Woman faces court dates after threatening judge and family

Staff report

AUSTINTOWN

A Chicago woman accused of threatening a Mahoning County area court judge is set to stand trial in county common pleas court.

A county grand jury secretly indicted Linda S. Crawford, 61, last month on felony counts of extortion and menacing by stalking, court records show. She also faces a separate misdemeanor count of telecommunications harassment.

Judge Scott Hunter of area court in Austintown reported Crawford, who is one of his former clients, called his office July 5. His wife took the call, and the judge then placed the call on speaker phone with his wife as a witness.

Crawford then asked the judge how many men Crawford had slept with while she was married to her ex-husband, the judge said.

When Judge Hunter explained that question was inappropriate and told her to stop contacting him at the court, Crawford reportedly “began yelling in a rage ... telling him he was dead, [his] family is [expletive] dead, and that she would nail him to the ground and burn him.”

Mahoning County Sheriff’s Detective Patrick Mondora said Chicago authorities arrested Crawford and courts extradited her to Ohio.

“She called and harassed [Judge Hunter] before a few years ago,” Mondora said. “We met with her and we thought we’d put a stop to it, but then it’s come back.”

According to a separate sheriff’s report, Crawford also threatened her ex-husband via text in September 2018, less than a month after his protection order against her expired.

Crawford also was charged in 2015 with breaking into the Canfield Township home of Phantom Fireworks CEO Bruce Zoldan. She was ultimately deemed not competent to stand trial in that case and was admitted to a behavioral health facility for treatment, court records show.

Crawford is set for arraignment on her new charges Tuesday before Judge Anthony D’Apolito of common pleas court.

An October jury trial date has been set.