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Ex-Youngstown mayor to be tried separately in corruption case
YOUNGSTOWN
A judge granted a request from former Youngstown Mayor Charles Sammarone to have a separate trial from others indicted in a corruption case that alleges city hall was for sale.
Sammarone was indicted Aug. 20, 2018, along with former city Finance Director David Bozanich, downtown developer Dominic Marchionda and 10 companies owned by the latter on a total of 101 counts.
They’ve all pleaded not guilty.
John Shultz, Sammarone’s attorney, asked for a separate trial with Dan Kasaris, a special assistant Mahoning County prosecutor and a senior assistant Ohio attorney general, objecting last month.
On Wednesday, Judge Maureen Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, who is overseeing the cases, granted Shultz’s request for a separate trial.
Sammarone “should have never been indicted with those defendants. There’s no commonality at all,” Shultz said.
Kasaris contended the defendants should be tried together because several witnesses may be called to testify against all of them and Sammarone’s and Bozanich’s crimes “are of the same character and involve the same person.”
Judge Sweeney will have a pretrial hearing next month with Shultz and Kasaris to set a trial date, as well as dates for various court filings in the case.
Sammarone, mayor from August 2011 to December 2013, is charged with one count of engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity, nine counts of bribery, three counts of tampering with records and one count of falsification.
He’s accused of accepting $10,000 in bribes from Raymond Briya, a former MS Consultant Inc. vice president, from October 2012 to July 2013 to steer city contracts to the company without the knowledge of other MS officials. Briya hasn’t been charged and is a key witness in the cases.
Sammarone also is accused of failing to disclose the payments along with rental income derived from owning a condo in Florida and is accused of making false statements about the money to state investigative officials.