Even before Joseph Doria resigned as chairman of the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs last week, legal woes from Bayonne plagued him.
Two years ago, a former executive director of the Bayonne Parking Authority and another employee sued the city, saying they were wrongfully terminated. They said the termination occurred after the director began pointing out problems in the agency.
Although the city recently managed to get some of the counts dismissed, the case apparently has moved ahead with its most serious charges.
Doria is among those charged in the federal civil suit.
“The most serious charges remain,” said Karen DeSoto, who represents former Parking Authority Executive Director Peter Hilburn, who filed a suit against the City of Bayonne, former Mayor Joseph Doria and other prominent city officials in U.S. District Court alleging a variety of charges – including wrongful termination.
DeSoto has claimed that Doria has tried to use legal loopholes to keep the matter from going to trial. Former City Attorney Jay Coffey, however, said DeSoto improperly served Doria by giving the notice to the city clerk instead of to Doria at his home.
The city did apparently issue a response to the charges, but then asked for a motion to dismiss the case because Doria has not been properly served.
DeSoto said this was a legal maneuver to delay the legal proceedings, although she could not say what Doria or the city hoped to gain by it.
“We’ll just serve him [Doria] again and move on,” she said.
District Court Judge Dennis Cavanaugh dismissed most of the counts a few months ago, but DeSoto said the most serious charges and those with possible punitive damage awards remain.
The suit claims that Hilburn and Felicia Ryan, an executive secretary for the Parking Authority, and others were among a handful of Parking Authority employees terminated as part of what Parking Authority officials claimed was reorganization during the summer of 2007.
But Hilburn, for months prior to his termination, told the Bayonne Community News that he was concerned about questionable activities in the Parking Authority, including possible ticket fixing for city and school officials. Hilburn said he had gone to the state Attorney General to investigate the matter, and in the months leading up to his termination, Hilburn expressed the fear that he would become a target for this cooperation.
“The trial could happen in the fall, but will likely be delayed.” – Karen DeSoto
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“The trial could happen in the fall, but will likely be delayed,” she said.
Doria investigated?
City officials involved with the case, but who did not want to be named in this story, believe Doria is being investigated by the U.S. Attorney’s office in connection with a federal sting that already has ensnared more than a dozen local politicians. It could hurt Doria’s case with the Parking Authority, especially in light of the fact that several key officials in the Doria administration have met with government informant and real estate developer Solomon Dwek more than once (see story at right). Two city officials say Dwek is also a partner in a local retail establishment that has done business in Bayonne for many years.
Dwek is the principal witness in a case that has resulted in the arrest of the mayors of Hoboken, Secaucus, and Ridgefield, as well as two Assemblymen – including Assemblyman L. Harvey Smith – who represent Jersey City and Bayonne.
Doria stepped down as the Department of Community Affairs commissioner after federal agents searched his home and apparently carried out boxes of records.
Meanwhile, the situation has become more complicated because Peter Cresci, who had been representing the city, filed a suit against the Parking Authority just prior to Mayor Mark Smith’s public statement questioning some of Cresci’s activities there.
Cresci said he had kept the Parking Authority commissioners fully aware of his activities. His suit claims he is being railroaded out of the position as Parking Authority counsel. Cresci was fired as city business administrator earlier this year.