Oakhill prosecutors: Tapes don't exist

CLEVELAND

Prosecutors in the Oakhill Renaissance Place criminal-corruption case say a judge shouldn’t dismiss the matter as requested by attorneys for two of the defendants who contend not all of the relevant secretly recorded tapes have been turned over to them.

The attorneys for Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally and ex-Mahoning County Auditor Michael V. Sciortino, both Democrats, asked Judge Janet R. Burnside of Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court to dismiss the case against their clients because prosecutors have failed to disclose about 2,000 hours of the recordings.

In response, Adam M. Chaloupka, an assistant Cuyahoga County prosecutor, wrote the judge in a filing that 2,000 hours of recorded statements “do not and have never existed.”

Prosecutors in the case from the Ohio attorney general and Cuyahoga County prosecutor’s office have said there are 700 to 800 hours of tapes and all have been given to the attorneys for McNally, Sciortino and attorney Martin Yavorcik, a failed 2008 independent candidate for Mahoning County prosecutor and the other defendant in the Oakhill case.

Read more about the motion and the case in Wednesday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.