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ISSUES
EDUCATING THE CANDIDATES & PUBLIC
Relevant NYS Constitutional &
Statutory Provisions
Public
Officers Law §17
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Attorney
General's Public Integrity Bureau Attorney General Appeals & Opinion Division ***************************
October 23, 2018 “He went on to question whether the attorney general needs permission from the state legislature to pursue corruption as Democratic nominee Letitia James believes.
'I have an opponent who, when asked how she’s going to go after corruption,
says she has to get permission from Andrew Cuomo and the state legislature
in order to go after corruption, and that’s just legally and factually
wrong. And also an abdication of the duties of the attorney general,'
Wofford said. What role, the AG? Wofford’s claim that the AG can, without gubernatorial permission, crusade against corruption has led to a disagreement with his opponents less about policy and more about the foundations of the post. On the state AG’s website, the description for the Public Integrity Bureau says that the office may go after corruption to 'restore the public’s interest in honest government and the integrity of government officials at the state and local level.' But the public officers law and the General Municipal Law cited on the website do not empower the attorney general to do so independently, nor does the state constitution. While it is true that no law explicitly limits the office from pursuing corruption, legal experts agree the scope of the AG’s prosecutorial power is restricted to what has been enshrined in law. For this reason, all of the Democratic candidates in this year’s AG primary debated potential legal reforms to empower the attorney general in a permanent way to fight corruption. 'It is remarkable that a lawyer who is paid at least $4.35 million as a partner at one of the largest Wall Street law firms in the country does not know enough about governance and the statutes that define the power of the attorney general’s office,' Jack Sterne, a spokesperson for James told City Limits. Lou Young, a former television reporter who is now campaign manager to Green Party candidate Michael Sussman, was blunt in his dismissal of Wofford’s claims. 'The Republican is bullshitting you. He had some assistant cut and paste the authorities off the state of the attorney general’s website,' he said. 'Wofford is a bill collector, he works for credit card companies and banks. He’s a confident attorney but he has no experience in public law.' Young said that the attorney
general’s office spends most of its time defending state agencies and uses
its remaining sliver of discretionary funds to fight on behalf of citizens,
but that 'they don’t do a goddamn thing unless there’s a headline in it,'
echoing one of Wofford’s complaints. Despite disagreements with
Wofford, the Sussman campaign shares the view that James is too tied to
Cuomo to adequately prosecute corruption. ..."
October 25, 2018 How would you
organize and staff the office and secure proper resources and authority to
reflect your priorities? Should the powers of
the Attorney General’s Office be expanded? Are there any areas where the
tools afforded by the Legislature to the AG are too limited?
It is always helpful to have additional investigative authority, but as I
have said repeatedly during this campaign, the attorney general has the
authority to investigate corruption based on the State Constitution, the
Parens Patriae doctrine, Executive Law 63(12), New York Public Officers Law
72s, the Martin Act, General Municipal Law 801 and 804, GBL 349, the Public
Integrity Bureau of the OAG, and the Operation Integrity collaboration with
the Comptroller’s Office. I welcome the prospect of working with the
Legislature on legislation to augment the attorney general’s ability to
fight corruption. However, in my view, the OAG has tools to investigate
now.
Does the office need broader grants of authority
to stamp out corrupt practices in Albany?
From day one as New York state attorney general, I will use every tool at my
disposal to fight corruption and protect taxpayers. After being sworn into
office, I will immediately initiate an investigation into systematic
corruption involving state and local government officials across the state.
Unlike what my opponent has said, the attorney general has the independent
legal ability to investigate and prosecute corruption without the consent of
the governor or Legislature. I will use all the powers granted to my office,
including parens patriae, the Martin Act, as well as a number of other
statutory authorities to pursue illegal and legal corruption wherever it
occurs. I will use the full authority of the office to review potential
problem contracts that harm taxpayers. It’s time New York state had an
independent attorney general, and I intend to fulfill my constitutional duty
to protect the hardworking residents of this state.
O How would you organize and staff the office and secure proper resources and authority to reflect your priorities? Should the powers of
the Attorney General’s Office be expanded? Are there any areas where the
tools afforded by the Legislature to the AG are too limited? Are there any
bureaus of the Attorney General’s Office that you think are currently
underutilized? ...doubling down on rooting out public corruption in Albany... We will both boost the resources dedicated to the “Operation Integrity” anti-corruption task force with the Comptroller’s Office and explore new ways to use existing powers under Executive Law 63(12), the False Claims Act, and the attorney general’s broad oversight of nonprofits to take on legislators, businesses, and charities involved in self-dealing. ...What is the proper scope of the attorney general’s
power to punish and deter public officials’ misconduct? Does the office need
broader grants of authority to stamp out corrupt practices in Albany? Yes. Unequivocally. When I am in office, I will
push the Legislature to give the attorney general original jurisdiction over
public corruption—but I won’t wait for them to act. I will explore creative
ways to use existing powers to tackle corruption, including beefing up the
“Operation Integrity” anti-corruption task force with the Comptroller’s
Office and using Executive Law 63(12), the False Claims Act, and the
attorney general’s oversight of nonprofits.
