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SCHENECTADY
Raucci trial prompts calls for change
BY AMEERAH CETAWAYO Gazette Reporter

    Current and former Schenectady city school board members reacting to evidence presented Friday in the Steven Raucci trial say that drastic changes in the way the school district is run may be needed.
    “I’m extremely disheartened and very concerned about the things being revealed, and I think it’s time that we start to look to turn around the district,” Schenectady School Board President Maxine Brisport said Saturday night. “That may mean making some drastic changes at various levels of the school district.”
    Raucci, 61, is facing felony charges, including terrorism and arson, related to allegations about misconduct while he was facilities supervisor for the school district and local union president.
    Evidence presented in the Raucci trial on Friday stated that School Superintendent Eric Ely sent an e-mail to Raucci in July 2008 giving him a “heads up” that Raucci was the target of a criminal investigation. District e-mails are being used by the prosecution to portray Raucci as engaged in intimidating behavior but also relate to the level of awareness that other officials, including Ely, had of his activities.
    Former school board member Joyce Wachala told The Gazette that she hopes once the trial with Raucci is resolved, criminal charges against other members of the administration will be brought forward. She resigned from the board in 2009 for family reasons.
    Wachala said Ely should be held accountable, specifically the e-mail he sent to Raucci warning him that he was being investigated. Statements made in the trial do not constitute formal allegations against Ely or any other official.
    “I thought that there was something legally that he has to be held accountable for. Maybe there should be some other criminal charges against other members of the administration. Everyone that is involved in this has to be held accountable. That’s what I’m hoping,” Wachala said.
    Wachala also said that since the Raucci trial is showing that “there are other people in the administration that did illegal things,” the state Attorney General’s office or the Commissioner of Education should step in and investigate.
    “I think that this problem is far reaching, and we need an unbiased entity to come in and help out the school district,” Wachala said. ...............>>>>.................>>>>...........http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....r01302&AppName=1

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EDITORIAL Raucci trial shows district was worse than thought

    “Explosive” is the only way to describe the revelations of the last few days at the trial of Steve Raucci, former head of buildings and grounds for the Schenectady school district. (From the looks of things, that title doesn’t do him justice; head of the whole district would be more like it). Thank goodness for the judicial process — and email.
    Better than those home-made bombs Raucci is accused of planting on the property of those he had grievances with, the trial has blown the lid off the sewer that is the administration of the school district. And the emails have shown how close certain administrators, including Superintendent Eric Ely, were to Raucci, how aware they were of his reign of terror, in school and outside, how they used and were used by him.
    Reading those emails gives one the creeps — and makes it obvious the district was being run by some. Assistant Superintendent for Business Michael San Angelo, Human Resources Director Michael Stricos and Ely tolerated and gave carte blanche to this obviously troubled man, paranoid with delusions of grandeur, this “man’s man” who verbally abused and threatened people, grabbed their crotches, punished them for no valid reason; who, it is alleged, and certainly appears from the evidence presented so far at trial, snuck around in the dark vandalizing their homes and cars and terrorizing them with his home-made bombs. No one was hurt, at least physically; but as the testimony shows, mental and emotional pain was clearly inflicted, and scars left.
    Any district resident should be angry that people were being treated this way; and that district administrators, hearing complaints about Raucci, and knowing from personal experience what type of person they were dealing with, did nothing. ..............................>>>>.............>>>>.............http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....r02400&AppName=1

Quoted from 8

I would have thought you'd have gotten it clearly. If you have to question that, a simple one line statement that requires a yes or no acknowlegement, then perhaps you need to read it again. A little more slowly perhaps.

The fish is out of the Florida waters and has traveled upstream to this area. No "point" was intended. Just a bit of fishy information. Comprende?

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Ex-cop turned informant had heroin addiction, sold drugsMarch 22, 2010 at 12:47 pm by Lauren Stanforth
Schenectady County District Attorney Robert Carney this morning went through State Police informant Keith McKenna’s sordid history from cop to drug addict.

McKenna, at the time a Glenville police officer, testified that in 1999 he got license plate numbers for an old friend who claimed he wanted to know who cut him off in traffic and suspiciously drove past his child while waiting for the school bus.

