I bet JC Official 1, the high ranking official within the Health Department who helped Beldini and Shaw set up bribes for
"JC Official 4," is Harry Melendez. Someone should start a pool.

OKay, who'll be the first to start the recall drive?

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That's a fascinating article! And makes me wonder if the "Journal" in question is the same poor Jersey Journal that we are saddled with today. Do they still make most of their money from the tax sale advertisements?

Without real investigative journalism the rats will crawl right back into city hall as soon as the FBI lights get turned off.

The FBI obviously didn't get Healy on tape taking a bribe, which is a shame. Clearly, however, his deputy mayor was accepting bribes on his behalf on tape.

So where does that leave us? Well, in the eyes of the law he might just get away with it, but that does not mean politically he can or should survive. That is not up to the FBI, the Sate Attorney General, or anyone except the people of JC.

I always hear a lot of griping about politicians and law enforcement looking the other way. Ultimately, it is the people who decide whether this guy stays in office.

Why am I not surprised about this.

In fact, I'm glad, keep it coming.

It's the enema this city needs.

What if Mr. Healy went to work tomorrow and a few hundred people were on the lawn with signs reading:

"JERSEY CITY OFFICIAL 4 MUST GO"

That would do the trick...just sayin.

God bless the FBI! Pray for them and a budget increase for the FBI to hire more investigators!....

Leona Beldini & Healy were joined at the hip for years! They were former business partners... There's no way, he wasn't involved...

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What you say makes sense. However, you must not know Hudson County. The pols here would chance their careers for $100.00. Bribery on all levels is so rampant it's just par for the course. Nobody thinks they'll ever get caught. Plus They just can't, can't keep their sticky fingers away from money.

I'm sure there are a lot of people who will be pacing the floors tonight wondering if they'll be in handcuffs tomorrow.

How dare these arrogant bastards betray the public trust, and I don't know what to say about the rabbis involved.

God Bless the feds!!! Hope half of the city council resigns tomorrow.

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You could have asked that particular question 44 times today.

BTW, I'm selling a kidney if anyone is interested....

At last! Channel 4 just mentioned "questions" surrounding Healy's involvement in all of this and and quoted briefly from the Beldini criminal complaint. Not surprisingly, a "no comment" from his people.

I don't believe that M. Vega took that tiny check as a bribe...why would he ruin his career or shot at being mayor for that? I think he's caught up in a misunderstanding...or at least pray he is. A check can be traced...if it were one of the "bribes" wouldn't it have been in cash like the rest?

Just answering "in good hands" with "like Allstate" could mean anything...basically a "joke".

Healy doesn't have much time if he is involved, which seems very likely. Would the council appoint a mayor or would they have a new election? I think Steven Fulop would be a good candidate. I guess time will tell if he was at all involved as well. This is a great opportunity for a young honest politician.

Life Can Imitate Art: Indictments Describe Deals More Fit for a Crime Movie

NY Times
By DAVID W. CHEN
Published: July 23, 2009

They did it in diners. They did it in parking lots.

What emerges on page after page of the federal government?s corruption investigation is that so many of the alleged deals happened in places that are almost visual clich?s about New Jersey corruption.

And some of the dialogue seems straight out of an introductory screenwriting class. Here are some of the moments, scenes and exchanges that are especially striking.

Apple Jacks Cereal

It?s sweet and crunchy and cinnamon toasty, and Apple Jacks cereal makes a brief but memorable cameo in the investigation.

At one point, according to the criminal complaint, Solomon Dwek, the cooperating witness, visits the Brooklyn home of Arye Weiss, who has agreed to launder money for him. Mr. Weiss gives Mr. Dwek ?a box of Apple Jacks cereal in which were secreted bundles containing approximately $97,000 in cash,? the complaint says.

Mr. Dwek removes a few bundles and asks, ?So this is the, uh, the ninety-seven, right?? Mr. Weiss tells him it is, but also tells him he has removed $3,000 for himself.

?Maybe we?ll have some more to pick up next week,? Mr. Dwek tells him.

Mr. Dwek then heads to New Jersey, and takes the Apple Jacks box, with the cash still inside, to Eliahu Ben Haim, the principal rabbi of Congregation Ohel Yaacob in Deal, the complaint says.