OTHER ARTICLES OF
INTEREST --
May 18, 2017
August 30, 2018
August 30, 2018
September 1, 2018 -------------------
May 21, 2018 https://law.justia.com/cases/new-york/other-courts/2013/2013-ny-slip-op-23366.html
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CJA's August 5, 2013 letter to the Commission
to Investigate Public Corruption --
"...concealing that
New York’s Attorney General has
always
had the power and duty to safeguard against public corruption was part of
the run-up to the creation of this Commission. For instance, this
April 18, 2013 news report:
'Attorney General Eric Schneiderman says he’d
love to have more authority to pursue public corruption cases, which even in
the face of recent scandals, no one is pushing to give him.
It appears that the Commission is also
concealing the Attorney General’s powers and duties by its website and
letterhead, wherein it calls itself 'Moreland Commission to Investigate
Public Corruption'. This is not
the Commission’s name. The Governor’s Executive Order #106 creating
the Commission could not be clearer in announcing that the Commission is 'to
be known as the Commission to Investigate Public Corruption' (at ¶I).
This is understandable as the Commission’s sweeping power to investigate
public corruption in all three government branches actually comes
not
from the Moreland Act (Executive Law §6), but Executive Law §63 pertaining
to the 'General duties' of the Attorney General [fn].
Tellingly, the Commission’s website
neither posts Executive
Order #106, nor Executive Law §6, nor Executive Law §63. Clear from Executive Law §63 is that the Attorney
General is an essential safeguard to ensuring governmental integrity in this
state. Is that essential safeguard functioning? Such must top
the Commission’s investigative agenda. Examining how
Attorney General Schneiderman and prior Attorneys General ACTUALLY discharge
their powers and duties under Executive Law §63 was the subject of a
proposal for scholarship embodied in a November 5, 2012 letter that I
personally delivered to Professor Briffault on that date at his comfortable
office at Columbia University Law School and which he personally received
from me, in hand. It identified that CJA, et al. v.
Cuomo, et al.
was the perfect case for such scholarship, that
it arose “from the official misconduct
of a succession of New York State Attorneys General – the most recent being
State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, a named defendant.
(at p. 1); and that it is 'a powerful case study for explicating and
resolving critical issues at the core of the state attorney general’s
function' (at p. 3). The letter stated: 'CJA v. Cuomo
is illustrative of what happens time, after time, after time, at the
New
York State Attorney General’s office. Citizens turn to the Attorney
General with evidence of unlawful, if not unconstitutional, state government
action, which he ignores. This then burdens the citizens with taking
legal action as ‘private attorneys general’, suing the state and/or its
culpable officials and agencies – at which point the Attorney General
defends the state, etc. by dismissal motions, including dismissal motions
that are frauds on the court, being based on knowing falsification and
material omission of fact and law, thereupon granted by a biased and/or
self-interested judiciary. In such fashion,
our state’s highest law enforcement officer
functions not as a safeguard of government integrity and constitutional
governance, as he was intended to be – but as a perpetuator of governmental
corruption and abuse,… [Here
demonstrated is how the Attorney General’s] misfeasance, malfeasance, and
nonfeasance have facilitated an ongoing parade of horribles: (1) the brazen
theft of tens of millions of taxpayer dollars in fraudulent judicial pay
raises this year and over the next two years, in perpetuity: (2) an
unconstitutional court-controlled attorney disciplinary law, utilized to
retaliate against judicial whistle-blowing attorneys; (3) a corrupt
Commission on Judicial Conduct, dumping the very complaints the law requires
it to investigate; (4) violative and unconstitutional state judicial
selection processes, including to the Court of Appeals; (5) obliteration of
state remedies against official misconduct provided by Article 78 and
motions for judicial disqualification and disclosure. All are
chronicled, with substantiating documentary proof, by the CJA v. Cuomo
lawsuit record.' (at pp. 4-5, underlining in the original). Our follow-up January
24, 2013 letter further reinforced this scholarship proposal and identified
that CJA v. Cuomo establishes the necessity of crafting legislation
to not only rectify the perversions wrought in Executive Law §63, but for
developing 'a powerful qui tam statute to protect the People from the
Attorney General’s derelictions and misfeasance' (at p. 6). See CJA's referred-to:
November 5, 2012 letter-proposal --
"RE: (1)
Building Scholarship:
Assessing the Performance of State
Attorneys General in Ensuring Government Integrity & Constitutional
Governance
– Beginning with the New York State Attorney General and the case
Center for Judicial
Accountability, Inc., et al. v. Cuomo, et al. (NY Co. #401988/2012)
Click here for:
***************************** FOIL REQUESTS
CJA's December 5, 2016 FOIL request to
Attorney General --
Attorney General's December 12, 2016 acknowledgment (#160856)
Attorney General's January 11, 2017 response NYCRR Title 13 -- Department of Law
CJA's December 5, 2016 FOIL request to Comptroller, Attorney
General, Governor, Senate & Assembly --
Assembly's December 9, 2016
response
Comptrollers' December 12, 2016 acknowledgment
Attorney
General's December 12, 2016 acknowledgment (#160857)
Governor's
December 12, 2016 acknowledgment
CJA's December 5, 2016 FOIL request to
Attorney General -- Attorney General's December 12, 2016 acknowledgment (#160858) Attorney General's January 11, 2017 letter
CJA's
January 12, 2017 e-mail January 31, 2016 e-mail of AG's FOIL Appeal Officer
CJA's November 28, 2016 FOIL request
to Attorney General --
Attorney General's December 5, 2016 acknowledgment
Attorney General's December 29, 2016 response
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click here for:
OUTING CORRUPT & COLLUSIVE INCUMBENTS
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CJA Ho |
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Post Office Box 8101 |
