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Board recommends indefinite suspension of Sciortino’s law license
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Michael V. Sciortino
COLUMBUS
The Ohio Supreme Court’s Board of Professional Conduct is recommending the law license of former Mahoning County Auditor Michael V. Sciortino be indefinitely suspended.
It is up to the Supreme Court whether to adopt the board’s recommendation. It usually takes up to a year for the court to make such decisions.
The board released the recommendation to indefinitely suspend Sciortino’s law license Thursday.
Sciortino, a Democrat, was convicted in 2016 in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court of a felony count of having an unlawful interest in a public contract and misdemeanor counts of falsification and receiving or soliciting improper compensation related to the Oakhill Renaissance Place scandal.
He was also convicted that year in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court of two counts of unauthorized use of computer or telecommunications property – one is a felony and the other is a misdemeanor – for his repeated illegal use of Mahoning County computers while an elected officeholder.
A May 14, 2014, indictment in Cuyahoga County and court records accused Sciortino and others – including then-Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally in his previous capacity as a Mahoning County commissioner – of being a part of a criminal enterprise that conspired to illegally stop the county’s purchase of Oakhill, the former Forum Health Southside Medical Center. They were also accused of trying to stop the county’s Department of Job and Family Services from relocating there from Garland Plaza, a building owned by a Cafaro Co. subsidiary on the city’s East Side.
Cuyahoga County Judge Janet R. Burnside sentenced Sciortino and McNally, convicted of four misdemeanors, to a year of probation each March 28, 2016, and suspended their law licenses.
In the board’s recommendation about Sciortino’s indefinite suspension, it also asked the Supreme Court to give him credit for the nearly two years of time served under Judge Burnside’s suspension. In December, the board recommended the Supreme Court give McNally a public reprimand.
Sciortino was appointed Mahoning County auditor in September 2005 and served until late February 2015, three months after he was defeated in the November 2014 election by Republican Ralph Meacham. His term was set to expire in early March 2015.