Legal lineup in Oakhill case totals 19

By Peter Milliken

By PETER H. MILLIKEN

milliken@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

Five special prosecutors will face off against 14 defense lawyers in the criminal trial of those indicted on corruption charges related to Mahoning County’s purchase of Oakhill Renaissance Place.

The prosecutors will be Paul M. Nick, chief investigative counsel for the Ohio Ethics Commission; Lorain County Prosecutor Dennis P. Will and three of Will’s assistant prosecutors.

The defense lawyers include prominent Youngstown attorneys and lawyers from Cleveland, Pittsburgh and New York City.

Anthony M. Cafaro Sr., retired president of the Cafaro Co., has three lawyers; his sister, Flora Cafaro, part owner of the Cafaro Co., has one lawyer; and the Cafaro Co. and its affiliates have four lawyers.

The Cafaros and their corporate entities are named in a 73-count indictment issued July 28, along with 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.

The indictment alleges that eight of the 10 defendants conspired criminally to prevent or delay JFS’ move from Cafaro-owned rented quarters to Oak-hill, which the county bought in 2006. Oakhill is the former Forum Health Southside Medical Center. JFS moved to Oakhill in 2007.

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

Yavorcik, who ran unsuccessfully for county prosecutor against incumbent Paul J. Gains in 2008, and Flora Cafaro, who contributed money to Yavorcik’s campaign, are charged with only one count each of money laundering.

The names of the defense lawyers were contained in a motion by lawyers for the Cafaros and their companies that prosecutors provide a bill of particulars identifying any unindicted co-conspirators and identifying dates, times, places and other details of the alleged crimes.

The motion asks for the names of witnesses that the prosecution will use in support of the three perjury counts against Anthony Cafaro. Ohio law says a defendant can’t be convicted of perjury unless testimony from two witnesses supports the charge.

The memorandum defense lawyers filed in support of the motion said the indictment contains insufficient information to enable the accused to prepare their defense.

The memorandum says prosecutors told the defendants they could expect to receive more than 50,000 documents from the prosecutors in the pretrial evidence exchange, known as discovery, but prosecutors didn’t say “when or in what form the documents would be produced.”

Nick said the bill of particulars likely would be filed a few days after the initial pretrial hearing Sept. 9, if that’s the time frame ordered by Visiting Judge William H. Wolff Jr. of Kettering.

Judge Wolff will conduct the initial pretrial hearing in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.