SCRANTON – A federal judge denied former Lackawanna County Commissioner Robert Cordaro’s request for a new trial on his corruption conviction.
Cordaro and former Lackawanna County Commissioner A.J. Munchak were charged in March 2010 with multiple counts of corruption stemming from illegal cash payments received while in office. They were convicted in July after a two-week trial before U.S. District Judge A. Richard Caputo.
Cordaro sought a retrial, arguing that Caputo had prevented testimony that would have rebutted evidence by the prosecution, that government attorneys knew or should have known a key witness – Al Hughes – lied under oath, and that prosecutors failed to disclose evidence that the defense could have used to discredit Hughes.
In paperwork denying the retrial, Caputo wrote that the testimony was properly barred as hearsay, that both Hughes and a rebuttal witness called by the defense offered “equivocal testimony” leaving no proof Hughes perjured himself, and that sufficient evidence was provided to Cordaro’s attorneys to make their case. Caputo wrote that, by law, prosecutors are not required “to conduct a defendant’s investigation.”
Caputo, in essence, upheld his own rulings made before and during the trial. His denial of a retrial is a necessary step in the effort by Cordaro to appeal to a higher court.