MISDEMEANORS Former Deters workers guilty

A former fund-raiser was fined $5,000, and ex-chief of staff, $1,000.
CLEVELAND (AP) -- Two former employees of state Treasurer Joseph T. Deters pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges involving campaign funding in an investigation that cleared their boss of any criminal wrongdoing.
The charges alleged that a $50,000 donation made in 2001 from then-stockbroker Frank Gruttadauria to the Hamilton County Republican Party was intended to benefit Deters' political campaign fund.
One of the charges referred to "certain brokers" who had made contributions to Deters' campaign fund in return for "a preferential position."
Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Eileen Gallagher on Tuesday fined Eric Sagun, a former Deters fund-raiser, $5,000 and Matthew Borges, Deters' former chief of staff, $1,000. Only Sagun faced possible jail time, up to six months, but no jail time was imposed.
"This is an uneventful conclusion to a 14-month fishing expedition," Borges' attorneys, Brian E. Dickerson and Karl H. Schneider, said in a prepared statement. "The notion that our client ever engaged in bribery or 'pay-to-play' is absurd."
"This is the best that they can do after 14 months? Go figure," Sagun's attorney, Charles Saxbe, told The Plain Dealer.
Although a grand jury has been investigating since January, Special Prosecutor Thomas J. Sammon filed the charges as an information, a document in which prosecutors file a charge directly instead of seeking a grand jury indictment.
The Cuyahoga County grand jury started investigating after Gruttadauria said he bribed an official connected to the treasurer's office to get state investment business.
Gruttadauria, serving an unrelated seven-year sentence for bilking clients out of $125 million, pleaded guilty in March to state charges and agreed to cooperate with the grand jury.
Prosecutors have refused to name the official that Gruttadauria said he bribed. The grand jury session runs through Friday.
Convictions
Borges was convicted of a charge of improper use of public office. The information accused Borges of arranging for "certain brokers" a preferential position with the director of investments at the treasurer's office.
Sagun was convicted of election law violation. The information said he solicited a $50,000 donation from Gruttadauria in December 2001 for the Hamilton County Republican Party when the money was for Deters' re-election campaign.
The two initially pleaded innocent in an arraignment. In a hearing about two hours later, Borges and Sagun answered a series of questions, including whether they understood the charges and whether they had been coerced to plead guilty.
Sammon said later that Deters' role was not criminal.
"We don't indict people for poor managerial skills. We don't indict officeholders because they are unaware of what activity may be going on either in their own office or in their fund-raising committee," Sammon said.
Deters testified before the grand jury in June but declined to disclose what he had been asked and said he had done nothing wrong. His office declined comment Tuesday.
Former Ohio Supreme Court Justice Andy Douglas, a Deters friend and adviser, said that the misdemeanor convictions should not be construed to mean any sort of pay-to-play scheme existed.
"It is furthest thing away from a pay-to-play scheme. You all would have heard about it and there would have been indictments for that," Douglas said. "And he [Deters] stands by all of his people and continues to have faith in their integrity."
Gruttadauria has said the $50,000 check he directed to the Hamilton County GOP was a disguised contribution to Deters and he illegally reimbursed others $7,000 for donating to Deters.
Other details
Investment firm SG Cowen handled no state business before Gruttadauria started there in 1999. Over the next two years, that firm and the broker's next employer, Lehman Brothers, together handled more than $5.9 billion in trades for the state.
Deters, a Cincinnati Republican, is a candidate for Ohio attorney general in 2006. Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Bill Mason, a Democrat who has been mentioned as a possible attorney general candidate, turned the grand jury probe over to the special prosecutor in February.