Listen to article \u2022\u00a00:00 min<\/p>\n
Convicted former Philadelphia labor leader John Dougherty<\/a> will remain in prison after a federal judge again denied Dougherty\u2019s request to be released on house arrest<\/a> to provide care for his gravely ill wife.<\/p>\n U.S. District Judge Jeffrey L. Schmehl wrote in a memorandum filed Thursday that Dougherty and his lawyers had failed to demonstrate that he was the only person who could provide adequate care for his wife, Cecelia, who for years has suffered from a debilitating brain injury.<\/p>\n In addition, Schmehl wrote, Dougherty did not sufficiently specify when a trust fund established to support his wife\u2019s care would run out of money. Those factors, coupled with the \u201cminimal amount of time\u201d Dougherty has served in his six-year sentence, Schmehl wrote, \u201cdo not weigh sufficiently in favor of relief.\u201d<\/p>\n The decision was a blow to Dougherty, 66, who for months<\/a> has been contending in court documents and in testimony before Schmehl that his wife\u2019s condition has significantly worsened while he has been imprisoned, and that if he is not released to care for her, she will likely die.<\/p>\n Dougherty\u2019s attorney, George Bochetto, said in an interview Thursday that he was \u201cdeeply, gravely disappointed\u201d by the ruling, and that he disagreed they had not shown the acute nature of the emergency that should qualify Dougherty for release. <\/p>\n \u201cI thought the evidentiary hearing we had in front of Judge Schmehl was extraordinary, and it left no doubt in anybody\u2019s mind\u201d about the merits of Dougherty\u2019s petition, Bochetto said.<\/p>\n The ruling followed another rejection in Dougherty\u2019s ongoing bid for freedom. Earlier this month, President Donald Trump<\/a> denied Dougherty\u2019s request for a commutation<\/a>, a legal avenue that could have cut Dougherty\u2019s prison term short.<\/p>\n Schmehl, in his memorandum, did say that Dougherty could file a renewed motion in the future, \u201cshould the facts materially change.\u201d<\/p>\n Bochetto said he would not wait that long. He was already working on his notice of appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, he said, and he intended to ask the court to consider the case on an emergency basis.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is why God invented appellate courts,\u201d Bochetto said.<\/p>\n Dougherty was sentenced in 2024 to six years in prison<\/a> after being convicted in separate bribery and embezzlement trials that centered on actions he took while serving as the head of his politically powerful union, Local 98<\/a> of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. <\/p>\n But last year, Dougherty \u2014 known colloquially as Johnny Doc \u2014 filed emergency motions<\/a> asking Schmehl to allow him to serve the remainder of his prison term on house arrest so he could be his wife\u2019s primary caregiver. <\/p>\n In his first request, filed in the summer, Dougherty said that the trust fund established to pay for her care was about to run out of money, and that his daughters and other relatives were unable to provide the kind of around-the-clock assistance she needed.<\/p>\n Then, in December, he filed another motion, saying the situation had become more dire after the death of his father-in-law<\/a>, who had been serving as the primary caregiver in his absence.<\/p>\n Prosecutors opposed Dougherty\u2019s requests, saying that although they were sympathetic to his wife\u2019s plight, they did not believe he had served enough of his sentence to merit release.<\/p>\n