried to destroy my
    life.” Alcosan dismissed Weimer six months later.

    Bill Scully is the security director at Alcosan. Was it a reward to Scully for protecting one of Risha’s informants? John Wellinger was a drunken pedophile Catholic priest, who may have dabbled in Satanism to lure his victims. What would it take for a rogue priest to sell information gleaned in the confessional? According to the notes I took while discussing my son’s shooting with Scully, Wellinger would go out every night accompanied by two or three others, sometimes to the symphony or to the theatre. I would learn many years later that Wellinger would often allegedly be accompanied by Pat Risha’s former wife Karen, Maria Campano (Wellinger’s long-time female companion), Babe Campano (a former Risha girlfriend I’m told), and Maria’s sister.

    Not very many levels of separation from Donald Wuerl to the mob – via John Wellinger, Pat Risha, Muzz Dilonardo, and Bill Scully. On the other end you have Donald Wuerl separated by his former legal advisor, former Pennsylvania Supreme Court Chief Justice Stephen Zappala, along with Zappala’s former protégé and PA turnpike commisisioner James Dodaro whose law firm Dodaro and Cambest served at Pat Risha’s pleasure. Mr. Risha passed away a few months ago.

    Scully – DiLonardo – Risha – Wellinger – Wuerl – Zappala- Dodaro – Risha – Dilonardo – Scully: Get the picture?

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  3. If you read down through the article you will find that Charles Porter is representing one of the Franciscan Provincials who covered up for the sexual abuse of innocent children.

    What are the odds that the son of a Pittsburgh mob underboss (Chuckie Porter) who happened to be partners with Stephen Zappala Jr. in a law firm would also represent would also represent scoundrels in the Roman Coward Church.

    In other words, mob muscle in the courtroom to remind the judge, prosecutors and witnesses that there better not be any skeletons in their closets.

    Or, maybe family members could be harmed.

    No different than DA Zappala being selected to serve on the board of the US Bishops Conference that oversees clergy sex abuse cases. Zappala’s presence sent a message nationwide that the Roman Coward Church had the muscle of the Sicilian mob. It’s okay for priests to rape and sodomize innocent children.

    No different than Stephen Zappala Sr. sitting on the Pittsburgh Diocesan review board that decides what cases of clergy sex abuse are credible. That’s easy for a Zappala, none of them And no Pittsburgh attorney better challenge a Zappala.

  4. Mike – I am sorry about your son. And the abuse scandal is a disgrace. Can you please tell me if you can connect this to any candidate directly? Or to the Office of any candidate?

    Because typing “Zappala Crime Family” over and over does not cut it.

  5. Attention Pittsburgh, PA College & High School Students:
    If you are drugged, raped or sodomized by a priest from the Pittsburgh Diocese

    DO NOT CALL 911.
    (Unless you want to help with a cover-up.)

    Is 911 the Pittsburgh Diocese’s Cover-Up Hotline?
    By Mike Ference

    In 1987, former Catholic priest John Wellinger, pastor of Holy Spirit Church in West Mifflin, PA, part of the Pittsburgh Diocese, allegedly drugged a teenage
    student attending the University of Pittsburgh. The crime allegedly took place in the student’s apartment that he shared with his brother, also a student at
    Pitt. Knocked out for hours, he intuitively called 911 when he woke.

    Sadly, that simply extended the nightmare.

    Running into the street to meet the paramedics, the student was taken to the Presbyterian University Hospital emergency room (now University of Pittsburgh
    Medical Center). He was admitted — but never examined.

    Unconscious for hours due to being given an unknown drug by someone he believed had bad intentions — yet no doctor bothered to examine him?

    It’s hard to imagine why medical personnel sworn to care for others in need would decide not to help this student. Until we consider the lengths that church officials have gone to in covering up cases of sexual abuse involving priests, all around the world.

    Could it be that the 911 call triggered an alert to the Pittsburgh Diocese that one of their own had harmed a student? Did Diocesan officials then pressure hospital officials to avoid contact? Why did the student receive no medical attention at Presbyterian University Hospital that day? Who paid the bill? These are all questions that I have asked of Paul Woods, Vice President & Chief Communications Officer at UPMC. (To verify my story, Mr. Woods can be contacted at 412-647-6647 or by cell at 412-352-2058.)

    To learn how I got involved in this story in the first place, you could contact former city of Clairton Public Safety Director William Scully.