?Green? Party Member

In February, Assemblyman Daniel M. Van Pelt meets with Mr. Dwek, who was posing as a developer, and listens to his proposal to build a real estate project in Waretown.

Mr. Van Pelt, according to the complaint, jokes that Mr. Dwek should hire him as a ?consultant? on the project.

Later, Mr. Dwek says he is neither a Democrat nor a Republican but a member of the ?green? party, as in, as he put it, ?Green is cash.?

At a later meeting in Atlantic City, Mr. Van Pelt says he can help the project advance because he is on the Assembly Environmental Committee. Then, as a customer at the restaurant takes a photograph, Mr. Van Pelt says, ?We don?t want to get our picture taken,? and laughs.

Later that month, Mr. Van Pelt accepts $10,000 in cash from Mr. Dwek, the complaint alleges. At a meeting on May 22, Mr. Van Pelt refers to the news that another assemblyman, Joseph Vas of Perth Amboy, had been indicted the day before on federal corruption charges.

?Defendant Van Pelt referred to this activity as dumb,? the complaint says.

?In Good Hands?

Mariano Vega Jr., the president of the Jersey City Council, is described in one of the criminal complaints as seeing himself as a future mayor or congressman.

So when Mr. Dwek, the would-be developer, approaches Mr. Vega about building a sprawling project in the city, Mr. Vega volunteers that the state is planning legislation that could help the developer defray some infrastructure costs. Mr. Vega adds that he was providing that information early, before it gets ?out of the box.?

Mr. Dwek hands Mr. Vega a $2,600 check and says he is satisfied that he is in ?good hands.? Mr. Vega replies, ?Like Allstate.?

Organ Exchange

One passage describes the visit of Mr. Dwek to the Brooklyn home of Levy-Izhak Rosenbaum, who prosecutors say traffics in illegal organ sales. Mr. Dwek introduces an undercover F.B.I. agent as his longtime secretary whose uncle is in need of a kidney.

Mr. Dwek says the uncle ?needs to, uh, you know, organize to buy one and, uh, you know, we need to find, uh, how we can do this. I told him I?d take care of the financial arrangements.?

Mr. Rosenbaum tells them he has been ?doing this a long time,? and will obtain a kidney from an Israeli donor, and gives them a price of $160,000. But, he explains, they must fabricate a relationship between the donor and the uncle, so that hospital authorities are not suspicious, given that it is illegal to buy human organs.

?Could be, ah, ah, neighbors, could be friends from shul, could be friends from the community, could be friends of, of, of his children,? Mr. Rosenbaum says.

Mr. Rosenbaum says that he will need to have someone take care of the donor after the surgery. But when Mr. Dwek asks whether the donor will ?get a good portion of? the $160,000, Mr. Rosenbaum responds: ?Don?t worry about it.?

A Generous Guy

At a meeting just last week at a diner in Jersey City, L. Harvey Smith, an assemblyman and former acting mayor, is told by Mr. Dwek that his help is needed with traffic and environmental concerns with a development project planned for Garfield Avenue.

?I?m looking for a guy that can help me out. You know me, I know you. I trust you. Just like before the election,? Mr. Dwek says, referring to a $5,000 payment that Mr. Smith accepted for his campaign fund. ?I?m a generous guy and then anything else that needs to get done ?? .?

Mr. Smith interrupts him: ?According to your standards you?re generous,? he replies, prompting laughter.

Or Not So Generous

While the criminal complaints are rich with examples of local officials performing favors for relatively small bribes, as least one person, Dennis Jaslow, an investigator for the Hudson County Board of Elections and a former corrections officer, gripes about what Mr. Dwek gave him.

After accepting an unsealed envelope from Mr. Dwek containing $2,500 in cash in a parking lot of a North Bergen diner, Mr. Jaslow jokingly asks the cooperating witness, ?Does it got my name on it??

Mr. Dwek replies: ?No, I don?t have your name on it. Here?s twenty-five hundred.?

Mr. Jaslow says: ?What happened? I thought you were hooking me up, man? You?re cutting me down.?

