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Attorneys in Infante case disagree over validity of search warrant
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
The judge in the Ralph Infante public-corruption case heard arguments Thursday from Infante’s attorney and special prosecutor Dan Kasaris of the Ohio Attorney General’s Office regarding Infante’s request to have evidence seized by agents at his former home in Niles be suppressed from trial.
The former Niles mayor and his wife, Judy, owned the home in earlier years, but his attorney argued in a September filing that they did not own it when investigators raided it Feb. 1, 2016.
Agents seized records that special prosecutors say are related to illegal gambling and the operation of ITAM No. 39 on State Street in McKinley Heights.
Through Atty. John Juhasz, Infante seeks to have the evidence suppressed on the grounds that investigators exceeded the scope of their search warrant by searching areas in the home on North Rhodes Avenue that “were not the residence of Ralph and Judy Infante.”
Infante, 61, is facing 41 criminal charges accusing him of taking bribes, receiving inappropriate gifts, tampering with records, illegal gambling and engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity.
Juhasz told visiting judge Patricia Cosgrove that agents who executed the search warrant that day were told there were parts of the home that had been designated as belonging to Ralph and Judy Infante and parts that had been designated as belonging to Judy’s daughter, Michelle Sudzina, her husband, John, and their three children.
The Infantes were living at the home at the time, but the investigators were informed that the two families were occupying the home, Juhasz said.
Upon questioning by Judge Cosgrove, Kasaris answered that he doesn’t recall anything that special prosecutors plan to use as evidence at trial that came from areas outside of Ralph and Judy’s parts of the house.
Furthermore, agents were told that the Sudzinas were still “in the process of moving back into the home” at the time of the search warrant.
Kasaris and Juhasz disagreed with each other on whether the facts of the case would show that the home was owned by Ralph and Judy Infante at the time of the search warrant, and Juhasz asked for a hearing on the matter.
Juhasz said he also would like another issue to be decided at a hearing – whether the procedure was properly used when Judge W. Wyatt McKay of Trumbull County Common Pleas Court approved the search warrant used Feb. 1.
Kasaris said he believes Judge McKay took testimony from investigators before authorizing the search warrant. Judge Cosgrove said she wanted a copy of the transcript from the hearing, if one exists, within one week to help decide that issue.
On the issue of searching the house, Kasaris said agents executing a search warrant “can go anywhere in that house that they have reason to believe documents could be found.”
The next hearing, which will be a phone conference, will be at 11 a.m. Nov. 15. The trial date is Dec. 11.