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‘Oakhill Trio’ now have a trial date — in March 2016
On the side
Bush fracks the facts: Jeb Bush, a very likely Republican candidate for president, recently wrote a guest column on the website of The Plain Dealer/Northeast Ohio Media Group touting fracking as something that “can contribute to an American economic renaissance and rebirth of manufacturing.”
In the second sentence of the column, Bush, a former Florida governor, wrote that fracking has “given new life to cities like Youngstown and Canton.”
Why would Bush write that fracking has already given new life to Youngstown?
Youngstown’s main fracking claims to fame are the city experienced numerous earthquakes as a result of a brine-injection well, and Vallourec Star invested $1.1 billion into an expansion plant.
But Vallourec, which makes steel pipes for the oil and gas industry, recently shut down for three weeks. The company specifically mentioned it was “in response to the declining oil and gas market.”
New life to Youngstown? Hardly.
There were a number of developments as the result of a recent pretrial in the Oakhill Renaissance Place criminal-corruption case.
The most important one is 11 months after Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally, ex-Mahoning County Auditor Michael V. Sciortino and attorney Martin Yavorcik were indicted, there is a trial date.
But there is a long way to go before a March 1, 2016, trial would start — assuming this goes to trial.
Of particular interest is the last line of Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court Judge Janet R. Burnside’s journal entry.
“Later orders will clarify whether bifurcation of defendants’ trials or not.”
That’s legalize for the judge will decide later on whether the defendants should be tried together or separately. It technically means splitting it into two.
Based on the court filings, that could occur, but, again, that assumes all three defendants go to trial.
Lynn A. Maro and John B. Juhasz — attorneys for McNally and Sciortino, respectively — share law office space and have been either filing joint or identical court documents while Yavorcik’s attorney, Mark Lavelle, and Jennifer Scott, Yavorcik’s first lawyer, file separately.
What that could do is turn this into two trials, and could be an advantage to whoever doesn’t go first.
Judge Burnside ruled at Monday’s pretrial hearing on a number of “housekeeping” items that already worked themselves out.
One source of contention that remains between the two sides is prosecutors labeling some evidence as “counsel only.” In the strictest sense that means that only the defense attorneys can look at that evidence. Much of it is secret audio recordings involving Sciortino and Yavorcik made by at least one confidential informant.
However, prosecutors had previously said the secret recordings could be shared with the defendants.
It was agreed at the pretrial that the two sides would come up with a process to allow specific defense witnesses to hear certain recordings in order to prepare for the trial.
It will require witnesses to hear “certain state’s exhibits after such witnesses enter protective agreements prohibiting their future disclosure of such items,” according to the judge’s journal entry.
There may be some blood oath and the taking of the first born involved for violating the order, but those aren’t spelled out in the journal entry.
One item that hasn’t been resolved is venue.
The defense wants the case dismissed contending Cuyahoga County isn’t the proper venue. Prosecutors say the criminal acts occurred in five counties, including Cuyahoga, and only one element of a single offense is needed to have Cuyahoga be an appropriate venue.
sixty-one allegations
And the prosecutors pointed to 61 allegations of events in the indictment in Cuyahoga County.
If Judge Burnside didn’t believe Cuyahoga was an appropriate venue for the trial, she wouldn’t have had this matter in front of her for the last 11 months.
McNally and Sciortino, both Democrats, and Yavorcik, a failed 2008 independent candidate for Mahoning County prosecutor, face 83 criminal counts, including engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, bribery, conspiracy, perjury and money laundering. The three have pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors contend the three 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.