Parole Board Members
To be eligible to be appointed by the Governor for membership on the Parole Board, an individual must have at least six years of professional experience in parole, probation, social work, or related areas, including one year in a supervisory or administrative capacity, and a bachelor’s degree. Parole Board members may not hold any other office or employment, and they are not permitted to take any active part in politics, a prohibition that applies to all Parole Board employees.
C. James Fox, Chairman
Mr. Fox began his criminal justice career in 1984 as a police officer for what is now known as the West Shore Regional Police Department. He served as a Captain in the United States Air Force as an Intelligence Officer from 1985 until 1990. After his military service, he again returned to policing until 1991, when he was appointed a Federal Probation Officer in the United States District Court, Middle District of Pennsylvania. He served as a Federal Probation Officer until 1999. Fox then left federal service to become the Police Academy Training Director at Harrisburg Area Community College. He was promoted to Dean of Public Safety and Workforce Development where he oversaw all public safety and workforce training for the College. Governor Edward Rendell appointed Fox to the Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole in 2007, where he served a 6-year term as Board Member. After his term, he was the Board’s Chief Hearing Examiner until 2016, earning the Board’s “Excellence in Leadership” award. He conducted criminal justice consulting and worked for Montgomery County Community College until he was nominated to return to the Board. Fox holds a Bachelor’s Degree in police administration from Eastern Kentucky University and a Master’s Degree in operations management from the University of Arkansas. A noted speaker, Fox has taught many academic classes and presented at numerous seminars on various criminal justice issues. In October 2018, Fox was nominated by Governor Tom Wolf to complete a partial term and returned to the Parole Board. He was re-nominated by Governor Wolf to serve a full six-year term and was confirmed by the Senate on May 13, 2020. Mr. Fox was appointed Chairman by Governor Shapiro on June 21, 2023.
Marcus L. Brown
Prior to being appointed to the Parole Board, Mr. Brown served as the Governor’s Deputy Chief of Staff for Public Safety and Director of the Pennsylvania Office of Homeland Security. Mr. Brown has over 30 years working in public safety in which he has held the positions of Superintendent of the Maryland State Police, Chief of the Maryland Transportation Authority Police Department and Deputy Commissioner of Operations in the Baltimore City Police Department. Brown has a Bachelor of Science in Business/Marketing from Penn State University and a Juris Doctor from the University of Baltimore School of Law. He completed the FBI’s National Executive Institute Leadership Program, the Naval Postgraduate School, Center for Homeland Defense and Security and the Fusion Center Leaders Program. He is an Adjunct Professor for Penn State University for both graduate and undergraduate level courses in the Homeland Security Program and in the College of Public Administration. Brown was nominated by Governor Wolf to serve a full six-year term and was confirmed by the Senate on June 25, 2021.
Jack Daneri, Esquire
Mr. Daneri has spent more than 29 years working within the criminal justice system. Prior to being appointed to the Parole Board, Mr. Daneri had served as the Erie County District Attorney since 2009. Mr. Daneri was selected by the Judges of Common Pleas Court to complete the unexpired term of his District Attorney predecessor. He was elected without opposition in 2011, 2015 and 2019. As the District Attorney with a staff of 35 prosecutors, his office was responsible for all levels of prosecution county-wide, handling in excess of 4,000 cases per year from initial charges through appellate review. Mr. Daneri began his legal career with his own Daneri Law Offices from 1993 to 2000. He first started with the Erie County DA’s Office in 2000 as an Assistant District Attorney and later became the Chief Deputy District Attorney in 2002. Mr. Daneri received his B.A. in Communications in 1981 from Allegheny College and his Juris Doctorate in 1990 from the Capital University School of Law. Mr. Daneri was nominated by Governor Wolf on June 16, 2022, and was confirmed by the Pennsylvania Senate on June 29, 2022.
Khadija T. Diggs, Esquire
A native of Pittsburgh, Khadija T. Diggs, Esq., received her Bachelor of Arts Degree in Psychology, with honors, from Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, and earned her Juris Doctorate from Howard University School of Law in Washington, D.C. Ms. Diggs has worked in various facets of the criminal justice system. She began her legal career with the Allegheny County Office of the Public Defender and moved to the position of Assistant City Solicitor in the City of Pittsburgh Law Department, during which time she also served as the Acting Police Legal Advisor for the City of Pittsburgh Police Department. Ms. Diggs was the Project Coordinator for the implementation phase of YouthWorks’ "BluePrint" a very successful and innovative juvenile offender reentry demonstration project in Pittsburgh with a $3 million-dollar budget funded by the Federal Department of Labor. Her legal career continued to advance as an Assistant Federal Public Defender in the Western District of Pennsylvania and then as a Deputy Public Defender in Allegheny County. Beginning in 2005, until her appointment to the Board, Ms. Diggs served as a member of the Pennsylvania Interbranch Commission for Gender, Racial and Ethnic Fairness and chaired the Criminal Justice Committee, which among other matters, has had initiatives focused on: the death penalty in Pennsylvania, overhauling the public defender system in Pennsylvania, reviewing the sentencing and re-sentencing of life without parole for juveniles, automating expungement of juvenile delinquency records, expanding “ban the box,” and student loan forgiveness for public interest attorneys. After a brief solo practice, Ms. Diggs became the Deputy Director for the Southwest Regional Office of Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf. Leading up to her appointment as a Parole Board Member, Ms. Diggs was an Assistant Counsel in the Governor’s Office of General Counsel, with a focus on Corrections, Probation and Parole. After her nomination by Governor Wolf to become a Parole Board Member, Ms. Diggs was unanimously confirmed by the State Senate on May 13, 2020, to serve a six-year term.
