Cuomo allusion slips in to trial

NEW YORK _ If jurors hearing the "Buffalo Billion" bid-rigging case did not know about campaign contributions to Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the trial, they might now.

On Wednesday, a federal prosecutor at the trial of SUNY Polytechnic Institute founder Alain Kaloyeros showed jurors an article in 2015 referencing a "big Cuomo contributor."

It is to date the only reference to campaign contributions prosecutors have shown jurors in the two-week corruption trial, which was initially expected to expose Albany's pay-to-play culture and include evidence of past campaign donations to the governor, who is up for re-election this November.

The reference to campaign money was in an article written by Buffalo-based investigative reporter James Heaney, which ran in the Times Union on June 21, 2015. Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Boone showed it to the jury as an exhibit during the testimony of David Doyle, a former spokesman for Kaloyeros at SUNY Poly.

The article contained redactions _ blacked-out passages _ to eliminate references to campaign donations the governor received from Buffalo developer Louis Ciminelli, owner of LPCiminelli and now one of Kaloyeros' three co-defendants.

"You've got sentences in here like, 'One of Cuomo's largest campaign contributors from Buffalo,'" Ciminelli's defense attorney, Paul Shechtman, told the judge Wednesday morning, before Doyle testified. "There is no evidence of that, and you've kept out that evidence because there is no foundation for it."

"That's the sort of thing the jury can ignore," U.S. District Court Judge Valerie Caproni replied. "That's not relevant to this case one way or other."

After discussions between prosecutors and the defense, Heaney's mention that Ciminelli "has contributed $96,500 to Cuomo's campaigns during his two races for governor" was redacted. Also eliminated was a line saying Ciminelli was "one of Cuomo's largest campaign contributors" from the Buffalo area.

The reference to the "big Cuomo contributor," which was in a sub-headline, remained.

Prosecutors allege Kaloyeros and ex-consultant Todd Howe steered more than $850 million in state contracts to LPCiminelli and to COR Development in Syracuse by corrupting the bid process. The contracts _ approved by the Fort Schuyler Management Corp, SUNY Poly's nonprofit development arm _ were for non-specific future SUNY Poly-related economic development projects that would need a "preferred developer" in those regions.

It was part of Cuomo's Buffalo Billion initiative to revive western New York and Syracuse. Howe later became a government witness.

As recently as June 6, a week before jury selection, Assistant U.S. Attorney David Zhou told the judge at a pretrial hearing: "We anticipate proving at trial that part of the motivation for rigging the bid in favor of LPCiminelli and COR Development was because those companies were clients of Todd Howe _ as well as major contributors to the governor."

Caproni has reserved decision on whether the donations would be allowed to be mentioned _ at least until prosecutors had laid the proper legal groundwork.

At the outset of the trial on June 18, Shechtman asked Caproni if the government was going to mention campaign contributions in its opening statement.

"No, your honor," Assistant U.S. Attorney David Zhou said.

Reid Weingarten, an attorney for Kaloyeros, later told jurors in his opening statement that Kaloyeros was not a contributor to Cuomo and "didn't go around getting campaign contributions."

In 2014, Ciminelli won the bid for a contract at Buffalo's RiverBend site, which ultimately became a $750 million contract for a SolarCity facility. Shechtman said the article also referenced losses that SolarCity experienced, and he asked that those references also be removed.

Despite redactions to the article, the same sub-headline stated the Buffalo Billion effort "hinged on money loser."

Kaloyeros and Ciminelli, both 62; COR Development President Steve Aiello, 60; and COR General Counsel Joseph Gerardi, 58; are charged with wire fraud and wire fraud conspiracy. Gerardi is also charged with lying to federal officers.

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