Oakhill prosecutors have about 700 hours of secretly-recorded conversations related to the corruption case

By David Skolnick | October 21, 2014 at 12:05a.m.

Oakhill - Notice of Intention for Recordings

Document

State's Notice of Intention to use evidence in the form of recordings in case no. CR-585428 State of Ohio vs. John McNally.

McNally

Sciortino

Yavorcik

CLEVELAND

Prosecutors in the Oakhill Renaissance Place criminal conspiracy case have about 700 hours of secretly recorded conversations made by confidential sources over a period of nearly five years it may use as evidence against the three defendants.

The legal filing submitted by Daniel Kasaris, a senior assistant Ohio attorney general and special prosecutor on this case, lists dates and locations of dozens of recordings from Oct. 18, 2005, to Aug. 6, 2010.

Indicted on 83 criminal counts are Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally, Mahoning County Auditor Michael V. Sciortino and attorney Martin Yavorcik. The charges include engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, conspiracy, bribery, perjury, money laundering and tampering with records.

The three have pleaded not guilty.

Attorneys for Yavorcik, McNally and Sciortino couldn’t be reached Monday by The Vindicator to comment.

The recordings are from “more than one informant” — two are listed as “Confidential Human Source 1” and “Confidential Human Source 3,” without the identity of either disclosed — and are recorded phone calls and in-person meetings, according to the court filing.

The locations for tapings done by the first confidential source include numerous Mahoning Valley restaurants: Royal Oaks Bar & Grill, Davidson’s Restaurant, and Charlie Staples Bar-B-Q in Youngstown; O’Charley’s in Niles; Panera Bread in Austintown; Kravitz Deli in Liberty; and many fast-food places.

Also listed for that source are a number of restaurants that are now out of business: Anthony’s on the River, Cafe Cimmento, Coconut Grove, Cedar Lounge & Restaurant, Rosetta Stone, and the Bean Counter, all in Youngstown.

There are other locations for the same source including the Mahoning County Courthouse, the county elections board, various polling places in Youngstown, inside cars, Yavorcik’s law office and various other offices not specified.

On the list is 4180 Lockwood Blvd. in Boardman, the former home of Sam Moffie, on Aug. 2 and 3, 2006.

Moffie has previously said and confirmed Monday that Anthony Cafaro Sr. visited him at his former home around that time.

Cafaro is believed to be “Businessman 1,” an unindicted co-conspirator.

Moffie said he is not the confidential source.

Moffie said Monday, as he did two years ago, that the FBI asked him to wear a wire when he met with Cafaro in April 2008. Moffie complied but showed Cafaro the wire and mouthed, “I’m wired.”

The state already provided defense attorneys with 576 hours of tapes in August.

In the latest filing, Kasaris wrote, “The state possesses approximately 700 hours of audio recordings made by more than one informant. There are not, nor does the state possess, 2,000 hours of recordings.”

The “2,000 hours” mention contradicts what previous special prosecutors said in July 2011 when they asked a judge investigating similar charges against the defendants, Cafaro and others to dismiss the case while allowing it to be re-filed at a later date.

At the time, special prosecutors — from the Lorain County Prosecutor’s Office and the Ohio Ethics Commission — said the FBI possessed 2,000 hours of recordings from at least one defendant in the case, and the federal agency wasn’t willing to turn them over.

In August, three months after the unsealing of the indictment, the case’s new prosecutors — from the Ohio Attorney General’s Office and the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office — provided the defense with 576 hours of tapes.

The latest filing points out that the state has not provided all the tapes to the defense.

The indictment contends McNally, Sciortino and Yavorcik, along with others, were part of a criminal enterprise that conspired to keep the Mahoning County Job and Family Services department at Cafaro’s Garland Plaza on Youngstown’s East Side.

McNally was the sole dissenter when the other two county commissioners, Anthony Traficanti and David N. Ludt, voted in May 2006 in favor of relocating JFS from Garland to Oakhill Renaissance Place, the former Forum Health Southside Medical Center.

The indictment and bill of particulars contend McNally, county commissioner at the time, and Sciortino received benefits for opposing the relocation. Both are Democrats.

Yavorcik is accused of accepting money from the businessman, Sciortino, McNally and others, and in exchange agreed not to investigate or prosecute members of the enterprise if he were elected county prosecutor in 2008 in a failed independent bid.

The filing states “Confidential Human Source 3” recorded telephone calls with Richard Goldberg between March 22, 2007, and Dec. 16, 2008.

Prosecutors have previously said Goldberg, a felon and former lawyer, worked on Yavorcik’s campaign.

Also, “Confidential Human Source 1” made “a number of recordings in-person,” according to the filing.

The filing listed that source talking to Yavorcik “and others” on July 7, 2007 at Anthony’s; Aug. 4, 2007, at Anthony’s with Goldberg, “Businessman 2” and others; Oct. 11, 2007, Don L. Hanni Jr.’s law office with Goldberg and Yavorcik; and Dec. 17, 2008, at Cafe 422 in Warren with James Tsagaris.

Tsagaris is a former Trumbull County commissioner convicted in 2009 for honest services mail-fraud for taking $36,551 from an area businessman while he was in office and not reporting it on state financial disclosure statements. Tsagaris, a Democrat, has been mentioned in previous documents related to the Oakhill indictments.

Meanwhile, Yavorcik has a new attorney, Mark Lavelle, with an office in Boardman.

Jennifer J. Scott and William L. Summers, Yavorcik’s Cleveland-based attorneys, had asked to be removed from the case as their client planned to represent himself, according to court filings.

A hearing to discuss Yavorcik’s defending himself was to be Monday in front of Judge Janet R. Burnside of Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court. But with the change in attorney, filed with the court Thursday, the hearing was canceled and Lavelle will represent Yavorcik.