Lawrence Co. D.A. will seek re-election this year

January 12, 2009 at 3:40p.m.

NEW CASTLE, Pa. — Lawrence County District Attorney John Bongivengo has announced he will seek re-election.SClBBongivengo, a Democrat and a New Castle resident, took office in January 2006.

Since taking office, he said, he has instituted the Take Back Your Neighborhood program and has increased the percentage of defendants being sent to state prisons to the highest of any fifth-class county in Pennsylvania.

Bongivengo said he is the first sitting district attorney to obtain a death-penalty verdict in 17 years.

Dennis Reed, who shot his 28-year-old girlfriend to death in 2001, was sentenced to die in April 2008. An execution date has not been set while the sentence is under appeal.