Probe of Oakhill followed complex, long path

By PETER H. MILLIKEN

milliken@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

The Ohio Ethics Commission probe of Mahoning County’s purchase of Oakhill Renaissance Place started with a local lawsuit by a corporation that is now under indictment.

Paul M. Nick, a special prosecutor in the Oakhill case, said the Oakhill case stemmed from a referral from Paul J. Gains, Mahoning County prosecutor. That referral concerned issues that arose from the Cafaro Co.’s lawsuit to rescind the purchase.

The Cafaro Co. is the former landlord for the county’s Department of Job and Family Services at Garland Plaza. JFS moved from there to Oakhill in July 2007.

The case took a long time to build as documents were gathered and testimony was taken by a grand jury. Proceedings needed to be extended three months beyond the planned conclusion of the grand jury’s regular four-month term April 30.

“We simply did not have enough time to obtain compliance with subpoenas for records,” explained Nick, the state ethics commission’s chief investigative counsel.

Other reasons besides the complexity of the case were the prosecutors’ desire to have the same grand jury hear the entire case, and the desire to give persons of interest a chance to testify before the grand jury, he said.

Nick said he perceives any debate now over the merits of the county’s purchase of Oakhill as a distraction from the ethical issues that laid the foundation for the indictment.

The 73-count indictment was filed Thursday in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court. It charges seven people and three business entities with corruption related to the Oakhill purchase.

Charges include engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, conspiracy, perjury, bribery, money laundering, tampering with records, disclosure of confidential information, conflict of interest, filing a false financial disclosure statement and soliciting or accepting improper compensation.

Those indicted are Anthony M. Cafaro Sr., retired Cafaro Co. president, the company itself and two of its affiliates; Flora Cafaro, part-owner of the Cafaro Co.; county Commissioner John A. McNally IV, county Auditor Michael V. Sciortino, former county Treasurer John B. Reardon; former county Job and Family Services Director John Zachariah; and Atty. Martin Yavorcik of Boardman.

Yavorcik, who ran unsuccessfully for prosecutor against Gains in 2008, and Flora Cafaro are charged with only one count each of money laundering.

Money laundering is concealment of the source type, location, ownership or control of money, Nick explained. However, he declined to be specific about the counts pertaining to Yavorcik and Flora Cafaro.

The indictment alleges that McNally, Reardon, Sciortino and Zachariah received free legal services from the Cafaro Co. in exchange for their hindrance of the county’s acquisition and occupancy of Oakhill.

The perjury counts allege that those four men lied under oath in video depositions they gave before the July 2007 trial of the lawsuit, in which the Cafaro Co. unsuccessfully sought to rescind the county’s purchase of Oakhill.

Nick wouldn’t be specific, but he said they attempted to conceal their participation in the conspiracy to hinder the purchase.

As for some defendants’ contention that they did no more than speak to Anthony Cafaro as they would to any other constituent, Nick said: “They certainly weren’t open about the fact that that was going on.”

Reaction continued to emerge Friday.

The Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber said the indictment “reminds us that we are all governed by the rule of law. The criminal justice process must be allowed to be played out with the realization that those charged are innocent until proven guilty.”

Atty. David Betras, county Democratic Party chairman, said: “Like most residents of Mahoning County, I am deeply concerned about the indictments handed down ... As an attorney and officer of the court, I have complete confidence in the judicial system. I think that we should allow that process to take its course.”

Betras also defended the local Democratic Party against a Thursday evening attack from the local GOP chairman, Mark Munroe, who said the Mahoning Valley “has once again been tarnished and embarrassed by the actions of Democrats.”

“Instead of casting broad-brush aspersions and hurling insults and invective, maybe Mr. Munroe and his cohorts should sit down and try to develop a plan for moving our region forward,” Betras said.

Atty. James B. Callen, former president of the now-dormant Citizens League of Greater Youngstown, which campaigned vigorously against corruption in government, had another perspective.

“I think it could be one of the most important developments in the history of this community because it addresses the problem that has been a handicap to this community for the last half-century, at least,” namely corruption, Callen said.

“It’s, in a way, a potential culmination of the investigations and the efforts that have been going on since the 1980s” to eliminate corruption in the Mahoning Valley, which has damaged the community’s reputation and self-image and business-attraction potential, he added. “My hope is that these cases are prosecuted vigorously,” Callen said.

He characterized the alleged attempts by county officials to hinder the county’s acquisition and occupancy of Oakhill as “special-interest governing at its worst.”