Outside attorney sought for probe

By Ed Runyan

An assistant prosecutor expects an outside attorney to be appointed this week.

WARREN — The Trumbull County prosecutor’s office will ask county commissioners and the county’s common pleas court this week to appoint someone to investigate an accusation that county engineer candidate David DeChristofaro offered a job to Niles Mayor Ralph Infante.

James Saker, an assistant county prosecutor who advises the board of elections, said Prosecutor Dennis Watkins decided last week to ask for an outside attorney to handle the complaint after several weeks’ worth of correspondence with Atty. Subodh Chandra of Cleveland.

Saker said Watkins felt it was time to “eliminate the sideshow” that Chandra was creating “and get to the meat.”

Chandra, who lost the 2006 Democratic primary for attorney general to former Attorney General Marc Dann, first wrote to Watkins on July 25, saying he represented Hartford residents Richard Ponder and Michael W. Anthony.

Chandra said Ponder and Anthony had no “personal knowledge of the facts,” but were aware of articles printed in an area newspaper indicating that DeChristofaro had offered Infante a job and that such an offer might qualify under Ohio law as bribery.

According to Chandra’s letter, a part of Ohio law pertaining to elections prevents any person from offering to give any “office, position, place or employment” to a voter or other person before “any primary, convention or election.”

It adds that someone violating the law shall forfeit his nomination to that elected position, or the office itself if he wins it.

DeChristofaro, of Niles, vice president with the Cafaro Corp. of Youngstown, reached Monday, said he had no comment on the allegation.

DeChristofaro defeated current Trumbull County Deputy Engineer Randy Smith in the March 4 Democratic primary and faces no opposition in November. The deadline for write-in candidates is Sept. 3.

Infante could not be reached to comment Monday.

Ponder and Anthony also could not be reached to comment.

Infante, re-elected to a four-year term as Niles mayor last November, told The Vindicator in January he didn’t plan to run for Niles mayor again when his term expires in 2011.

Saker said Monday that he had begun to conduct an informal investigation into the accusation in early August that involved interviews with Infante. He also said that his preliminary investigation turned up nothing pointing to bribery.

“I don’t know today of any basis for what they [Chandra and his clients] are talking about,” Saker said, declining to elaborate further.

Chandra said Monday that he would expect a lawyer to be appointed by the common pleas court and that such a person would ask the elections board to hire an investigator to delve into the matter before a decision is made on whether to prosecute.

Saker said he expects the lawyer to be appointed by the end of the week.

runyan@vindy.com