McNally's, Sciortino's, Yavorcik's attorneys get tapes, documents in corruption case

CLEVELAND

The prosecution in the Oakhill Renaissance Place criminal conspiracy case has provided the defense with 576 hours of tapes and many documents including John A. McNally’s fax of Mahoning County’s offer to purchase Oakhill to a law firm representing the Cafaro Co.

McNally, a former Mahoning County commissioner and now Youngstown mayor, provided the county’s confidential offer to purchase Oakhill to Ulmer and Berne of Cleveland, a newly filed court document says.

The document, filed Wednesday, is the prosecution’s notice that it has provided partial discovery to the defense in the Oakhill case, which is being prosecuted by the Ohio Attorney General’s Office and the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office.

In the Oakhill case, McNally, Mahoning County Auditor Michael V. Sciortino and Atty. Martin Yavorcik are defendants in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court.

Yavorcik was an unsuccessful candidate for Mahoning County prosecutor in 2008.

All three defendants have pleaded not guilty, and no trial date has been announced.

The criminal case alleges a conspiracy to impede the move of the county’s Department of Job and Family Services from rented quarters in the then-Cafaro Co.-owned Garland Plaza on the city’s East Side to Oakhill.

The county bought Oakhill for $75,000 in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in 2006 and moved JFS there the following year.

Sciortino withheld the $75,000 check until a judge ordered him to release it in July 2007.

A perjury charge against McNally alleges he lied under oath when he denied giving anyone a copy of the county’s Oakhill purchase offer.

Read more about the case developments in Saturday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.