Inmates charged with hanging man

in kangaroo court

SCRANTON, Pa. (AP) -Police say the judge was a convicted murderer, the attorneys were a parole violator and a burglary suspect. They allegedly tried a young drifter in a county jail, sentenced him to death, and had him hanged.

And authorities said yesterday that the kangaroo court was one of five that have been held by inmates at the Lackawanna County Jail.

Scranton police Capt. Frank Roche said: "The defendants were forced to commit homosexual acts... or were told, clean my cell, do my scrub duty tomorrow.' Jazz like that."

On Thursday, two inmates were charged with murder and one with conspiracy in the hanging death Feb. 6 of Clifford Doolittle, 21, a drifter who had been arrested in the killing of an ex-convict.

However, Roche declined to connect the trial and hanging of Doolittle directly with the ex-convict's death.

"It was a scheme really, not having anything to do with (the drifter's) offenses in or out of prison," said Roche. " but it's strictly a kangaroo court."

The Scranton Times reported that Doolittle's wife, Gladice, was told by an inmate that if her husband "got on his knees and begged for his life they would have let him live.”

"You don't ask a Doolittle to beg," she was quoted as saying, " he'd never do that."

...

Doolittle's body was found swinging from a window in his cell, a tidy hangman's noose woven from bedsheets around his neck. Authorities originally ruled the death a suicide, but an investigation was launched after three inmates told authorities of the alleged kangaroo court earlier this week.

Inmates Nicholas Karabin Jr., a 34-year-old convicted murderer, and James R. Martin, 39, a parole violator, were charged with Doolittle's murder. Joseph Bossick, 32, a friend of Martin's who awaited trial on burglary charges, was charged with conspiracy.

Police said Karabin was the judge who passed sentence, Martin, served as prosecutor and Bossick played defense attorney.