The former head of the Hoboken Parking Utility is facing eight years in prison after appearing in Superior Court on Friday to admit his role in the theft of $600,000 from that city’s parking meters.

John P. Corea pleaded guilty before Superior Court Judge Francis R. Hodgson Jr. to official misconduct, a second-degree crime carrying a potential prison term of 10 years.

In entering his guilty plea, Corea, 45, a Hoboken resident, admitted steering three no-bid contracts to United Textile Fabricators, an arcade game manufacturer headed by a Toms River man, to collect and count coins from Hoboken’s parking meters.

Corea told the judge he made false statements to the Hoboken City Council about the company’s qualifications, and that he came to believe that the head of the company, Brian A. Petaccio, 51, of Toms River, had stolen a substantial amount of the city’s parking revenues.

On December 7, 2011, the United States Bankruptcy Court District of New Jersey signed an order granting the first interim allowance to the law firm representing HUDSON HEALTHCARE, INC. “HHI”, the bankrupt non-profit private corporation “manager” of Hoboken University Medical Center. 

HHI’s bankruptcy counsel TRENK, DiPASQUALE, WEBSTER, DELLA FERA & SODONO, P.C. was awarded $1,083,941.77 representing fees and expenses for the “First Interim Fee Application for the Period August 1, 2011 through October 31, 2011.”

During the bankruptcy process, newspapers and political blogs have reported allegations of bankruptcy fraud with respect to HHI and the Hoboken Municipal Hospital Authority. 

Former chief operating officer Spiros Hatiras will receive a $600,000 severance package from the Hoboken University Medical Center even though the agency that oversees the hospital is not obligated to pay it.

And what Hoboken taxpayers may find more appalling is that they are on the hook for $100,000 of that package. Hatiras, who resigned on July 14, was CEO for just two years.

According to a resolution approved by the Hoboken Municipal Hospital Authority, the city-created agency that oversees the city-owned hospital, new owners HUMC Holdco LLC are responsible for 80 percent, or $500,000, and the city is responsible for the remaining $100,000.

Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio has asked the office of the state attorney general to step in on the case of alleged fourth ward election fraud, but his reasons for doing so have as much to do with politics as usual in Hoboken as they do the ballots themselves.

"These cases are very difficult because people have their own political motivations," DeFazio said in a phone interview earlier this afternoon.

Last week, the county Board of Elections moved 190 mail-in ballots and four criminal referrals to DeFazio's desk in response to challenges made by the campaign of Mike Lenz, the incumbent who was defeated by Tim Occhipinti in the Nov. 2 election.

In the 1990s, the president of Adelphi University was accused of receiving excessive compensation and forced from office. Since then, the leaders of American, Towson, Texas Southern and other endowment-poor universities have also crashed to earth after plunging their institutions into turmoil for similar excesses.

Now, charges are swirling over Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, N.J. The state attorney general has sued the institute and its president, Harold J. Raveché, accusing him of plundering the endowment and receiving $1.8 million in illegal low-interest loans for vacation homes, with half of them later forgiven.

The former head of the Hoboken Parking Utility, who authorities say conspired with a Toms River man to steal coins from meters, has been indicted by a state grand jury.

John P. Corea, 45, used his position as head of the municipal parking authority in Hudson County to skim more than $600,000 from meters over the course of nearly three years beginning in June 2005, according to authorities. The indictment, handed up Friday, charges him with first-degree counts of conspiracy and money laundering as well as official misconduct, theft and misapplication of government property.

For Immediate Release: December 11, 2009

Office of The Attorney General
- Anne Milgram, Attorney General
Division of Criminal Justice
- Deborah L. Gramiccioni, Director

Former Director of Hoboken Parking Utility Charged with Conspiring with Contractor to Steal More than $600,000 in Parking Meter Funds from City of Hoboken Contractor from Toms River pleaded guilty to stealing more than $1.1 million

View indictment pdf

TRENTON – Attorney General Anne Milgram announced that John P. Corea, former director of the Hoboken Parking Utility, was indicted today on charges that he conspired to steal more than $600,000 in parking meter revenue that he allegedly split with a Toms River contractor whose company was hired by the City of Hoboken to collect coins from city parking meters.

John Corea, former director of the Hoboken Parking Utility, was indicted today on charges that he stole $600,000 from Hoboken. He is shown in January demonstrating parking in the re-opened robotic public parking garage on Garden Street in his own Corvette. The former director of the Hoboken Parking Utility has been indicted on charges he conspired to steal more than $600,000 in parking meter revenue.

