Former official is found guilty
Used state workers to run legal practice

Tuesday, July 31, 2007
BY RICK HEPP
Star-Ledger Staff

A jury yesterday convicted a former high-ranking state official of using state employees to run her private legal practice, but acquitted her of conspiring with family members to funnel them public contracts.

The jury deadlocked on a dozen other counts after spending a week deliberating the fate of former commerce commission chief of staff Lesly Devereaux.

As the verdict was read, Devereaux sat at the defense table with her hand on a Bible and a content look on her face -- a sharp contrast to the brazen, overbearing bureaucrat described by state prosecutors during the six-week trial.

Prosecutors contend Devereaux began running her law practice almost as soon as she was named chief of staff in January 2002 by the Rev. William Watley after he became the commerce secretary. Devereaux was a long-time adviser to Watley, pastor of St. James AME Church in Newark.

Watley stepped down in July 2004 amid ethical questions into $870,000 in grants and land that Jersey City approved for St. James after being lobbied by Watley and Devereaux. Watley has not been charged and the proposed housing project never got off the ground.

Devereaux's problems started in April 2004 when state auditors suspended their review of the New Jersey Commerce and Economic Growth Commission after she refused to turn over documents. Within the month, criminal investigators got involved.

"Lesly Devereaux thought that she could do whatever she wanted and get away with it," Attorney General Anne Milgram said after the hearing. "She conducted herself in a manner at Commerce that was open and notorious, doing her private legal practice on an almost daily basis. Today, she was convicted of being a corrupt public official."

Devereaux faces at least five years in prison, a ban on public service and possible disbarment on the charges of official misconduct and the misapplication of $87,000 in state services. That includes the salary of the commerce secretary that Devereaux ordered to type, file and mail private legal documents on at least 45 separate matters, including work for St. James and Watley, who had a religious book deal that needed review.

During the trial, Devereaux's attorney argued his client was simply finishing up work from her previous job -- and that her boss, Watley, knew about it.

Jurors found the state failed to prove Devereaux conspired with her mother and her sister to get them more than $11,000 in state contracts to do proofreading and computer work and tried to disguise those contracts by submitting fake documents to make them look legitimate. The jury also found Devereaux not guilty of taking a cut of the contract that went to her sister.

Devereaux's mother, Lillian Harper, and her sister, Candace Harper, both pleaded guilty to reduced charges of tampering with public records just hours before jury selection began. The sister faces up to four years in prison while her mother will avoid incarceration.

The remaining 12 counts in which the jury deadlocked also centered on those contracts. Superior Court Judge Maryann Bielamowicz asked the state to decide by Aug. 16 whether it will seek a retrial on the remaining counts.

Devereaux, who resigned her office in June 2004, did not discuss the verdict afterward. Her attorney, Jack Furlong, said the jury's decision showed the state had no foundation for charging her with criminal conduct for getting her mother and sister work.

Furlong attempted to put the state's political system on trial, arguing his client was guilty of little more than ethical missteps commonplace in state government. He noted that former Gov. James E. McGreevey had put his paramour, Golan Cipel, in charge of homeland security.

"Anytime a jury spends as much time as this jury did, you have to figure they came closer to the truth than anyone in the Division of Criminal Justice," Furlong said. "The refusal to convict on 14 of 16 counts speaks volumes about the attorney general's tendency to hit every thumbtack with a sledgehammer."

Milgram, however, said "a conviction is a conviction" and credited the work of Deputy Attorneys General Robert Czepiel and Anthony Picione, State Police Detective Sgt. Myles Cappiello and Criminal Justice investigators Kiersten Pentony, Edward Augustyn and Anthony Luyber.

She said the case also sends a message to those who doubt the Attorney General's Office can effectively prosecute corrupt public officials.

"The state can both do corruption cases and will do corruption cases," Milgram said. "Today is a small step forward in that direction."

Rick Hepp may be reached at rhepp@starledger.com