It turned out the childhood friend was using the plate numbers to commit acts of harassment in Kinderhook. But when State Police asked McKenna to wear a wire to confirm the misdeeds, he warned the friend with a written sign that said “I’m wired.”

McKenna said he was disciplined with Glenville PD for giving out the license plate numbers.

He said in the early 2000s he became depressed and started having panic attacks. Pills prescribed to deal with the mental problems led to an addiction to painkillers, and then McKenna began using heroin, he testified.

In fall 2008, McKenna was taking an opiate inhibitor in addition to drug treatment. However, he started selling his extra pills to a friend – and police learned of the transactions. State Police brought him in to the Clifton Park barracks, and McKenna agreed to be an informant – used in whatever way the police might need him in the future.

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By Ellen Patrice

     Found guilty by Carl Strock that is.  I’ve read a lot of bizarre articles and columns put out by the local news media, but Carl Strock’s on Sunday, March 21, 2010 takes the top prize.  As I’ve said previously, I do not know Steve Raucci, Eric Ely or any of the people that are involved in this case.

Strock begins his column as follows:
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Ladies and gentlemen, I have long believed based on the evidence that Schenectady school Superintendent Eric Ely protected the school’s head maintenance man, Steve Raucci, who is accused of arson and terrorism, but I admit I was flabbergasted when it emerged in court the other day that he had actually tipped Raucci off to the criminal investigation against him.
He found out about it and gave him a whistle.
What happened was, a former employee, Ron Kriss, was suing the school district over alleged sexual harassment (crotch-grabbing) by Raucci.


     Strock starts out his column with some real eye grabbing terminology himself; “Ladies and gentlemen” as if he is a carnival barker.  My first thought with his opening was this small poem that’s been heard the world over; “Ladies and Jellyspoons, I come before you to stand behind you and tell you something I know nothing about. Next Thursday, which is Good Friday, there will be a Mothers meeting, for Fathers only. Wear your best clothes if you haven't any, and if you can come, please stay at home. Admission's free, pay at the door. Take a seat and sit on the floor.” It’s an exercise in “double talk or nonsense” and that is what Carl Strock’s entire column for today is made up of.

     By the way, Carl Strock begins his column with the statement “Based upon evidence … “ yet nothing in this trial or any other, is “evidence” until it has been adjudicated by the jury. What is presented in a trial is called “testimony” or “exhibits.” What Carl Strock is showing you in the very first sentence of his column, is his ignorance of criminal proceedings. As an investigative reporter or columnist he should know these things. And even though he sprinkles the word “alleged” here and there, he doesn’t use it appropriately as an investigative journalist should. “Investigative Reporting 101” is obviously not a course he took in writers’ school.

     Stock continues with:
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The district’s insurance company hired a lawyer, Anne-Jo Mc-Tague, of the Albany firm of Maynard O’Connor Smith Catalinotto to defend it, and in the course of business she learned that Raucci was under criminal investigation.
When I reached her by phone after court, at home, she said she wasn’t sure if the information was in a legal filing prepared by Kriss’ lawyer, John Hoke, or if she heard it from Hoke in a conference call, but in any event, “I felt it was my duty to inform them [the school district] that these things were in the complaint,” so she notified the school attorney, Shari Greenleaf.
Greenleaf, in turn, sent an e-mail to Superintendent Ely: “Sorry to send you messages during your vacation & Anne Jo McTague again heard allegations that Steve R is under a multi-county investigation (from Ron Kriss’ lawyer) so she wanted to meet with Steve to learn if there is anything new that she needs to know about ...”
That was on Mon., July 28, 2008, at 2:06 p.m. Eight minutes later, Ely forwarded the alert to Raucci and said, “Just a heads up on these allegations. We need to talk about taking a head on approach pretty soon.”


