And you thought City Hall was the only place the Old Guard was trafficking in unethically-obtained confidential information?
No, it is not.
Patrick Ricciardi, free on $100,000 bond, faces 3 counts of intercepting wire and electronic communications punishable by 5 years imprisonment for each and a $250,000 fine. These are criminal charges.
Could he be sued by victims later in civil court? I'm pretty sure, but I'll check with Not-Stempler (GA's $850/hr legal department- pro bono for me).
What recourse does a victim of a CONSPIRACY to traffic information from CLOSED SESSION BoE meetings have- with at least two parties involved:
- CONSPIRATOR A: An elected official on the School Board who has smuggled closed session discussions about a teacher to a political operative to dump online. Conspirator A's goal is to: IDENTIFY the teacher by name, DAMAGE the teacher's reputation and character in allegations that CANNOT BE ANSWERED because closed-session facts are CONFIDENTIAL, and most of all, cause COLLATERAL DAMAGE to the teacher's allies on the School Board and the Hoboken Housing Authority.
- CONSPIRATOR B: The political operative who posts online under many different monikers, but mostly as Curious Gal and prosbus, and has never denied she is Kim Cardinal. Cardinal is the current (or former) wife of 1010WINS cabby-crooner Lane Bajardi. Cardinal has not denied she's moved out of Hoboken to a waterside development in Edgewater. Curious Kim has been the Energizer Bunny of this conspiracy to seed Patch with closed-session allegations- which cannot be debated or refuted because they are closed session. This is Cardinal's modus operandi- planting ugly rumors online, lies and spin, against those she perceives as 'enemies'. All disturbing, and in his case, her victim is an African American. The vigor and venom with which Curious Gal has pursued this individual with unethically-obtained information NOT AVAILABLE BY OPRA REQUEST suggests a very dark motive driving her animus toward this African American professional.
We know the identity of Conspirator B, but WHO leaked the closed-session information to her?
GA has confirmed the following elected officials are NOT involved in this data-smuggling conspiracy against this African American teacher: Theresa Minutillo, Ruthy McAllister, Leon Gold, Rose Markle and Irene Sobolov. These BoE members are in fact horrified that one of their colleagues has betrayed their oath by participating in such unethical conduct.
Which leaves the question.
WHO is Conspirator A?
WHO would have the MOTIVE and OPPORTUNITY to leak closed session information to Conspirator B for the purpose of harming the person's allies on the HHA and on the School Board (Kids First)?
Who hates Kids First enough to attack this teacher to damage Kids First by proxy?
Who has a history of leaking and publishing closed session information online in violation of their School Board OATH?
Your guess is as good as mine.
That's the WHODUNIT, folks.
This is quite the story. If it is Maureen, she's in trouble. At some point the law has to catch up with her, right? And maybe Ms. Burrell can hit her with a slander suit. . .and Kim with libel. That would be interesting for sure!
ReplyDeleteI truly hope that whoever is feeding this information to online posters for dissemination gets caught and is taken to task.
Maureen's been in the data leakage game for a long time. This one's a little different- a clear case of conspiracy to used closed session information (smuggling) then laundering it thorough a third party for a political attack. But the vigor and intensity of the campaign against this African American teacher suggests something much worse, much darker.
DeleteAny civil rights organization familiar with bias attacks would recognize this pattern of singling out a minority individual for this kind of smear campaign.