Carlia Magpantay Brady, a suspended New Jersey State Judge, has plead ‘not guilty’ for harbouring her fugitive boyfriend at her home.
Brady faces a five to 10 year sentence for charges that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has called “deplorable and frankly, stupid.”
Brady entered the plea on July 15 at her formal arraignment in Somerset Country Superior Court – Brady did not attend the arraignment due to a medical issue.
The former $165,000-a-year paid judge is accused of harboring Jason Prontnicki, her boyfriend. Prontnicki has had an arrest warrant issued on him in 2013 for armed robbery of a pharmacy in Old Bridge, New Jersey.
Reports involving the crime say that Prontnicki threatened the pharmacy owner with a crowbar and demanded drugs.
Brady was indicted by a grand jury on May 15th on two counts of hindering the apprehension of a fugitive and one count for official misconduct.
She stands accused of “allegedly harboring her then-live-in boyfriend Jason Prontnicki, 43, in her Woodbridge home for approximately an hour on June 11, 2013 and ‘never making any attempt to contact law enforcement,’ according to the complaint filed against her,” says a report in NJ.com. The prosecutor’s office states she was aware of the arrest warrant against Prontnicki “yet still offered to help him get money and transportation to avoid arrest.”
Governor Chris Christie has said “If the accusations about a sitting Superior Court judge are true, then the conduct is deplorable and frankly, stupid.”
Brady, 43, is the first Philippine-born judge on the Vicinage 8 Superior Court in New Jersey covering Middlesex County. The county has jurisdiction over the townships of Perth Amboy, Piscataway and Woodbridge, which are considered high-income and very middle class.
Brady was appointed to the seat in 2013 and her term was to end in 2020 – she was the only Filipino American on the State’s Superior Court bench.