PITTSBURGH — Attorneys for former state Supreme Court Justice Joan Orie Melvin will ask a three-judge appeals panel to reverse her conviction, or at least part of her sentence, for using her state-paid staffers to help her campaign for a seat on Pennsylvania’s highest court.

The Superior Court panel was scheduled to hear the case today in Lawrence County, about 45 miles northwest of the Allegheny County courtroom in Pittsburgh where Melvin was convicted last year and sentenced to three years probation, a $55,000 fine and community service in a soup kitchen.

Melvin also was ordered to send an apology to every judge in the state — written on copies of a picture trial Judge Lester Nauhaus ordered taken of Melvin in handcuffs minutes after he imposed the sentence.

Melvin’s attorneys particularly object to the autographed apology pictures as part of the sentence and say that ordering Melvin to apologize while her overall case is on appeal violates her right against self-incrimination. But prosecutors say that argument is irrelevant because Melvin apologized for her conduct when she was sentenced.