     Carl Strock is “painting a picture” for you, the reader; supposedly of the events leading up to Steve Raucci knowing about a multi-county investigation into his actions.  Strock is relating to you what he himself heard, giving you a sequence of events amounting to nothing more than possible recollection by the parties in this matter.  What should stand out in your mind here is that the school district’s lawyer hears from Ron Kriss’s lawyer that a “criminal investigation” of Raucci was underway. So where would anyone find out information about a criminal investigation? Obviously from a cop.

     The column then continues with:
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Now, when a Schenectady police officer, Mike Hamilton was convicted a few years ago of alerting one of his drug informants to an investigation, he was sentenced to 4 1⁄2 years in prison for it.
When another Schenectady police officer, Chris Maher, admitted to tipping off a gambling friend to an investigation of a couple of bookies, which allowed the bookies time to destroy gambling records, he got just a slap on the wrist, a $250 fine plus some departmental discipline.
But any way you slice it, it’s verboten to disclose an investigation, and now I wait to see what if anything happens to Superintendent Ely, who has been telling school boards around the country, as he desperately looks for a new job, that he had no idea what was going on with Steve Raucci and that in any event an internal investigation cleared him, which is a lie on top of a lie.


     What Carl Strock is trying to have you believe is that a cop disclosing an investigation is the same as you telling your neighbor that “they may be under investigation” because you saw a cop watching their house.  Now I may not be a “reputable and seasoned” columnist, but I do know the difference between the two situations. A police officer can, by nature of his position, have the means and resources to learn of an investigation conducted by any police agency. It’s called “having direct access to information” and by virtue of being a cop, other agencies will give that information to him or her.

Carl Strock is using the analogy of Mike Hamilton and Chris Maher, both being cops at the time of their tip-offs. Eric Ely is not a cop and therefore does not have direct access to police investigative files.  So if anyone committed a crime, who was it? It has to be the “cop” who disclosed it to Ron Kriss’s attorney, not Eric Ely whose information was received third or fourth hand.  Ely is like that neighbor who informed “you” that someone was watching your house. The unnamed cop is like Mike Hamilton tipping off the alleged drug dealers.

While Hamilton and Maher may have tipped off a few suspected criminals, this unnamed cop tipped off the whole world to Steve Raucci’s activities. However, this was done in the wrangling of a civil lawsuit against the school district. The question I have is, “Did this unnamed cop disclose this information for the benefit of the civil lawsuit against the Schenectady School district?” What other purpose would it serve? Why would a cop tell the plaintiff’s attorney of a criminal investigation involving the defendant(s) to begin with?


     Oh, and there is more:
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Raucci avoided detection for a long time (if he indeed was the person setting explosives and vandalizing houses and cars) in part because the crimes were committed in different jurisdictions — Rotterdam, Clifton Park, Colonie, Burnt Hills, Schodack — and no one was putting the pieces together. Then in 2007 the state police got involved, and that’s when there developed a “multi-county investigation,” which finally ensnared him.
That’s what Ely got wind of, and that’s what he alerted Raucci to.
Do think it’s unusual that a school superintendent would be on such cozy terms with the kind of weirdly belligerent guy that Raucci is finally revealed to have been?


     So now we have it. The “unnamed cop” is obviously a state trooper involved in this multi-county investigation that Strock claims Ely squeaked to Raucci.  So let’s look a little closer at the state police involvement in this case, that has come to light so far.  Is this trooper part of the same team that engaged the assistance of former Glenville cop Keith McKenna to aid in their investigation?

We all recall the fiasco where the state police wired McKenna, instructing him to get admissions from two individuals suspected of terrorizing insurance investigators. In that SNAFU, McKenna admitted that while wearing “the wire” he handed a note to the targets warning them that they were about to be taped by him.  You will also recall that the state police dropped the investigation of these individuals as a figment of the imagination of the victims. Fortunately the FBI stepped in at the request of the victims’ attorneys and they were later convicted, ironically with the help of McKenna again, who was granted immunity and testified to what he had done.  What I find even more ironic is that Keith McKenna is the District Attorney’s “star witness” as reported by the media and is expected to testify as to the “wire” he wore during a conversation with Steve Raucci.

