Yonkers Tribune

The Hezitorial: A Bankrupt Criminal Justice System By HEZI ARIS

No Charges Against Officers Involved in Killing of Kenneth Chamberlain, Sr.

The pronouncement Westchester County District Attorney Janet DiFiore made on Thursday, May 3, 2012, was monotonously repetitious of many previous similar circumstances. A grand jury advised they had voted to not indict White Plains Police Department Officer Anthony Carelli, who shot the now deceased, 68-year-old, former U.S. Marine, Kenneth Chamberlain, Sr., to death. This fast paced scenario culminating in death began after a barrage of racial slurs and epithets peppered the mind of a senior citizen with taunting and insults that should have years ago been grounds for dismissal by a police force that to this day claim a pristine wall of silence that seemingly perpetuates conduct anathema to public expectation yet the proof is there for all to see otherwise. But wait a minute. Some will be heard to say that there are circumstances that few have been made aware that validate the outcome voted upon by the 23 people who sat on the grand jury panel. And that is the disconnect and the ploy that continues to be used to be maintained in widening the societal divide over issues concerning people of color. It can be said that it is too late to close the evil demons that lurked in Pandora’s Box. It is however not too late to distill the issues exacted by the death of Kenneth Chamberlain, Sr.

The Hezitorial: Back to the Future - Now Rather Than Later By HEZI ARIS

Yonkers Mayor Mike Spano won the hearts of Yonkersites with his penchant for discourse and the sincerity of his smile while battling for his political survival and polishing the Spano name for posterity further into the future. At issue is just how much time does he have? Is it a full 4-year term or only a part thereof, that is, at the helm as a strong mayor in government, or hobbled by a financial review board to which he will be demanded to answer? Will Mayor Mike Spano be able to tackle the issues permitted to fester at the sinew of the City of Yonkers (CoY), or will he have the mindset and the staff / team to devise a cohesive vision for CoY?

THE HEZITORIAL: Silence Evokes Governance Devoid of Accommodation, Consensus, or Prudent Direction By HEZI ARIS

Yonkers Mayor Mike Spano’s proposed FY 2012-2013 budget will at last be daylighted from behind its opaque hideout. The contention of whether the budget deficit is $89 million or $150 million is moot. At issue is how does the City of Yonkers (CoY) sustain its viability as it presumably pursues a doable financial paradigm true to the city’s plight and reflective of its needs and desires. A wishlist that leads to success as opposed to the make believe, pie in the sky schemes proposed over the many years passed is professed to be the goal. Neither of the camps of power has afforded anyone a clue. They have coalesced into the one and “true” party. The names refer to the “One,” God-like in the deference given Him, called upon under various names. Some will cry out for Jehovah, while others prefer to call him Democrat, Republican, Conservative, Independent and even Working Families. To those who work diligently to undermine public understanding of how things are, a feigned battle cry espousing the righteous tenets of one name for the Almighty is described by calling out his name. While the Almighty is the One and only Almighty, he is known by disparate names. He responds to all with adherents under many names, god-like in His name

The Hezitorial: Yonkers City Clerk Joan Deierlein to Step Down By HEZI ARIS

YONKERS, NY -- Yonkers City Clerk Joan Deielein was reported on February 22, 2012, to be stepping down, but she claimed she would not. Today, April 4, 2012, she officially announced she would do so in June 2012. Her long expected announcement was anticlimactic considering all the candidates that have been placed as contenders for the post of City Clerk.

It is only logical that Yonkers Clerk Vincent Spano, the lone clerk, after Ms Deierlein's departure, and the only one with the experience that can afford the city professional continuity and knowledge of the office should acceded to Yonkers City Clerk. Joan Deierlein is a registered Republican, Barbara Flatley, has been ill for a few years. Ms Flately is a registered Democrat and will not return to her post, suffering from a medical issue. 

THE HEZITORIAL: A Squeeze Play Gone Awry By HEZI ARIS

The jury’s verdict was divulged before the Hon. Colleen McMahon’s courtroom close to the Noon hour last Thursday, March 29, 2012. The jury foreman gave the unanimous verdict over which every allegation deliberated upon was made. On the first count, he was heard to say, “Guilty.” I did not believe I heard correctly. On the second count, he said, “Guilty.” I believe I realized my lower jaw had dropped to the floor only when on the third count he also said, “Guilty.” It was then, that I said to myself, “They are going to find them ‘guilty’ on every count.”  There were 11 charges in all, some shared others specific to one defendant, rather than the other. Upon reflection, and to this day, I cannot fathom the rationale deduced by the jury in their deliberation.

