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Yavorcik seeks sentencing delay
and David Skolnick
CLEVELAND
Martin Yavorcik, found guilty of eight felonies by a jury March 25 in the Oakhill Renaissance Place corruption case, has asked for a delay in his sentencing, scheduled for Friday.
In a motion filed Monday, Yavorcik, an attorney who defended himself in a two-week trial, asked for the delay to enable a court-approved treatment facility to give him an alcohol-abuse assessment.
Yavorcik, 42, of Boardman, wrote the prosecution “had concerns that the defendant was suffering from alcohol problems and rightly raised the issue with the court.”
He added: “An alcohol assessment is important in this case for the court to consider when imposing judgment and sentence.”
“We have not had a chance to review [Yavorcik’s motion], but we plan to proceed with Friday’s hearing,” said Dan Tierney, a spokesman for the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, which prosecuted this case with the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office.
Yavorcik, who is free without bond, faces up to 29 years in prison. Prosecutors are recommending Yavorcik serve a prison sentence.
Before Yavorcik’s trial started March 14, he asked Judge Janet R. Burnside of Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court, who oversaw the trial, to prohibit prosecutors from bringing up his supposed drug and alcohol use contending it wasn’t relevant to the case. Prosecutors said they had no plans to discuss those issues at the trial.
Yavorcik also asked for the postponement to enable him to raise funds to retain David Doughten, an attorney from Cleveland, for his appeal and obtain a transcript of his trial.
Doughten estimated the transcript alone would cost about $10,000, Yavorcik wrote in the motion.
Yavorcik wasn’t specific in his motion about the length of the delay he is seeking.
Yavorcik, who ran unsuccessfully for Mahoning County prosecutor in 2008 as an independent, was convicted of one count each of engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, conspiracy and tampering with records, two counts of money laundering and three counts of bribery.
The jury agreed with prosecutors that Yavorcik illegally took about $140,000 in bribes to make the Oakhill investigation go away had he been elected prosecutor. He lost by 38 percentage points to incumbent Paul J. Gains, a Democrat.
Prosecutors in the Oakhill case alleged a conspiracy to impede the move of Mahoning County’s Department of Job and Family Services from a Cafaro Co.-owned property on Youngstown’s East Side to the county-owned Oakhill Renaissance Place.
Nearly all the money in the bribery and money-laundering convictions came from Anthony Cafaro Sr., the company’s president in 2008, his brother, J.J., and their sister, Flora, who were executives with the family business.
An FBI agent testified during Yavorcik’s trial that the bureau still is investigating Anthony Cafaro Sr.
The county bought Oakhill, which is the former Forum Health Southside Medical Center, in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in 2006 and moved JFS there the following year.
Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally, a former Mahoning County commissioner, and former county Auditor Michael V. Sciortino, both Democrats, took plea deals in the Oakhill case and were each sentenced to a year’s probation.
Yavorcik also filed a motion April 8 to dismiss his convictions, which prosecutors asked the judge to reject in a Friday response.
The judge rejected a request from Yavorcik to review grand jury testimony, calling it a “fishing expedition” in an April 12 decision. Yavorcik filed a similar motion before his trial that Judge Burnside denied.