     Carl Strock goes on to say:
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Well, you don’t know the half of it, and neither did I till I started reading the e-mails that have been introduced into evidence in the trial.
Here is one that Raucci wrote to Ely on Sept. 4, 2008, that is, about a month and a half after Ely tipped him off and two months after he had allegedly trashed the house and vehicles of two of his detractors who lived in Burnt Hills: “I have often told you that you and I are alike me [sic] in many ways, we just have different backgrounds.
We both like to win and we do not care how we do it as long as we win. We both tell it like it is and if someone doesn’t like what we say, that’s too damn bad. If we do not like someone we let them know about it and usually do something about it. There we may differ a little. According to rumors, when I don’t like someone, I force them to go away or make them disappear.
When you don’t like someone, you have to wait until they die of old age (unless you give me their name.)”
Cute, no? Especially the sly insinuation that Raucci can take care of Ely’s enemies for him.


     According to news reports it was Robert Carney, District Attorney for Schenectady County, who read these emails into the record. I have never heard of a proceeding wherein the attorneys of either party are allowed to read into the record, communications sent by others. If any reader of this forum knows otherwise, I would welcome the opportunity to learn of it.

     My layperson’s understanding of criminal or civil proceedings is that either the author or the recipient of any written material is the only person authorized to authenticate its contents and read it into the court record. Emails or for that matter hardcopies of any written material do not become “proof” until such a time as either the author or the recipient can attest to said events. What makes it even more puzzling is that emails are machine generated and as such cannot be concluded to have been created by the “author” or received by the “recipient.” Anyone with a modicum of knowledge can easily manipulate the communications by changing the dates or contents of it. Moreover, unless the recipient or author of the transmission can testify to either sending or receiving same, there is no proof that it was either sent or received.

     If I sent you an email, does it mean that you got it? Or does it also mean that I personally sent it just because it’s from my computer? Does it mean that you even read it? By virtue of the judge’s allowance of Carney to “testify” to these emails, by reading them into the record, Carney has technically become a witness for the prosecution as well as being the prosecutor.  Obviously Carl Strock does not see or understand this so essentially, in my opinion, Carl is using this unorthodoxed procedure to try to pin actual guilt on Steve Raucci. He even goes so far as to take these emails as factual evidence, as opposed to their being “allegations.”

     Carl then includes a string of other emails, none of which were apparently attested to by either the sender or recipients thereof through the news reports as follows:
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Here’s an excerpt from one that Raucci wrote to Ely on Feb. 15, 2009: “I have never seen a superintendent in our District who speaks so openly and without any hidden agenda’s & NEVER underestimate my capabilities and believe me when I tell you that you have something far better than any contract, my word.”
And here, in full, is what Ely responded the next day: “There aren’t many I trust. You are one. Thank you.”  Which is actually my favorite and which I intend to frame and put on the wall of my cubicle.
It was written on Feb. 16, 2009, the day that Raucci made his final attack (allegedly) on the residence
of Hal and Debbie Gray in Burnt Hills, splashing their front door with yellow paint.
Four days later he was arrested, and Ely began saying he had no clue.
With other administrators Raucci was less sycophantic (the mode of the coward) and more belligerent (the mode of the bully). When Michael Stricos, the head of human resources for the school district, tried to cover the district’s legal butt by setting up a sexual harassment workshop, for example, Raucci at first said fine, but then irked by what he thought was the district’s coddling of his enemies, he changed his mind and e-mailed Stricos: “Now I am making a decision that is in truly my best interest and my union. I am withdrawing my response below declining the sexual harassment workshop on April 14 for my office staff.”
Which was in line with his earlier response to the district’s proposed investigation of the sex harassment charges: “I will not cooperate throughout this investigation ...”
They didn’t tell him, he told them.
And here’s one that’s really telling. When poor admiring Stricos (he’s the one who presented Raucci with a Godfather picture) sent an e-mail to one of Raucci’s subordinates, Pat Paratore, inquiring about some matter or other, this is the response he got from Raucci, dated Feb. 9, 2008:
“First, why are you looking for Pat when everything in this office and department filters through me.
“Secondly, God help both of you if I find out that you are communicating using some sort of communication in private or that I can not decipher.
“Third, even God would not be able to help Pat if he did anything job related and did not inform me. As a matter of fact, Mr. Gray and Mr. Kriss would probably be able to tell you that it could extend beyond just job related.” The reference at the end apparently being to the puncturing of tires and splashing of paint that both Hal Gray and Ron Kriss had experienced after getting on Raucci’s bad side. Repercussions “beyond just job related.”


