Investigative Agencies

Attorney: Cammarano lost everything, had rough childhood, Ex-mayor sentenced to two years in prison in corruption bust

Former Hoboken Mayor Peter Cammarano, 33, was a rising star in the Democratic Party 14 months ago – but thanks to an FBI corruption sting last July, “He has been absolutely unemployed … [he’s] lost his marriage and been separated from his child,” said defense attorney Joseph Hayden on Thursday.

Hayden and Cammarano appeared in U.S. District Court in Newark to find out the ex-mayor’s sentence, four months after Cammarano pleaded guilty to accepting $25,000 in illegal campaign contributions from an FBI informant who posed as a real estate developer.

N.J. corruption case witness joins rogue's gallery

One man ran a Mafia-controlled brokerage that fleeced investors out of millions. Another was an admitted drug user who once ordered a murder. Yet another operated a Ponzi scheme right under the nose of his employer — the U.S. government.

To that rogue's gallery of federal snitches add the name of Solomon Dwek, the failed New Jersey real estate tycoon at the center of the biggest corruption sting in the state's history.

When Dwek takes the witness stand, possibly as early as next month, the success of the government's cases against potentially dozens of defendants will hinge on whether prosecutors can persuade a jury to believe a man who recently pleaded guilty to a $23 million bank fraud.