Candidates for two Butler County Common Pleas Court judge offices said they would base their decisions about motions and arguments made in court on precedents established by the state’s higher courts.

Four candidates have entered the May 20 primary for the judge seats.

One office is open due to the retirement of Judge Timothy McCune, who serves in the criminal court division, at the end of the year. The second office is a new position, and the nominee who wins in the November general election will become the county’s seventh Common Pleas Court judge.

President Judge S. Michael Yeager will assign the new judges to serve in the court’s criminal, civil, family, juvenile or orphan’s divisions sometime after the election.

The new judge’s position was created by Act 58 in 2023. The law added Common Pleas Court judge positions in six counties, including Butler, to reduce the caseloads of the existing judges.

The last expansion of the Common Pleas Court bench came in 2006, when McCune took office as the sixth judge, after winning the election in 2005.

The candidates are Pittsburgh attorney James Insco II, of Mars; Matthew McCune, an attorney with the Conlon Tarker law firm in Butler; John Scialabba, a partner at Frank, Gale, Bails & Pocrass; and Clarion County public defender Jake Roberts.

McCune and Scialabba filed petitions to run on the Republican and Democratic ballots to seek both party nominations, and Insco and Roberts filed petitions to run only on the Republican ballot.

Insco said Common Pleas Court is not a policymaking court like the higher Superior and Supreme courts.

He said Common Pleas judges should be legal scholars, or students of the law, who base decisions on existing laws without bias.

“A Common Pleas judge decision should be guided by what the law tells them to do,” Insco said. “It comes down to a great judge, or legal scholar, who takes legal scholarship very seriously, and relying that to tell them how they should rule in any matter.”

He said judges should read filings from attorneys and use their understanding of precedents and what the legislature intended when it created laws to render decisions, especially in cases that attorneys present questionable evidence or contradictory evidence.

A judge should “try to rule in accordance with what the law is,” Insco said.

He said he considers a judge’s job as an opportunity to put his 21 years of experience to use as public service and does not have an division assignment preference.

“Judges need to be students of the law,” said McCune, who is the son of Judge Timothy McCune.

Research into precedents is required to render decisions, he said.

“Attorneys cite the law they believe applies. It’s the judge’s job to study the law and determine what applies and apply that to the evidence,” McCune said.

Precedents are Supreme Court rulings on appealed decisions from Superior Court that originated in Common Pleas or district courts.

A precedent is a ruling that has been “tightened up” through the scrutiny of the Supreme and Superior courts, he said.

“The law guides us. That’s why it’s written down. We have to abide by the controlling precedent,” McCune said.

A case before a Common Pleas judge that is similar, but not identical, to one in which a precedent was established requires a judge to interpret the precedent, he said.

“The law may be black and white, but people may interpret it differently,” McCune said.

He said he does not have a preference about a division assignment.

Roberts said use of precedents and interpretation of the law are important for a Common Pleas judge.

In his job as a public defender, he said he regularly uses precedents in arguments, and judges ask attorneys for supporting case law, or precedents, to back their arguments.

“At the trial court level, judges are pretty beholden to precedent,” Roberts said.

However, he said facts of a criminal case rarely align completely with existing case law so there is always some room for interpretation, but is important to uphold legal precedent.

Roberts said the greatest need to interpret the law occurs during sentencing. Sentencing guidelines are important, but they were written by legislators who might not have legal training and are not always appropriate for all defendants, he said.

“Guidelines don’t always fit each defendant. That’s where judicial discretion and interpretation is important,” Roberts said.

Some defendants need sentences that are more or less severe than what the guidelines call for, he said.

As an example, when the guidelines call for a sentence of a year in prison, a judge may consider a lighter sentence if the defendant received treatment and performed community service before sentencing, he said.

Roberts said voters must be aware of activist judges or judges with agendas.

“The role of a judge is to uphold the law and apply it fairly in any given case,” he said.

If elected, Roberts said he believes he would be assigned to the criminal division because his career has been in criminal court, and he represents defendants in drug treatment and behavioral health courts.

Scialabba, who is the husband of state Rep. Stephenie Scialabba, R-12th, said he would rely on the precedents from the higher courts when he makes decisions.

“The role of a Common Pleas Court judge is to apply the law as written. I will apply the precedents laid forth by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court,” Scialabba said. “The role of a Common Pleas Court judge is not to make law — it’s to hear the facts of a case that you are presented and apply the relevant case law or statute. The role of a Common Pleas judge isn’t to be an activist, but to be an impartial body that allows litigants to feel as though they have been given a fair and just day in court.”

He said he hopes he has the opportunity to assist in finding mutual and sometimes difficult resolutions in people’s lives as a judge. He said bringing compassion and fairness to the bench is his goal.

Scialabba said he believes one of the new judges will be assigned to the family division, and he has a lot of experience in family law.