     Again, it appears to me that this is a series of unauthenticated communications that strings together a series of events designed to make it look to the general public and layperson that Steve Raucci is in cahoots with the school district administration to perpetrate crimes. But the whole idea behind a trial, criminal or civil, is to PROVE the actual charges. In a civil trial it’s to prove it by a preponderance of the evidence, a criminal trial to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. The outcome of Carney’s criminal trial will have a profound impact on the outcome of the civil lawsuits against the Schenectady School District.



     And finally, Carl Strock ends his column with:
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Raucci didn’t try to hide these things from the school administration; he boasted of them, at least indirectly. And most of his e-mails he blind-copied to other administrators, including Ely.
Can you think of another organization, public or private, where an employee would be able to talk like that to his nominal superiors?
Can you think of another organization where the chief executive would express his singular trust in such an employee and alert him when the cops got on his trail?
It’s why I say I didn’t know the half of it. And the trial isn’t even over yet.


     As for Carl Strock, I have this question for him.  Why are you taking this procedure totally as a factual indication of Steve Raucci’s guilt of being a terrorist?  There was a time not so long ago where you attended a federal trial of terrorism involving rocket launchers designed to shoot a plane out of the sky.  You wrote many columns about that trial, screaming “entrapment” by the FBI. Despite both individuals having been convicted, to this day you still maintain their innocence.  

     Just has Robert Carney is insulting the integrity of the court system, Carl Strock is insulting the intelligence of the general public. Carney is doing so by parading an array of disgruntled employees.  Most of them have a financial interest in the results of this trial. If Raucci gets convicted criminally, the civil cases will be a “shoe in.” Carl Strock is doing so by failing to disclose all of the allegations that have surfaced in the Raucci trial. Because he is insulted by Eric Ely’s refusal to be interviewed, he has painted Ely as being an accomplice to the allegations against Raucci.

     It appears to me that Carl Strock has used a reverse approach to the Raucci trial and when I compare the alleged use of firecrackers to the criminal convictions of those attempting to use rocket launchers, his credibility is shot – no pun intended.  

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Raucci: A braggart, or a bomber?
March 23, 2010 at 8:17 am by Mike Goodwin
Here is staff writer Paul Nelson’s article from today’s newspaper:

SCHENECTADY — The conversations between the former rogue cop and his old friend Steven Raucci quickly turned to Raucci’s unfettered power as the school district’s facilities director and CSEA union president — and the two men’s claim of a penchant for street justice.

“When you find that someone can touch you at home, there’s no fear like that,” Raucci told Keith McKenna in a secretly recorded 57-minute discussion on Dec. 9, 2008, at his Mont Pleasant Middle School office. McKenna also wore a recording device when he visited Raucci again at his workplace on Dec. 16, 2008, and Feb. 18, 2009. Those talks lasted 19 and 45 minutes, respectively,

District Attorney Robert Carney provided the text Monday as he played the recordings in their entirety for jurors, strategically stopping along the way to question McKenna on the contents.

At one point, Raucci talks glowingly about himself and how he became an asset to school administrators like Superintendent Eric Ely.

“Everyone’s lucky because they’ve got a Steve. I’ve always said why didn’t my mother have twins? Then I could have a Steve to go to,” Raucci said. “The superintendent, he comes to me; he’s certainly not going to tell me what to do.”

Raucci, who is on trial in Schenectady County on arson and terrorism charges, told McKenna that his words could come back to haunt him.

“Keith, I could go to jail for the things I do, but I do it anyway,” he told McKenna. “You could get me in a lot of trouble because I’m trusting you.”

Street justice is a recurring theme. “Sometimes that’s the only justice there is,” Raucci said, who stressed to McKenna that he targeted “bad guys” and “punks” and that nobody ever got hurt.

