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Judge: Oakhill witnesses should hear some secret recordings
CLEVELAND
The Oakhill Renaissance Place criminal-corruption case judge wants prosecutors and defense attorneys to develop a process to allow certain defense witnesses to hear specific secret recordings in preparation for the trial.
Judge Janet R. Burnside of Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court, who is overseeing the case, wrote in a Monday journal entry that she wants the issue to be resolved in a week.
Prosecutors had labeled some evidence as “counsel only,” meaning defense attorneys can’t share it.
Attorneys for the defendants – Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally, ex-Mahoning County Auditor Michael V. Sciortino and failed 2008 independent county prosecutor candidate Martin Yavorcik – have contended they can’t properly prepare their case if witnesses aren’t allowed to review the recordings made by confidential sources.
Prosecutors have largely objected to protect the safety of informants, and point to one confidential source being threatened while at Southern Park Mall in Boardman on May 7, 2014, seven days before the three were indicted.
In a journal entry after Monday’s pretrial hearing, Judge Burnside wrote: “Within one week, parties are to develop mutually satisfactory protocol for defendants’ counsel to permit certain witnesses to listen to certain state’s exhibits after such witnesses enter protective agreements prohibiting their future disclosure of such items.”
The journal entry wasn’t available until Tuesday on the Cuyahoga County Clerk of Court’s website.
Dan Tierney, spokesman for the Ohio Attorney General’s office, which is prosecuting the case with the Cuyahoga County prosecutor, said: “It’s a reasonable request. The two sides will come to an agreement on parameters. The agreement will balance the safety of confidential witnesses and the constitutional rights of the defendants.”
Prosecutors previously had pointed to a court rule stating that hearings on “counsel only” decisions only could be conducted seven days before a trial.
Defense attorneys have either declined to comment or not returns calls to The Vindicator seeking to discuss the judge’s rulings.
Prosecutors contend McNally, Sciortino and Yavorcik were part of a criminal enterprise that illegally – and unsuccessfully – tried to impede or stop the move of the Mahoning County Department of Job and Family Services from the Cafaro Co.-owned Garland Plaza to Oakhill Renaissance Place, the former Forum Health Southside Medical Center, owned by the county.
The enterprise, which included numerous others who aren’t indicted, also wanted to get Yavorcik elected prosecutor in 2008 to make a criminal investigation into the matter go away, prosecutors allege.
On Monday, the judge set the trial date for March 1, 2016.
That’s about 22 months after the May 14, 2014, indictment of McNally and Sciortino, both Democrats, and Yavorcik.
The judge wrote on a Monday journal entry that she will decide later if the three will be tried separately or at the same time.
McNally, Sciortino and Yavorcik face a total of 83 criminal counts, including engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, bribery, conspiracy, perjury and money laundering. The three have pleaded not guilty.
Also, prosecutors agreed to produce any evidence they’ll use in the trial by June 1 from computers and computer files seized by Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation agents Sept. 22, 2014, from Sciortino’s home and Mahoning County offices.
The same day BCI agents seized those items, attorneys for McNally and Sciortino filed a motion asking the court to order prosecutors to “provide a detailed description of each item of evidence that is intended to be used or introduced against the [defendants] which could reasonably be subject to challenge by pretrial motion.”
In a one-sentence journal entry, Judge Burnside granted the motion Monday.
The next pretrial hearing is scheduled for June 19.