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February 21, 2008

Update: Oster found guilty of bribery, conspiracy

PROVIDENCE -- A jury today found ex-Lincoln Town Administrator Jonathan F. Oster guilty on all bribery and conspiracy counts after Oster and a then-political ally twice attempted to extort bribes from potential buyers of a nearly six-acre, town-controlled property on Route 116.

Oster, who was town administrator from 2000 to 2002 when the plot played out, was found guilty on two counts of bribery and two counts of conspiracy in Providence County Superior Court after less than two full days' deliberations.

The state's case held that Oster’s role was to get the town to sell the land for $105,000 in exchange for $25,000 cash payoffs, working, the state contended, with Robert R. Picerno, a former Lincoln Planning Board member and Oster ally, to shake down the different potential land buyers.

Picerno pleaded no contest in 2004 to four counts of taking or trying to solicit bribes, and three counts of conspiracy to solicit bribes.

In closing arguments Tuesday, prosecutor Bethany Macktaz in part cited a Feb. 16, 2002, meeting that Picerno went to at Oster’s law office wearing state police transmitters. A state trooper was outside videotaping.

Picerno had met over several weeks with contractors David Wayne Daniel and Robert Gelfuso, who were working with the state police, to get them to pay the $25,000 bribe in exchange for getting the town to sell them the H&H Screw Co. property, on Route 116, for $105,000. Picerno had an envelope filled with $10,000 when he went to Oster’s office -- money Picerno was to say was from Daniel.

On video, Oster and Picerno are standing outside and Picerno puts the envelope in a metal mailbox, saying, “All right, that’s from Wayne, for that H&H [expletive].” A police search later that day found the cash-containing envelope in Oster's office, according to testimony.

“There’s the proof,” Macktaz said in closing arguments. “The hard, direct evidence to convict this man.”

Before the attempt to extort money from Gelfuso and Daniel, Robert R. Campellone, whose car dealership was down Route 116 from the land, was Picerno’s first bribery target for the H&H land, according to testimony. Campellone testified earlier in the trial that Picerno lied to him about the deal's terms -- and Campellone said he backed out and sought his $25,000 back. Picerno wanted the bribes from Daniel and Gelfuso to pay back Campellone. Daniel testified Picerno had him make out the $15,000 “legal fees” check to Campellone, whom he didn’t know.

Oster's defense lawyer, C. Leonard O’Brien, argued that Picerno was an extortionist who was doing whatever he could to get the state police to give him a break less than two days following his arrest.

The defense also used testimony to argue that the land Oster was accused of selling at a too-low value might actually have so much industrial contamination as to have a negative value, so that any offer for it a good one.

And O’Brien established that the car dealer had done favors for Picerno for at least a year prior to Osters' taking office. O'Brien also got Campellone to say he had never talked to Oster about bribes he paid Picerno.

Read about the case's closing arguments.

-- projo.com staff writer Michael P. McKinney, with reports from Journal staff writer John Hill and Journal archival reports

Posted by Mike McKinney  at 1:52 PM | Permalink

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FRED MORSE | February 21, 2008 2:34 PM link

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