The Herald, Sharon, Pa.

Local News

August 29, 2012

Police: Ex-cop cheated Amish

By Joy Leiker Herald Staff Writer

SPRINGFIELD TOWNSHIP — A Beaver County constable took the law into his own hands last fall, launching an investigation, pursuing suspects and forcing members of an Amish community to pay fines and costs – all for an incident state police said didn’t warrant criminal charges.

It’s not the first time Glenn Young Jr., 63, New Brighton, has been on the wrong side of the law.

According to The Beaver County Times, Young was forced to resign from the New Sewickley Township police department in 2004 after being accused by his police chief of insubordination, conduct unbecoming an officer and violating department policies.

After that incident, Young started working for the Mars police department in Butler County. He was fired by that borough after filing reports, and prompting a media storm, that two children were lured by strangers. The Butler County District Attorney later said an investigation showed the incidents never happened.

All of that is on top of a longtime family fight between Young and his siblings in Beaver County. They have all sued and countersued each other in a dispute over property they inherited from their parents. The Beaver County Times said in a seven-year span police were called to the family property 122 times.

And now Young has yet another apparent crime feather to add to his cap. Accused of swindling the Amish, he’s charged with theft by deception, official oppression and impersonating a public servant.

State police filed those charges Tuesday, nearly a year after the incident that prompted Young to act like a law enforcement officer.

According to the probable cause affidavit filed in Lawrence County district court, there was an incident in October 2011 at the Indian Run schoolhouse on Cannery Road, Springfield Township. The nature of that incident isn’t detailed in court papers, but windows of the school were damaged and desks were overturned. Bishops and deacons of several Amish communities gathered to talk about the incident and Young told them he could help.

Young told the Amish leaders that if this incident had happened in the “English community” it would result in fines and costs between $4,000 and $5,000 for each individual involved. Young identified 21 youths who had been at the schoolhouse, though court papers don’t reveal how he knew who had been there.

Young said that if the Amish “went through him and not the criminal courts, he could save them money.” The defendant insisted the families pay the bishops, and then they should pay him in cash.

Police said Young “began to operate beyond the scope of his authority.”

He’s accused of going to people’s homes in October and November, insisting they needed to pay him fines. In some cases he said the fine was $500; other times he said it would be $1,000 or $2,000. He said if the fines weren’t paid the person risked being sent to jail.

Other times he stopped members of the Amish community as they were driving their buggies. He stopped one driver and searched the buggy looking for alcohol. Young let the man go, but then later arrived at the man’s house and began to question him about the earlier incident at the schoolhouse.

In February police interviewed Gideon J. Byler, the Amish bishop the community had appointed to turn over the fines to Young. Byler told police he had paid Young $2,450 thus far, and that Young had told him he had been a state trooper for 35 years.

In every instance, police said Young was dressed in his constable uniform, and armed with a gun.

The windows of the schoolhouse were repaired by another member of the Amish community. The man said the work cost him $92, and he wouldn’t charge other members of the community for those repairs.

Police said Young was “acting under false pretense (and) he created the impression that he was acting as a law enforcement officer and had law enforcement authority.”

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