It’s been a busy year for Times Leader staff writers, one that took them everywhere from the Luzerne County Courthouse to local schools. As we ring in the New Year, our reporters to share their picks for the top stories of 2015.
Hugo Selenski gets life in prison
A whirlwind, decade-long legal drama that saw a stunning prison escape and a plot to kill a key witness came to a close in February when a Luzerne County jury convicted Hugo Selenski of double homicide.
Selenski, then 41, received consecutive life sentences from Luzerne County Judge Fred A. Pierantoni in the 2002 strangulation deaths of Tammy Lynn Fassett and Michael J. Kerkowski.
Selenski and an accomplice, Paul Weakley, tortured and killed the couple at Kerkowski’s home in Hunlock Creek in a robbery attempt. A state prison inmate was later charged after he attempted to solicit a “hit” on Weakley prior to Selenski’s trial.
After being charged in 2003, Selenski later that year used bed sheets to repel seven stories down the base of the Luzerne County Correctional Facility, using his mattress to hop a razor-wire fence and escape. Selenski was captured three days later at his Kingston Township home.
The verdict, which came nearly 12 years after the couple’s bodies were found buried in the backyard of Selenski’s Kingston Township home, was received with hugs shared between the victims’ families and a courthouse outburst that saw Selenski’s brother, Ronald, arrested for making threats to prosecutors.
County manager hangs up his hat
Robert Lawton and his performance as Luzerne County government’s top manager dominated discussions at many county council meetings in 2015.
Would he stay or go? Was he doing a good job or not? Will he leave on his own or be fired? Lawton put the subject to rest when he resigned from the position he held for nearly four years, effective Dec. 31.
He was the county’s first non-interim manager under the home rule government structure implemented in January 2012. Much of the council’s focus in 2016 will be on finding Lawton’s successor and determining whether the new form of government should remain in effect.
Voters are free to alter the home rule structure or revert back to the prior system of three elected commissioners when the current setup completes its five-year anniversary at the end of 2016.
Community bands together to save veteran’s home
Residents from the Wyoming Valley and throughout the country came to the rescue when 91-year-old Wilkes-Barre Township veteran Abram Belles faced the loss of his home due to delinquent real estate taxes.
After reading the Times Leader’s reporting on Belle’s plight, Dallas resident John Daily, who got to know Belles from cleaning his carpets in the past, set up an online GoFundMe account that raised $13,275 to get Belles’ home out of the auction and pay his back taxes. There was enough left over to also get taxes caught up on a rental property Belles had inherited.
Leighton decides not to seek re-election
So long Mayor Tom Leighton. After nearly a quarter of a century as an elected official — 12 years each as a councilman and mayor — Leighton, 55, in February announced his exit from Wilkes-Barre city government. He said he would not seek a fourth term as mayor.
The Democrat’s decision ended speculation about his future and cleared the way for new leadership. Councilman and former police chief Tony George, who had butted heads with Leighton over big and small issues, will take over on Monday.
Leighton had repeatedly touted the establishment of a credit rating for the city, A-minus with a stable outlook as of December 2015, and the creation of an 18-hour downtown that did not shut down after 5 p.m. among his major accomplishments. He acknowledged leaving some things undone, but remained a believer in the city.
Local education
Washington replaced the No Child Left Behind law that mandated high stakes testing nationwide with a new law curbing the use of standardized tests. Harrisburg created a budget impasse in June, still unresolved on New Year’s Eve, that wreaked havoc on local school district finances. But the real local education story of the year had to be the Wilkes-Barre Area School Board’s decision to merge two venerable high schools.
The June vote to close Meyers and Coughlin and move the students to a new building on the Coughlin site — at a cost estimated as high as $100 million — evoked hours of public criticism at every school board meeting and spawned the new Save Our Schools organization.
Local businessman Bob Sypniewski emerged as a savior, offering private money from distant investment companies to the district, then faded from view. The school board mulled buying buildings, including the Times Leader edifice on North Main Street, buying modular classrooms for more than $2 million and setting up a private-public partnership in which Panzitta Enterprises would buy and renovate a building to be leased to the district. Yet the year ended with plans still in the air and critics contending there are far more questions than answers.
Some other education stories that topped the year’s news:
• The SHINE afterschool program came to Luzerne County at the start of the 2015-16 school year, promising free help to at-risk students.
• Bear Creek Community Charter School, having radically outgrown its cramped quarters in a former Wilkes-Barre Area elementary building, showed off the region’s newest school in December, a sweeping, $22 million structure set among 96 wooded acres.
• Wilkes-Barre Area unveiled the more modest $9 million renovation of the former Mackin Elementary building, which will house half the Coughlin High School students beginning in January. Greater Nanticoke Area School Board opted to begin a plan for an $8 million expansion of J.F. Kennedy Elementary and eventually close K. M. Smith Elementary.
• Wilkes University announced a $3.3 million donation — the school’s largest ever — from philanthropist John Passon for renovation and expansion of the nursing school. Wilkes also plans to move and enlarge the Sordoni Art Gallery, taking advantage of the new Gateway Project that runs through the campus from South Main Street to Franklin Street.
Religion
The Diocese of Scranton continued to transform in response to fewer priests, knocking down churches and ordaining permanent deacons to help fulfill priestly duties. But the biggest story, by far, was the visit of Pope Francis, who stirred things up from the start with a more relaxed stance on gays and abortion, a call for mercy and service to the disadvantaged and a strong statement supporting the notion of climate change and global warming.
Bishop Joseph Bambera and other religious leaders participated in many events with the leader of the Roman Catholic Church as the pope visited Washington, D.C., New York and Philadelphia. Some 2,800 diocesan faithful journeyed to the City of Brotherly Love hoping for a glimpse, though many were stymied by tight security that prompted rigorous criticism post-visit.
Business
Uber, the ride-sharing giant tech company, launched operations in the Wyoming Valley Area in February, evoking safety concerns and outcry from established taxi companies.
Blue Cross of Northeastern Pennsylvania officially merged with Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield June 2, meaning about 550,000 health plan members in BC NEPA’s 13-county coverage area joined about 4.7 million in Highmark, one of the 10 largest health insurers in the country.
Social
The Wilkes-Barre chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People got a new president for the first time in 18 years as Ron Felton stepped down and Larry Singleton stepped up in January. Nine months later, a years-long effort came to fruition as officers were elected for the newly formed NAACP Youth Council No. 28AM.
Leighton
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Leighton
Selenski
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Selenski
Lawton
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Lawton
Selenski John Daily hugs Abram Belles after giving Belles receipts for his now-paid back taxes.
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Selenski John Daily hugs Abram Belles after giving Belles receipts for his now-paid back taxes.
Aimee Dilger|Times Leader file photo
Times Leader staff