Theodore W. Johnson
Mr. Johnson is a native of Erie and now resides in Pittsburgh. Prior to his appointment, Mr. Johnson served as the Deputy Director at THE PROGRAM for Offenders, Inc., which is a nonprofit organization that specializes in community corrections and offers residential alternatives to incarceration, drug and alcohol treatment, and a wide range of support services to male and female offenders and their families in Allegheny County. In 2011, Mr. Johnson retired as Chief Probation Officer for the U.S. District Court in Western Pennsylvania. He worked in Federal Pretrial and Probation services for 23 years. Before that, he worked seven years for Allegheny County's Probation services and two years for Erie County's Probation services. During his time with the Court, Johnson merged probation and pretrial services and received the Director's Award for Leadership, a national award given to a director or manager of a federal court office, in 2009. He initiated a workforce development program designed to help people on probation find and keep jobs. Johnson was the first federal Chief to hire an ex-offender to run the reentry program. Johnson holds a Bachelor’s degree in social work from Edinboro University and a master’s in leadership from Carlow University. Johnson is a member of MADDADS, NOBLE and Omega Psi Phi Fraternity. On June 15, 2016, Mr. Johnson was confirmed by the Senate. He was appointed by Governor Wolf to serve as Chairman on February 6, 2019.
Anthony Moscato
Mr. Moscato has a life-long career of public service. He is a 1986 graduate of Indiana University of Pennsylvania. After serving for 16 years as a Cameron County Commissioner, he served as a Special Assistant to the Lieutenant Governor of Pennsylvania, Joseph Scarnati. Following this position, Mr. Moscato was appointed to the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board to an initial two-year term in February 2011, and was then reappointed in January 2013 and January 2015. Prior to his government service, Mr. Moscato was the Administrator for the Keystone Rural Health Consortia, Inc. a federally qualified health care center serving all or part of Cameron, Elk, McKean, Potter and Centre counties. Moscato has also served as an investment executive for Parker/Hunter now Janney Montgomery Scott, LLC. In addition to his public service, Mr. Moscato has served as a member of the Nature Tourism Task Force; was president of the Cameron County Community chest; was chairman and state committeeman for the Cameron County Republican Committee; was President of the Cameron County Public Library Board of Trustees; was a member of the Citizen’s Trust Company Emporium Advisory Board; was the treasurer for the Cameron County Multiple Sclerosis Club; was chairman of the Cameron, Elk Mental Health/Mental Retardation Joinder; was the chairman of the North Central Pennsylvania Regional Planning and Development Commission; was Vice-President of the Northern Tier Community Action Corporation Board, was a past member of the Charles Cole Memorial Hospital Emporium Advisory Board; and is a member of the Emporium Rotary Club. In June 2017, Mr. Moscato was appointed to serve on the Board of Probation and Parole. On July 11, 2017, he was confirmed by the Senate.
Elizabeth Bolton Penna, Esquire
Prior to being appointed to the Parole Board, Ms. Penna had served as the Assistant District Attorney for Cambria County since 2009. She had served as the Domestic Violence prosecutor and was most recently serving as the Child Abuse/Sexual Assault Prosecutor. While in the DA’s Office, she was a part of the team that created an anonymous reporting protocol for sexual assault victims that is used as a template worldwide. She worked to create a child sexual assault/forensic interview protocol and helped to open a child advocacy center in Cambria County. Ms. Penna’s law career began over 24 years ago when, between 1998-2009, she was a criminal defense attorney, worked as a Judicial Law Clerk under the President Judge of Cambria County in the Court of Common Pleas as well as serving as the Juvenile Master for Cambria County. She also served as the court-appointed attorney for parole hearings from 2003-2009. Ms. Penna was an Adjunct Professor at Saint Francis University who taught instruction in the American Court System, Sociological Perspectives on Policing, and Litigation from 2013-2020. After receiving her B.A. Degree from Dickinson College, Ms. Penna received her Juris Doctor in December 1997 from the Widener University School of Law. Ms. Penna was nominated by Governor Wolf and was confirmed by the Pennsylvania Senate on June 21, 2022.
Linda Pastroff Rosenberg
Ms. Rosenberg is a native of Pittsburgh. She graduated from Mt. Lebanon High School in 1983 and went on to earn a Master of Business Administration from Robert Morris University in 1990 and a Bachelor of Arts from Michigan State University in 1987. She was appointed as Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency in 2011 and has more than 25 years of experience working to improve the efficacy and efficiency of the Commonwealth’s criminal and juvenile justice systems. As Executive Director, she was responsible for the oversight of over 90 full-time staff and the administration of over 30 state and federal funding streams totaling more than $100 million annually. Ms. Rosenberg began her career at PCCD in 1992, serving as manager of its Computer Laboratory and Training Center and later as chief information officer. Ms. Rosenberg returned to PCCD in 2004 after serving as Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Justice Network, or JNET, from 2001 to 2004. She is a member of the Commonwealth Leadership Development Institute for Women in State Government, and a member of the National Criminal Justice Association Board of Directors. She is also a former board member of SEARCH, the National Consortium for Justice Information and Statistics. On June 15, 2016, she was confirmed by the Senate.