State Attorney General Anne Milgram announced the indictment against John Corea, 45 of Hoboken, today.

The Jersey Journal's Jarrett Renshaw reports that the state's criminal investigation of Hoboken's top construction code official has now expanded to at least one neighboring municipality.

The Attorney General's Office issued a subpoena for records from Weehawken's Building Department earlier this week, Renshaw reports. The Attorney General's Office ordered Weehawken's Building Department to turn over documents by Sept. 17 related to its oversight of construction projects in neighboring Hoboken, according to Weehawken township attorney Rick Venino. Read more about the investigation into Arezzo here.

State Police grab documents in Arezzo probe

The Jersey Journal's Jarrett Renshaw is reporting that State Troopers from the Organized Crime Unit went to City Hall yesterday and seized documents from Construction Code Official Al Arezzo's office.

In addition, sources have told Renshaw that a grand jury has been convened in connection with the probe.

State Attorney General Stuart Rabner, who has promised to slay the public-corruption dragon, on Wednesday revealed his view of how to snare such targets: "You catch a lot of frogs before you've got a prince."

Rabner, seven weeks and a day into his job, told reporters that indicting public officials takes time, with good and not-so-good leads, followed by investigations and eventual cases.

Attorney General Stuart Rabner has asked the State Police to join the fight against public cor ruption by having troopers in their organized crime bureau focus on developing cases, tripling the number of investigators sniffing out crooked pols.

"The key to it all is building a more stable base of leads," Rabner said during a sit-down with reporters yesterday in his Hughes Justice Complex office in Trenton. "The first stop for me ... is the State Police."

Bob Ingle Blog
http://bobingle.blogspot.com/
Saturday, October 07, 2006

And Now The Legislature Is Targeted

U. S. Attorney Chris Christie's office has asked the Office of Legislative Services how subpoenaes can properly be served on lawmakers in Trenton. Looks like Christie's net is spreading.

Perhaps he has in mind a RICO indictment for the entire bunch. That would be a perp walk no one would want to miss -- all of 'em led out of the Statehouse in cuffs to the cheers of thousands.
posted by Bob Ingle at 11:04 AM

Ed Mecka Comments:  Earlier today, Bob Ingle's story was confirmed to me by a highly placed state official. 

The NJ State Attorney General and the Federal Attorney General are working together on this corruption investigation.

I have provided a brief overview of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act , also known as R.I.C.O., for educational purposes only.  

Legal scrutiny of state Sen. Wayne Bryant's mixing of business and politics is broadening with new state and federal subpoenas issued this week, according to published reports.

Bryant, a Democrat, resigned his post as chairman of the state Senate's powerful budget committee after a federal monitor's report earlier in the month found that he had held a no-work, $38,000-a-year job for the University of Medicine and Dentistry.

The [New Jersey State] Attorney General's Office has opened its own investigation into Sen. Wayne Bryant, the embattled Camden County lawmaker accused by a federal monitor of ordering the state's medical university to give him a no-show job.

State prosecutors sent a subpoena to the city of Camden last Monday seeking the financial records of a neighborhood redevelopment plan for which Bryant helped secure millions of dollars in state funding in 2003.

CAMDEN — State Sen. Wayne R. Bryant, who stepped down Monday from a key legislative post amid an ethics scandal, pressured Rutgers officials for a job and a berth in the university\'s Hall of Distinguished Alumni, a former university board member said.

The Camden County Democrat, an alumnus of the School of Law at Rutgers-Camden, was hired by the university in 2002 and inducted as a distinguished alumnus in 2005.

Partisan opponents in the U.S. Senate race escalated their charges Friday as the race continued veering toward the negative some five weeks before Election Day.

Democratic supporters of U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez accused Republicans of engaging in an unabashed campaign of "mudslinging" to avoid discussing serious national issues.

Republican backers of GOP challenger Tom Kean Jr. asked the state Attorney General's Office to investigate the connection between Menendez and a powerful North Jersey attorney, two days after the release of secretly taped conversations that have rocked the campaign.

TRENTON, Aug. 16 — Even as Gov. Jon S. Corzine was minutes away from publicly calling for the resignation of Attorney General Zulima V. Farber, Ms. Farber was deciding whether to fight the effort to force her out, according to four people involved in the complex negotiations.

Zulima Farber came in under a cloud. And she's leaving under one.