Word is Matsikoudis is angling for a position in Washington. He'll be gone soon.

Liar or coward? You decide.


I am guessing both. Please people, shake City Hall up! Levin 09'.

Did Bill Matsikous perjure himself in court last month?

The Jersey Journal reported yesterday that on January 28, Hudson county Superior Court judge Shirley Tolentino threw out a malicious prosecution case filed by former Liberty Humane Society manager Nicole Dawson against Jersey City Animal Control Officer Joe Frank. The reason? Frank had relied on advice of counsel when he filed animal cruelty charges against her in October, 2005. (The prosecutor dismissed the case against Dawson a few months after Frank filed charges.) And on whose advice does Frank say he relied? None other than Corporation Counsel himself, Billy Matsikoudis.

Here's the problem. For three years now, neither Frank nor Billy M have ever mentioned this. Reliance on counsel is an absolute defense to a malicious prosecution case, meaning if this is true, the case could have been dismissed three years ago. And yet Billy remained silent this whole time and allowed both Frank and the City to endure a lengthy and expensive litigation. He even went before the Council four times to request allocation of funds for Frank's outside legal defense -- $56,000 of the taxpayer's money has been spent to defend Frank as of November 12, 2008.

Neither the City nor Frank raised "advice of counsel" as a defense or in any motion before the court. Not until the day of trial did Billy M have a memory jolt. He even got up out of bed and drove through the snow storm from Red Bank to testify at the courthouse on Newark Avenue. And Mr. Frank apparently forgot about this discussion too. Apparently, if you don't raise a defense before trial, you can't raise it at trial. But thankfully, Judge Tolentino had Billy's back.

There's more. When a public outcry ensued in 2005-06 after Frank charged Dawson -- someone he had relentlessly pursued for years and had repeatedly threatened he would eventually take down -- Matsikoudis said nothing. To activists, he expressed astonishment and promised to have Frank removed from his job as Chief ACO. Check out his quotes in the JJ and Huson Reporter via google. He appeared at numerous Council meetings and participated in discussions concerning "What should we do about Mr. Frank?" And not once did he pipe up and say, You know, Frank only did what I told him to.

Then three years of silence. And $56,000 of the taxpayers money.

Hmmm.

So I ask you, is Bill Matsikoudis just a coward who threw Joe Frank under the bus in 2005-06, rather than face public outrage? Did he deliberately misled the Council (his client), and then for years kept silent throughout an expensive litigation, even misusing taxpayer money in an effort to cover his own ass? Or did he just perjure himself last month to save Frank from a damages award?

Liar or coward? You decide.