The Hezitorial: Prosecution Rests Without Going the Distance in Yonkers Corruption and Bribery Case By HEZI ARIS

The corruption and bribery charges against Sandy Annabi, former Yonkers City Councilwoman, and Zehy Jereis, former Yonkers GOP Chairman, were met with lust for blood by some, and questioned as being circumstantial by others. Either way, the prosecution, the United States of America, was expected to have all guns blazing in the case that came to rest yesterday (March 21, 2012), in the courtroom presided over by the Hon. Colleen McMahon, District Judge, after five weeks of testimony. The jury was charged with eleven total counts, which were at times shared allegations by both defendants, and others that were accusative of one, but not the other. Judge McMahon’s charge would consume three hours in studied and meticulous expression of the law to the jury. The task before the jury of twelve and four alternates is daunting. The charges are complex, and at times not easily contemplated. Many requests for further explanation are likely to ensue in the coming days of deliberation. While the jury is sequestered behind closed doors, we can consider some issues that question the value of this case and others that may likely follow in the wake of the government’s effort to excise corruption and bribery from governance and politics.

The Hezitorial: Allegations of Conspiracy, Corruption, and Bribery of Jereis and Annabi is Testimony to Yonkers’ Societal Norms By HEZI ARIS

 

The allegations of conspiracy, corruption, and bribery by the government against co-defendants Zehy Jereis and Sandy Annabi will be proven or go unproven under the aegis of the Hon. Colleen McMahon, District Court Judge, of the U.S. Federal Court, as it meanders its way this week toward a conclusion within set and confined parameters within the law before a jury of peers. The issues that burden both judge and jury is, with all due deference and respect, nothing more than a deflection from those who should logically be on trial. Instead, inconsequential protagonists are thrown to the sharks as chum to satisfy the call for and cry of lust for their blood. Annabi’s and Jereis’ personal lives have been invaded while the marionette masters continue to pull the strings of the puppets that are part of the grand ploy of deception, and deflection for monetary gainor such largesse that few could fathom. The marionette masters often mentioned obliquely are the likes of developer Bruce Ratner, lobbyists Patricia Lynch, Al Pirro, and Nick Spano, former Yonkers Mayors Angelo Martinelli, John Spencer, and Phil Amicone, among others, who will take a deep sigh of relief for not being mentioned herein. The case against Mr Jereis and Ms Annabi will have its moment.

 

The Hezitorial: A Cry for Blood By HEZI ARIS

 

The federal corruption trial of former Yonkers City Council Majority Leader Sandy Annabi and former Yonkers GOP Chairman Zehy Jereis with regard to the political shenanigans that surrounded the Forest City Ratner for bringing about the Ridge Hill Development is telling.

While many in the media have drawn the conclusion that both Ms Annabi and Mr Jereis are guilty of corruption, among other charges, the Yonkers Tribune / The Westchester Guardian have not. The facts have yet to be fully presented. The government is still in the process of making their case. It is not yet completed. The defendants have not had their turn at fully responding to the charges promulgated against them. It would be irresponsible to steer toward one possible conclusion over another. Yet a cry for blood is heard throughout many sectors of the city.

The Hezitorial: Murtagh To Move Ball Forward BY HEZI ARIS

YONKERS, NY -- February 15, 2012 -- Former Yonkers City Council Minority Leader John Murtagh (pictured left) has been ascribed by The Journal News to having suggested last week “that current lawmakers should consider legislation” he stipulates was twice introduced to the Yonkers City Council by him, in 2009 and 2010 to require anyone lobbying city officials or employees to register with the city.”

That original bill anguished; never making it to the floor.

Murtagh suggests somebody should “take the ball and move it forward,” referring to his past efforts and by the recent federal court allegations that both former Yonkers City Council Majority Leader Sandy Annabi and former GOP Chairman Zehy Jereis conspired to sell their votes on the Ridge Hill Village and Longfellow School projects.

The Hezitorial: Anticipated Results Over Nick Spano May Evaporate By HEZI ARIS

 

 

Download Spano-020812-Plea Agreement

It was late Thursday, February 9 when the Yonkers Tribune / The Westchester Guardian would come to learn of a lawsuit in which the United States of America v. Nicholas A. Spano would charge the former New York State Senator with tax evasion. The complaint was read to him Friday morning, February 10, upon his appearance before the federal court in White Plains, New York. He was formally charged with obstructing and impeding the due administration of the Internal Revenue Laws. The complaint went on to state that Nick Spano had also failed to report consultant fees, and real estate commissions.

