John Jefferson
Left: Judge Steve Stambaugh with his motorcycle (Facebook/Steve Stambaugh). Right: then judicial candidate Stambaugh speaks at York County Bar Association Judicial Candidates Forum in 2021 (YouTube/White Rose Community TV).
A personal injury lawyer known for riding a Harley-Davidson motorcycle was indicted Tuesday for more than two dozen crimes, including an obstruction of justice offense he allegedly committed after he was elected and serving as a state judge in Pennsylvania.
York County Court of Common Pleas Judge Steven Stambaugh, 61, stands accused of “unjustly enrich[ing] himself” during the COVID-19 pandemic by claiming to lay off employees at his personal injury law firm Stambaugh Law, P.C., and paying them with government money even as those employees continued to work.
The indictment on a whopping 26 counts of wire fraud, two counts each of mail fraud and witness tampering, and one obstruction count, claims that the fraud scheme began in March 2020 and continued for two months, but that in the year that followed the judge tried to get an employee, identified in documents as “Employee #4,” to lie before that witness’ “anticipated testimony before a federal grand jury.”
The defendant “did knowingly attempt to intimidate and corruptly persuade” the witness to “lie to those investigators by stating that any work performed while ostensibly laid off was voluntary, and that Steven Stambaugh” did not require Employee #4 to work while collecting unemployment, with the intent to hinder, delay and prevent the communication” to authorities of “information relating to the commission and possible commission of a federal offense, namely, unemployment compensation fraud,” the indictment alleged.
The indictment further alleged that Stambugh, including while serving as a judge in 2022, obstructed justice by “urging Employee #4 to ‘back him up’ and follow his instructions” amid the federal probe and intimidating the witness by saying the judge would “retaliate against Employee #1 for allegedly reporting his conduct to federal authorities[.]”
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According to the U.S Attorney’ Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, the wire fraud and witness tampering charges are punishable by up to two decades in prison upon conviction.
Law&Crime reached out to a defense attorney for Stambaugh for comment.
Stambaugh’s personal injury firm website, still online, emphasizes that he “owns and rides a 2014 Harley-Davidson Ultra Classic Limited” and for that reason he “not only understands the dangers bikers face every day that they ride, he faces the same dangers himself.”
He went on to be elected to a 10-year judicial post in York County in November 2021.
Read the indictment here.
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