McKenna testified that he saw an explosive device in Raucci’s office.

On one of the recordings, he explained to Raucci, a nonsmoker, that cigarettes have a safety feature which causes them to extinguish if they are left unattended. In two instances, explosive devices Raucci allegedly left on the door at a home in Schodack and under the windshield of a sport utility vehicle in Clifton Park failed to detonate.

“I wondered why the last two never went off,” Raucci remarked. Raucci mostly held his head down and appeared emotionless while sitting at the defense table next to his attorney, Ronald DeAngelus.

Jurors must decide whether any of the admissions Raucci allegedly made on tape are criminal in nature, as the prosecution has asserted, or just the defendant bragging, as the defense has repeatedly argued over the first three weeks of the trial.

DeAngelus also argued that McKenna, who retired from the Glenville Police Deparment in 2002, is receiving immunity from prosecution for selling prescription painkillers.

On cross-examination, McKenna, now a security officer for Union College, conceded to DeAngelus that he has made a lot of bad choices, caused a lot of damage, had a history of substance abuse and has committed a lot of crimes, but said that he has never been arrested.

McKenna acknowledged that he felt “emotional” and confused when Raucci confided in him that he could be in a lot of trouble if their conversations ever became public.

The two men met in the mid-’90s when McKenna responded to Raucci’s home in Glenville home for a domestic call.

McKenna renewed their friendship on the ruse that he was looking for a part-time job with the school district. And State Police investigators also provided McKenna with three bogus motor vehicle violations in hopes of getting Raucci to discuss a firebombing.

This is not the first time McKenna agreed to be a confidential informant for police. He also acknowledged that he agreed to wear a wire after being questioned in 1999 for illegally running license plates for a friend who was under investigation.

On a visit to the man’s house, he tipped him off by writing “I’m wired” on a piece of paper, which led to the State Police dropping the case before it was picked up by the FBI. McKenna never faced criminal charges.

While on the force, he was disciplined for punching a man who followed him to McKenna’s parents’ home after McKenna illegally passed him.

Earlier, State Police Investigator Peter Minahan returned to the stand, testifying about how authorities recruited McKenna because they felt Raucci trusted him.............>>>>............>>>>................http://blog.timesunion.com/crime/raucci-a-braggart-or-a-bomber/4268/#more-4268

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Jury gets a lesson on explosives
March 25, 2010 at 6:19 pm by Rob Brill
Paul Nelson reports on today’s proceedings:

SCHENECTADY  — The explosions in the FBI video shown to jurors in Steven Raucci’s arson and terrorism trial transformed a metal mailbox into a dangerous projectile, destroyed a block of gelatin and obliterated a concrete block.

The videotaped evidence Thursday also may have shattered defense arguments that explosives Raucci allegedly possessed were the harmless type used by Fourth of July revelers.

But Raucci’s attorney Ronald DeAngelus is expected to emphasize to jurors that the no one was hurt and nobody witnessed his client commit any crimes when the defense has a chance to go on the offense.

He must also counteract Raucci’s own self-incriminating words, which were captured on e-mail correspondences from Raucci’s work and home computer and when Raucci’s former friend, retired Glenville police Officer Keith McKenna, wore a hidden recording device for State Police.

Over the past three weeks, the prosecution has presented evidence to buttress the theory that Raucci, 61, targeted city school district employees he supervised as facilities manager as well as Civil Services Employees Association union officials who threatened his power and authority. The prosecution has also aimed to prove that he committed firebombings as favor to friends and in at least one instance to curry favor with a CSEA official.


On Thursday, two FBI employees testified about tests they conducted on explosives sent by authorities on the case to agency headquarters in Quantico, Va, for analysis.

Thomas Mohnal, a special agent in the explosives lab, who also worked on the Unabomber case, explained to jurors the laws that govern commercially manufactured firecrackers and unregulated homemade improvised explosive devices..................>>>>.................>>>>....................http://blog.timesunion.com/crime/jury-gets-a-lesson-on-explosives/4413/

Quoted from GrahamBonnet

The lone bombman...LOL