Hezitorial Analysis: M & N - Mayer & Nolan By HEZI ARIS

Politics that Melts in Your Mouth Not in Your Hands  

A three-way campaign effort coalescing on the presently vacant 93^rd Assembly District was a situation unexpected. Shelley Mayer, has been working various political circles for support. She came out of the gate last week armed with having garnered the endorsement of the Democratic, Independence, and Working Families parties. Mayer was known to have made the rounds among the king and queen makers. She earned support from disparate quarters with the blessing of many, even before the then New York State Assemblyman Mike Spano would come to win the Office of Mayor of the City of Yonkers.  Until that momentous Election Day, November 8, 2011, a cautionary, yellow light was subliminally flashing a cadence of intermittent warnings to maintain the campaign effort below the radar screen.  For all intent and purpose it did.  Even after the euphoria of then Mayor-elect Mike Spano’s win moved one octave lower, jubilation did not outwardly reveal itself among the ancillary political contests down the line. The most important of which is to succeed Mike Spano to the Office of New York State Assembly serving the 93^rd District.

The Hezitorial: The Political Femme Fatale By HEZI ARIS

Transparency, Respect, Arrogance, Strategy, Honesty.

It was Election Day, November 8, 2011. New York State Assemblyman Mike Spano had won the office of Mayor of Yonkers among a pejorative political landscape. Yonkersites would be consumed by the disparaging words that were meant to detract and diminish the successful battle for accession to the most prominent position in Westchester County. Reality was questioned beyond that day; many people were shocked and in disbelief. Hope for calamity of any sort was the “plan” to derail the mayoral-elect. As delusion and self-denial quivered before the political reality that had revealed itself, the political side-show, cloaked for fear that discussion of it would unravel the final outcome was subliminally making inroads onto the political arena. A successor to complete the second year of the term of office of New York State Assemblyman Mike Spano was seemingly forgotten, or so it was hoped. The reality was far from the truth.

The Hezitorial: The Melancholic Tragedy of Phil Amicone’s Slash and Burn Exit Strategy By HEZI ARIS

A foreboding and agitating discomfort and melancholy has reared its ugly head in the closing days of Yonkers Mayor Phil Amicone. The benevolence expected from one raised within our midst to fall short of the trust bequeathed upon him when he was afford the honor of serving Yonkersites from their most august office is a tragedy that has diminished him as it has soiled a city deserving greater respect from one of its own.

 

The Hezitorial: Political Psychology 101 By HEZI ARIS

Yonkers Mayor Phil Amicone must have taken a course in Political Psychology 101. How else would he have become so adept at the finger-pointing antics by which we have become familiar judging his temperament. He became proficient at engaging others to do his bidding. He was superb in nurturing strife over inconsequence. The superficiality of those engaged in those pointless adversarial chapters in Yonkers historical pages brought about no better understanding over any of Yonkersites’ concerns. We were simply caught in the treadmill-like existence we were astute in recognizing in other communities, among others, but not among ourselves. If we did, we would not admit to it. We were either on the side of those who perpetrated these irrelevant sideshows, or we found ourselves incapable of extracting ourselves from the mesmerizing hold it had over us.

The Hezitorial: Threat of Additional Legal Action Exacts Vote of Indemnity of Yonkers Mayor Amicone by City Council By HEZI ARIS

Yonkers' Benedict Arnold Revealed

It was a well-orchestrated ambush of the Yonkers City Council. A week after they conducted an Executive Session over the request of them by Yonkers Mayor Phil Amicone to indemnify him of his personal responsibility in a First Amendment lawsuit which he lost before Federal Judge Cathy Seibel and a jury of his peers, the Yonkers City Council was ready to take a vote over whether they should indemnify Yonkers Mayor Phil Amicone of his personal liability of $393,388.00 incurred when it was ascertained that it was he who directed Yonkers Police Officers and DPW personnel to take the blue metal newspaper dispensers owned by The Westchester Guardian from the authorized City of Yonkers placements they were situated. The property owned by The Westchester Guardian, but removed as directed by Mayor Amicone, caused the protection afforded Mayor Amicone to be pierced. Mayor Amicone’s directive was an act that was dismissive of the United States Constitution’s First Amendment guaranteeing the freedom of the press. By directing DPW and YPD personnel to remove the blue metal dispensers from their locations, Judge Cathy Seibel ruled that it was Phil Amicone who is personally liable to satisfy the debt demanded of him by the court, and not the responsibility of the City of Yonkers. Phil Amicone would not hear of it. The man voted into office, expected to be benevolent to the city in which he resides for all of his years except the first two, would turn on Yonkers and threaten its very viability were he not granted indemnification by the Yonkers City Council.