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Judge mulls motions in final hearing before Monday start of Oakhill trial
CLEVELAND
Prosecutors and the defense in the Oakhill Renaissance Place criminal- corruption case will be in court today for a final hearing before the Monday start of the trial.
The two sides will discuss numerous motions filed by defense attorneys seeking to have the case dismissed or at least evidence excluded and the testimony of some witnesses restricted.
Judge Janet R. Burnside of Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court, who is overseeing the trial, is expected to rule today on the numerous filings by the defense and responses from prosecutors.
Also, the attorneys for two of the three defendants – Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally and ex-Mahoning County Auditor Michael V. Sciortino, both Democrats – filed a third and likely final witness list.
The original list, filed Nov. 30, 2015, had 68 witnesses. It grew to 71 in a Feb. 12 filing and is now at 59 witnesses.
McNally is on the witness list, while Sciortino is not.
Former and current Mahoning County officials on the defense witness list include: Prosecutor Paul J. Gains; Linette Stratford, chief assistant prosecutor; ex-Treasurer Lisa Antonini, also a former Democratic Party chairwoman; ex-Commissioners David N. Ludt and Edward J. Reese; Commissioners Anthony Traficanti, David Ditzler and Carol Rimedio-Righetti; Youngstown Health Commissioner Erin Bishop; James Fortunato, director of purchasing; Clerk of Courts Anthony Vivo; Joe Caruso, former special projects director; Thomas McCabe, board of elections deputy director; county Democratic Party Chairman David Betras, vice chairman of the board of elections; Youngstown State University President Jim Tressel; county Auditor Ralph Meacham; Youngstown Finance Director David Bozanich; Thomas Humphries, president and chief executive officer for the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber; and Robert Bush, Job and Family Services Department director.
Potential witnesses on the original list who aren’t on the latest one includes ex-Sheriff Randall Wellington; Judge Theresa Dellick of the county’s juvenile court; former probate court Judge Timothy P. Maloney; common pleas court Judges R. Scott Krichbaum, John M. Durkin and Maureen A. Sweeney; Maureen A. Cronin, a former common pleas court judge; domestic relations court Judge Beth A. Smith; and ex-Youngstown Mayor George A. McKelvey, also a former county treasurer.
Also off the witness list are U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan of Howland, D-13th; state Rep. Michael O’Brien of Warren, D-64th; and Trumbull County Clerk of Courts Karen Infante Allen.
The Cuyahoga County Clerk of Courts office didn’t have an updated witness list from Martin Yavorcik, the third defendant and a failed independent 2008 Mahoning County prosecutor, as of late Thursday afternoon. Yavorcik, an attorney since 1999, is defending himself.
The three defendants have pleaded not guilty to 53 total counts including engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, conspiracy, bribery, perjury, money laundering and tampering with records.
The three defendants are accused of being part of a criminal enterprise that conspired to stop or impede the relocation of the county Department of Job and Family Services from Garland Plaza, owned by the Ohio Valley Mall Co., a Cafaro Co. subsidiary, to Oakhill Renaissance Place, the former Forum Health Southside Medical Center owned by the county.
Lynn Maro and John B. Juhasz, the attorneys for McNally and Sciortino, respectively, also filed a motion to have the jury make a visit to Oakhill.
“The merits of the Oakhill purchase are an integral part of the defense of this case,” they wrote in the motion. “The view requested will show jurors that the building, nine years and $15 million after its purchase, is still a money pit in poor condition and repair.”
Prosecutors filed responses in opposition to defense attorneys’ filings to dismiss the case contending prosecutorial misconduct by the Mahoning County Prosecutor’s Office, that McNally can’t be charged as he signed an agreement in September 2007 to resolve a civil case involving the Oakhill purchase that none of the parties could be charged, that testimony from that civil suit can’t be used in this criminal case, and for supposed violations in turning over evidence to the defense.
Prosecutors also objected to a motion filed by Yavorcik in which he contends secretly taped recordings by Harry Strabala, a political consultant and FBI informant, in Yavorcik’s law office was an unreasonable search and seizure.
Though prosecutors agreed to motions by the defense not to use some of their evidence in this trial, they wrote in a motion that other exhibits would remain.
That includes evidence gathered by a Mahoning County grand jury; secretly taped recordings by Strabala and a confidential witness; the recorded deposition of Anthony Cafaro Sr., a retired businessman who is prominently included in court documents but hasn’t been charged; and Cafaro’s handwritten notes of meetings with figures related to Oakhill.