Westmoreland Co. sheriff appears in court on public corruption case

GREENSBURG, Pa. — Embattled Westmoreland County Sheriff Jonathan Held appeared in court Monday.

It was the first in a series of hearings ahead of his criminal trial later this year.

Held is charged with ordering department staffers to perform campaign duties while on the job.

His defense attorney, Ryan Tutera, filed motions late last month saying there's not enough evidence against held.

"In these political prosecution cases you'll see that they want to bring up matter that has nothing to do with what's being alleged," he said,

The out of county judge is being asked to decide if Sheriff Held has to comply with the subpoena seeking those campaign records, but his attorney calls it prejudicial.

"Now they want to expand this into his campaign finance reports. Now I want to make it clear we're not hiding anything in regards to records," Tutera said.