Unfortunately, the Beldini criminal complaint implicating Healy has so far been completely buried/ignored in all the news coverage. The sheer number of suspects involved, the rabbis, the organ sales and the more sensational angle of Hoboken's mayor being arrested after just 3 weeks in office have dominated all the coverage. I haven't seen a single news outlet delving into this "JC Official 4" business, and Healy has even managed to milk this to his advantage with a very public and pathetic announcement suspending his cronies. Until the press starts highlighting this Official 4 business, there's not going to be much public heat on Healy. As much as we clamor for his head on this forum, JC List holds very little sway in terms of broadly influencing public opinion. It makes me ill thinking Healy just might get away with this.

The 32 year-old Cammarano is going to have to find a prison daddy fast once he goes away....

see what we can accomplish when jersey city comes together? first a new page. tomorrow, a new, i don't know, i can't think of anything else new we need.

Just heard a great line about Healy....

"He's busy right now trying to figure out how to stay AT bars as opposed to being BEHIND them...."

Scum! But seriously, are any of us surprised? Some things never change. This article is from 1889.

http://tinyurl.com/krasqm

You can tell a lot about a person by how they react to a situation....

While Fulop has called for the immediate resignation of both Vega and Beldini, Healy is satisfied that they are only suspended without pay.

I guess Healy doesn't want to cut them off completely; lest they really start talking.

Adonis Said: Quote:

This absolutely correct. The Jersey City Independent does a good job looking at this. http://www.jerseycityindependent.com/ ... y-jersey-city-official-4/

Ofcourse Healy is "Jersey City Official 4" in the complaint. The complaint describes this person as seeking re-election and how the deputy mayor is constantly setting up appointments with the informant and Jersey City Official 4.

Who else would the deputy mayor set up appointments for? and who else was seeking re-election at the time?

Ofcourse it is healy.

The Baldini complaint is most amazing for telling the story of Healy receiving bribes, having others do the dirty work, and possibly getting away with it.

If you read the Beldini complaint, Healy is implicated over and over again. I don't even think Beldini got any money, she just was the middle man for healy.

READ IT!

OMG, this is sooooo exciting, I hope they take down the fat drunk slob healy and I hope they all get tons of time of jail because they are all SOB's. How dare they steal my money..it makes me so mad!

It makes you wonder how much of the "millions" Healy supposedly has in his "war chest" came from this type of corruption. If he got $30,000 from one guy over the past 6 months, it isn't hard to get the $1,000,000 real fast.

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Very interesting... wonder how much of this scandal is reflected in how easily the whole PADNA zoning was allowed to fall apart?

Healys corruption started with the distruction of 111 1st street. He could not resist the fat sack offered by Lloyd goldman, then Vega hopped on board (two faced POS) who did a complete about face on the arts district. How is it that no trouble came to healy for allowing members of the board with EXPIRED TERMS to vote on the Powerhouse arts district
and Historic designation, thats how the case was lost and i believe that was planned. I hope the truth is revealed about this, and many other things because it has created such a negative effect on this entire district.

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Even if that is Healy, he could play ignorant. I'm not a big Healy fan, but for all we know he was. If they had something on him they would of rounded him up today. Still puts him in a bad light.

Also, NBC news said Healy said everyone involved is being suspended without pay. Don't know why I think that's funny but I do. Maybe because he ran on the crime issue, it's going on under his nose, and when it's revealed that's all he can do.

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Need I go on HEALY?

Wow!
You know what?

I never liked that guy (Mariano) he bumped into someone I know at the Loews here in Jersey City and was showing off pictures of his mansion in upstate NY.

Then I thought mansion? How does he afford a mansion?

A$$hole! Hope you go doooooowwwwwwnn wwaayyyyyy dooooowwwwnnn...and your little cronie friends too!!!

They're not worth the ball of spit I would love to throw at the foot of their feet

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Healy Step DOWN

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JC Official 4= Healy
Oppent of JC Official 4 = Manzo is the most probability

I hate to say it, but, I would suggest that we prepare ourselves for pleas of innocent based on entrapment.

and, I agree that this seems kind of big now, but, probly won't change the big picture here in Hudson County... unless #4 is Healy... but even so, I mean, what happened after the Governor of NY State went down? We need a wholesale cultural change in our "leaders" to affect any real change. Not to mention the apathy of the voters... Healy was elected by how many votes?

Although, while it may not be central, I do have to say that I'm intrigued by the underground kidney trading aspect of this. Freakin sick, and possibly something that could garner national attention... at least until that new reality show about the fine artists airs... (did anyone here audition?)... or, the Sopranos movie hits the big screen... whichever comes first.