    During another possible cover-up — this one involving a near-fatal shooting of my son in 1987 by a boy who then killed himself and may also have been a victim of Wellinger — Scully gave me handwritten notes that were almost identical to the information I later received from the Pitt student who was drugged and probably assaulted. Not sure how to you can reach Scully these days. He’s enjoying his second government pension as a retiree of ALCOSAN, one of Pittsburgh’s most corrupt government agencies. He was the director of security — which means he guarded poop.

    He also enjoys a pension from the city of Clairton, where he never had the years to actually qualify for a pension. A Clairton councilman spearheaded the proposal to give Scully a pension. Typical in the deMOBocratic Mon Valley.

    I still have Scully’s notes — given to me in the presence of a witness — as well as a transcript of an interview with a woman from Holy Spirit Church who warned the Pittsburgh Diocese about Wellinger but was turned away and labeled a gossip-hound. There’s a paper trail from the Pittsburgh Diocese to the victim’s father too.

    In short, although I am careful to use the term “alleged” in cases like the Pitt student’s, or the boy who tried to kill my son, there is plenty of evidence to verify these stories. And, in my own experience, abuse involving priests like Wellinger seems to be almost common knowledge for many in our region.

    As an alumni of the University of Pittsburgh School of Social Work, I assure you I have no ax to grind with the school. I’m searching for truth and justice — as I have during more than 25 years of investigating clergy abuse and corruption in the Pittsburgh Diocese and PA government. These efforts have not been in vain. Pressure from myself and others has helped force the Pittsburgh Diocese to send out warning letters concerning three clerics in the past year: Father Michael LeDoux, former headmaster at Serra Catholic High School, Brother Kenneth Ghastin, former monk and teacher at Serra Catholic High School, and Father John Wellinger, former assistant at St. James Parish in Wilkinsburg.

    For more details, please contact me at 412-233-5491.

    P.S. Fortunately for Bishop David Zubik and the Pittsburgh Diocese, are partners with the Zappala Crime Family which keeps everything under the radar.

  6. Marie – Too funny (Union League and bow-ties …)!! And you are correct. Seth Williams is over a barrel. He can fire Fina and say goodbye to his last avenue to more $$$ (aside from Johnny Doc). Or he can keep him and continue this career suicide.

    Below is the article that talks about Corbett guy Mike Barley – Seth Williams’ new campaign manager – and the bartender that heads up Seth’s PAC. it’s a great read. The reporters went to interview the bartender. He had NO IDEA what the reporter was talking about. Seth just listed the bartender on his PAC because he is a Democrat and was trying to conceal that he is in bed with Corbett Republicans. Seth is a snake. A Repervlican in Democrat’s clothing …

    http://articles.philly.com/2016-03-15/news/71513917_1_d-a-williams-new-pac-campaign

  7. Are you ready kids? “Aye Aye Captain”
    I can’t hear you! “AYE AYE CAPTAIN”
    Oohh…
    Who lives on his knees and drinks lots of TEA?
    “bungy RETARD”
    Stupid and yellow and troll-like is he!
    “bungy RETARD”
    If Repervlican nonsense be something you wish
    “bungy RETARD”
    Then drop to your knees and suck like a fish!
    “bungy RETARD”
    READY?
    “bungy RETARD”
    “bungy RETARD”
    “bungy RETARD”
    BUNGY RETARD !! AH AHH AHH AHAHAHAHAHAHAHHH…

  8. Marie FINA still has no interest in you. You are SAD and PATHETIC. Give up your FANTASY man FINA, it will not happen for you. SORRY.

  9. Aaron – Fina is now Seth Williams’ only friend left. Do you think it is just a coincidence that, right as the Feds tighten their noose and Seth runs out of money, he just so happens to stumble upon a Corbett Republican in Harrisburg to be his campaign manager? It’s laughable. But, it’s also easy to follow. Frank Fina is also a Corbett guy. Seth, on the ropes, is desperate for friends and desperate for money. Fina hooks him up with his pal, Mike Barley and a Harrisburg bartender (LMAO). Seth starts hanging out at Union League, demoting hard-working female Deputies, getting fat and wearing bow-ties, sleeping with women he hired (and vise versa) …… and his transformation to Corbett Repervlican is complete. It’s hard to decide who is more pathetic – Seth Williams or Frank Fina.

    And I do think it is telling that nobody is even asking Seth Williams for an endorsement!!!

  10. Why is it that none of the candidates for AG want the endorsement of Philadelphia’s newest Republican – Seth Williams? LOL ….

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