With FBI Supervisory Special Agent Mike Doyle on the witness stand for the fifth day, Mack's attorney Mark Davis questioned the agent on timing of events in the case.
By Jenna Pizzi and Alex Zdan
TRENTON — Calls that were not returned to a government informant passing bribe money, inconsistent statements by a co-defendant, and events that did not fit the corruption scheme the prosecution has outlined were all part of the defense counterattack during the first cross-examination in Mayor Tony Mack’s federal corruption trial yesterday.
With FBI Supervisory Special Agent Mike Doyle on the witness stand for the fifth day, Mack’s attorney Mark Davis questioned the agent on timing of events in the case. Mack and his brother Ralphiel Mack are accused of conspiring with others to extort money in exchange for the mayor’s help with an automated parking garage plan, which was actually a sting orchestrated by the FBI to catch the mayor in illicit activity.
In his questions for Doyle, Davis pointed out bribe money was often in the hands of Joseph “JoJo” Giorgianni, an admitted co-conspirator, but said Doyle had never testified the money got passed to the mayor, even when on surveillance tapes Giorgianni had the money and was standing just feet away from Mack.
Davis contended that, during the period of the FBI’s investigation between September 2010 and January 2012 covered in yesterday’s testimony, there was no evidence Mack was aware of the parking garage project, or knew that Giorgianni was accepting cash in exchange for promised official action by Mack.
Davis played a series of phone calls between Mack and government cooperator Lemuel Blackburn from January 2011. The calls were made while Giorgianni was out of town in Florida. While it has been established that Blackburn passed bribe money to Giorgianni, listening to tapes yesterday the jury heard that Blackburn repeatedly was unable to arrange meetings or even a meal with the mayor, who stood him up and put off Blackburn several times.
“I’ll call you back in 20, 30 minutes,” Mack said in one call, hurriedly trying to rush off the phone.
“Now, Mr. Mack didn’t call him back in 30 minutes,” Davis said.
“He did not,” Doyle said.
Davis pointed to 15 calls — including five in three days — Blackburn made to Mack, saying none of the calls resulted in the meeting Blackburn was trying to set up. Blackburn had already met with Giorgianni once to talk about the garage, and Giorgianni had claimed that after that meeting Mack was on board.
“At that point did you realize that Tony Mack wasn’t going to meet with Mr. Blackburn?” Davis asked.
“In hindsight, it did not look like it was going to happen at that time,” Doyle said.
The prosecution has stated previously that code words were used by Mack and Giorgianni in reference to bribe money, but Davis yesterday noted sometimes the words were not used, suggesting the prosecution’s corruption theory wasn’t reliable.
Shortly after Blackburn or fellow government collaborator Harry Seymour would drop off a cash payment to be delivered to Mack, a phone conversation or text would follow with the cash words “Uncle Remus,” Doyle has said. Within a few days, Tony Mack would visit Giorgianni.
Doyle has said after the federal corruption investigation into former Hamilton Mayor John Bencivengo was made public in April 2012, the pattern changed slightly and Ralphiel Mack would visit Giorgianni rather than the mayor.
Davis questioned this pattern during his cross-examination of Doyle, saying that at least early on there are communications and meetings that do not fit into this “pattern” as defined by the government.
Davis pointed to Jan. 6, 2012, meeting with FBI informant Blackburn, a disbarred Trenton attorney who was posing as the intermediary for a North Jersey developer. Blackburn dropped off two envelopes, each filled with $2,500 in cash, to Giorgianni at his Trenton steak house.
After the meeting there was no phone call or text message to either of the Mack brothers dropping the words “Uncle Remus” or asking them to see Giorgianni. Tony Mack did arrive at the steak shop on Jan. 10, 2012, Doyle said.
“You would agree that this does not fit your pattern,” Davis said.
“The visit on the 10th does not fit the pattern,” Doyle replied.
Doyle testified that the FBI does not believe Giorgianni passed any money to Mack when he came by on Jan. 10, 2012.
Davis also questioned Doyle’s instructions to Blackburn when the cooperating witness first approached Giorgianni about the parking garage.
In his first call to Giorgianni, Blackburn had flattered Giorgianni, saying he was “the man to see” and that Giorgianni had a close relationship with the mayor. During his questioning of Doyle, Davis asked whether those were factual statements about Giorgianni’s relationship with the mayor or simply attempts to stroke Giorgianni’s ego so a meeting could be set up.
Doyle said that he would go over general topics with Blackburn prior to recorded meetings and phone calls, but said they were never specific instructions to “stroke” Giorgianni’s ego.
“What I told him to say was he had heard Joseph Giorgianni had sway with Mayor Tony Mack, and he was interested in a meeting with him,” Doyle testified.
In one of the taped phone calls played for the jury, Blackburn tells Giorgianni he heard Giorgianni had influence with the mayor.
Davis aggressively questioned Doyle for most of the afternoon. His questions occasionally confused the 17-year veteran agent, who was forced to admit several times that the investigation had not gone according to plan, and that statements made by Giorgianni were lies when they were originally uttered.
A Jan. 13, 2012, conversation between Giorgianni and Blackburn included a trademark Giorgianni phrase “money makes the blind man see,” which Giorgianni used to suggest that the lure of bribe money for the parking garage project had already drawn the mayor into the scheme.
But Giorgianni had told the FBI shortly before he pleaded guilty last year that Mack had not received any money at the time of the January 2012 conversation, and Davis pounced on the discrepancy shown by the recording.
“So he’s lying, correct?” Davis asked about Giorgianni’s claim about Mack’s involvement.
“Yes,” Doyle said.
Ralphiel Mack’s attorney Robert Haney attempted to get Doyle to say he did not know whether Ralphiel Mack had cash when Ralphiel left the steak shop in May 2012.
“According to your testimony, he picked up a bribe along with a sandwich and an orange soda?” Haney asked.
“I don’t know if he picked up a sandwich,” Doyle said with a deadpan expression.
In motion hearings, Haney has advanced the theory that Giorgianni play-acted the conspiracy in front of FBI listening devices he had discovered so that Mayor Mack would appear guilty, too.
The surveillance equipment was planted inside a clubhouse next to Giorgianni’s steak house in July and August 2011. Doyle acknowledged it was possible Giorgianni became aware of the devices, but rather than play that to his advantage, Giorgianni simply stopped using the clubhouse, Doyle said.
“So it wasn’t available to us, we believe, because whatever activity was noticed they didn’t want to walk into that area which had been compromised,” he said.
Davis is expected to continue with his cross-examination of Doyle today. The prosecution is expected to spend at least one more week presenting its case, followed by a week of defense testimony before the case goes to the jury.
Contact Jenna Pizzi at jpizzi@njtimes.com or (609) 989-5717.
Contact Alex Zdan at azdan@njtimes.com or (609) 989-5705.
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