Xudge Michael T. Joyce, Esquire | SENTENCED

Penn­syl­va­nia.  Hear Ye!  Hear Ye!

From the Key­stone State.  If you would like a state endorse­ment for reelec­tion as appel­late judge and enjoy long rides on the Harley,  golf­ing on pris­tine courses, scuba div­ing, learn­ing to fly a plane, and defraud­ing a cou­ple insur­ance com­pa­nies of *$440,000.00,* look no fur­ther than Erie, Penn­syl­va­nia.  There, nei­ther fed­eral indict­ments nor short term mem­ory loss will jeop­ar­dize your fit­ness to be endorsed by the State of Penn­syl­va­nia for another 10 year term on the bench.  Sound too good to be true?  Just ask for­mer appel­late Judge Michael Joyce.

The for­mer judge was sen­tenced to 3 years and 10 months in a fed­eral prison for insur­ance fraud stem­ming from pur­ported injuries he suf­fered in 2001 when an SUV rear-ended his state-leased Mercedes-Benz (although his lawyer reas­sured the pub­lic that he will endeavor to keep the for­mer appel­late Judge free pend­ing his appeal).  Pennsylvania’s Judi­cial Eval­u­a­tion Com­mis­sion took the alle­ga­tions, which included sub­mis­sion of his fraud­u­lent claim on judi­cial let­ter­head, very seri­ously:  It kept a close eye on the fed­eral grand jury inves­ti­gat­ing Joyce’s activ­i­ties while deem­ing Joyce fit to spend another 10 years on the bench.  Mean­while, after Joyce was indicted, the Penn­syl­va­nia Judi­cial Con­duct Board unequiv­o­cally reported that it was ful­fill­ing its duty to pro­tect the pub­lic by “mon­i­tor­ing the sit­u­a­tion.” 

Joyce, who had yet to suf­fer so much as a slap on the judi­cial wrist, was unde­terred by his indict­ment for mail fraud and money laun­der­ing.  With raw bravado rarely seen from the bench, he main­tained his inno­cence while run­ning for reelec­tion.  It is unre­ported what kind of appel­late cases Judge Joyce was decid­ing dur­ing the eight years within which he was either defraud­ing insur­ance com­pa­nies or defend­ing him­self against those charges.

In any event, 8 years after the car acci­dent that started it all, the for­mer judge had to pay the piper what we, at Evi­lEsq, know must have been the ulti­mate price.  The feds took his Harley.