Lawyer for mob relatives blasts prosecutors’ innuendo in Atlantic City casino licensing case

Lawyer for mob kin blasts NJ’s innuendo in AC case

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — The lawyer for the owners of a concrete reinforcing business accused by state casino investigators of having ties to mobsters blasted the agency for implying that an official who recommended the company be allowed to work in the Atlantic City casino industry is biased, stupid or corrupt.

John Donnelly, the lawyer for Joseph N. Merlino and his mother, Phyllis, fired back Wednesday at the state Division of Gaming Enforcement, which on Monday leveled blistering criticism at state Casino Control Commissioner William Sommeling.

Sommeling, who had acted as the hearing officer for Bayshore Rebar of Pleasantville, said he believed the Merlinos’ claims that they had cut ties to the criminal side of their family. Merlino’s father, Lawrence “Yogi” Merlino, was a mobster who died in the witness protection program. Merlino’s cousin is jailed Philadelphia mob boss Joseph “Skinny Joey” Merlino.

In its criticism, which was nearly unprecedented in its level of harshness, the gaming enforcement division said Sommeling ignored voluminous evidence that the Merlinos continue to have contacts with organized crime figures, despite their protestations to the contrary. The division said Sommeling reached “a predetermined result,” which it characterized as “a travesty.”

In a 30-page response made public Wednesday, Donnelly wrote that the gaming enforcement division “engages in name-calling and unsupported allegations that the hearing examiner was biased, incapable of understanding, or corrupt.”

He asserted that gaming enforcement division knows the Merlinos are not associated with organized crime.

“Yet it has pursued a scorched-Earth prosecution, and now makes a disrespectful and dishonorable personal attack” on Sommeling. “Adjectives, adverbs and allegations, no matter how vile, are not proof. The DGE’s position has been, from Day One, if it says it is so, then it is so. No proof is needed.”

A spokesman for the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office, which includes the gaming enforcement division, declined to comment Wednesday.

Dan Heneghan, a spokesman for the Casino Control Commission, said none of the commissioners would comment Wednesday because they have to consider the matter and render a final decision, probably in early May.