corruption

US congressman Glenn `GT’ Thompson, (Republican, Howard, 5th District PA) is asking Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett to investigate claims in former financial manager Ralph Bailets’ lawsuit against the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC).

A former finance manager Ralph M Bailets has lodged a lawsuit in Commonwealth Court in Harrisburg Pennsylvania accusing Turnpike Commission chiefs of serious wrongdoing. He says he was fired for his efforts to resist corrupt procurement practices and waste at the Turnpike Commission.

- by Jerry Werner and Peter Samuel   Regular road construction conjures up images of brawny asphalt paving contractors getting together at a hamburger joint to agree whose turn it is to put in the "low" bid for local state highway work, and discussing which official needs to be "helped" in order to ensure that "that new bastard" - not "one of us" - is kept off the list of "qualified contractors."

The large US Department of Justice prosecution that put the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission's longtime state senate patron Vincent Fumo into jail for four and a half years for 137 counts of thievery and corruption was run by Patrick Meehan, the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania Turnpike employees have received an email ordering them to retain a wide range of documents because of multiple corruption investigations. The email called a Revised Mandatory Preservation Order gives an indication of the scope of the FBI and state's attorney's probes - a legal "roadmap."

The specific projects listed for document preservation:

We were accused of "irresponsible journalism" Thursday morning for the report (see http://www.tollroadsnews.com/node/4418) we'd run of the FBI raid at the Pennsylvania Turnpike HQ Thursday and Friday Oct 23 - 24 in pursuit of a corruption investigation.

Of course our report inconvenienced both parties. Both went into flat denial mode. It never happened. The FBI weren't there. There was no corruption investigation. We should retract the story immediately.

Pretty much the same line from the Pike and the FBI.

Bob Dietz, 55 of Lancaster PA, construction supervisor for a Turnpike widening project near Valley Forge says we can quote him as saying the FBI were at the Turnpike's head offices in Harrisburg Thursday afternoon and that they went away with computers and other materials.

A number of Pennsylvania Turnpike officers have lost computer hard drives to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Conspiracy, corruption and other malpractice is alleged at the Pennsylvania Turnpike by a former manager of labor relations Donald Kovac in a wrongful dismissal complaint filed in US District Court in Pittsburgh. Kovac says he was fired on the orders of chief operating officer George Hatalowich after he refused to reinstate a toll collector who had assaulted a motorist.

Morning Call, the major newspaper of northeast Pennsylvania frontpages a report today that there's a major criminal investigation into corruption at the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission.

Don Kovac the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission's (PTC) former Labor Relations Manager is suing the Turnpike Commission itself, Mitchell Rubin former chairman, George Hatalowich chief operating officer, and Melvin Shelton a manager at the Turnpike, plus Mark Rowe of the Philadelphia Teamsters Union Local 77 alleging they conspired to have him wrongly dismi

Orlando Sentinel newspaper reports this weekend grand jury records apparently linking Orlando Orange County (Toll) Expressway Authority (OOCEA) chief executive Mike Snyder to the political fundraising from toll authority vendors. This long drawn out affair has cast a pall over OOCEA over the last several years.

A February 2006 memo written by the tollroad's then PR and marketing chief Ron Pecora on a "fundraising strategy meeting" said:

Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell says in a letter released this morning that he is removing the chairman of the Turnpike Commission, Mitchell Rubin as a commissioner because of his links to corruption. Rubin had asked Rendell for a "leave of absence" from the chairmanship, but instead the Governor today fired him from the Commission.

The Governor gives four reasons in his letter to Rubin:

Shakeups are looming at toll authorities in Orlando FL and Pennsylvania.In Orlando the release of a grand jury paper about shenanigans inside the local toll expressway authority threaten the tenure of CEO Mike Snyder and longtime general contractor PBS&J, while in Harrisburg PA the Governor Ed Rendell has said he's investigating whether he has the leg

Vincent Fumo, the Pennsylvasnia Turnpike's leading legislative patron while a Democrat state senator and Ruth Arnao, wife of the chairman of the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission have been found guilty on all 182 counts in the big corruption case against them tried in Philadelphia by the US Government.

Illinois Tollway spokesman Joelle McGinnis says that Governor Blagojevich was not controlling Tollway contracts and that the Tollway has not been involved in the fundraising by the Governor which got him arrested by the FBI and put under impeachment proceedings by the state legislature.

Illinois Attorney-General Lisa Madigan has asked the state Supreme Court for an injunction preventing Governor Blagojevich from "directing the activities of the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority" among other gubernatorial powers. Madigan's 12 page motion titled "PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, Plaintiff v.

The Illinois Tollway is heavily involved in corruption charges following the dramatic arrest of state Governor Rod Blagojevich and his chief of staff by the Feds and their indictment on multiple criminal counts.One incident cited in the indictment is Gov Blagojevich saying he expected an Illinois Tollway contractor to raise $500k for his Friends of Blagojevich campa

New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine has told the Newark Star Ledger newspaper he has paid a former Turnpike Authority and state Treasury accountant Rocco Riccio $362,500 in a legal settlement. Riccio the brother-in-law of Corzine's then girlfriend Carla Katz is reported to have gained a job at the Turnpike with the Governor's help.

The Chicago press has run occasional reports over the past three years of federal prosecutors investigating corruption at the Illinois Tollway in connection with vendor contracts at their service plazas or 'oases' as they call them. This morning the thing went national with the Wall Street Journal in an editorial piece headed "The Chicago Boys":