BLOOMFIELD, NJ — In sworn testimony on Tuesday, Feb 7, Newark Superior Court Office of Administrative Law Judge Leslie Celantano heard two versions of whether Gladys Rivera, a Bloomfield Board of Education member, qualified as a township resident on the day she was elected.
The version that indicated she was not a resident on Election Day, Nov. 8, 2016, was largely provided by a Bloomfield Police Department lieutenant and a private detective. BPD Lt. Vincent Kearney and Edward Koster, a private detective, had conducted database searches and interviews.
Testimony was also given by the building superintendent of an Ampere Parkway three-family house where Rivera now lives. The superintendent, Leonardo Marin, 18, alleged that he saw Rivera moving in and becoming a permanent resident at the address during April 2016. If that were true, Rivera would not have been eligible for a seat on the board.
These accounts were challenged by other testimony that seemed to favor Rivera.
The version that asserted that she was a permanent resident for the necessary one year prior to being elected was provided by Rivera and her fiance, Richard Mendez. They tied her residency timetable to the memorable dates of two people meeting for the first time, becoming engaged and deciding to live together in Mendez’s Ampere Parkway apartment.
The facts were further clouded when it was learned that Rivera’s mail was being delivered to three separate addresses: one in Elizabeth and two in Bloomfield. There were 11 witnesses all told.
The hearing was brought by a court complaint submitted by Shane Berger, an unsuccessful BOE candidate in the election.
Three, three-year seats were contested in 2016 and Berger, an incumbent, was going for his third consecutive term. Rivera was an unknown who stayed out of the public eye and did not campaign although she later said her campaign manager was Gary Iacobacci. Iacobacci managed the unsuccessful mayoral campaign of former Councilman Joseph Lopez last year. At the hearing, Berger was represented by Ciro Spina III; Rivera was represented by James Key.
The hearing was almost four hours in length. Those who attended included 2nd Ward Councilman Nicholas Joanow; former BOE President Mary Shaughnessy; current BOE President Emily Smith; BOE Member Jill Fischman, who also testified; Nicholas Dotoli, the BOE general counsel, who also testified; and Jonathan Busch, the BOE special counsel.
Koster, the director of the Spartan Detective Agency, was the first witness. He testified for Berger.
Koster told Spina that he conducted two database investigations for Berger, the first one involving an altogether different Gladys Rivera. He blamed the commonality of the name.
But once provided with the birth date of the correct Rivera he determined that she resided at an Elizabeth address on Jan. 13, 2016. He recalled no Bloomfield address for Rivera.
In testimony, Fischman told Spina that she became concerned after the election that Rivera did not qualify as a Bloomfield resident. She contacted Rivera who provided her with an April 2016 change of address document from the Motor Vehicle Commission but nothing else.
Fischman told Key she asked Dotoli to request a BPD investigation of Rivera’s address.
“Who told you that you had the duty and the right to an investigation?” Key said.
But Spina protested. He said anyone can ask for a police investigation; it was up to the police to determine if it were warranted. Celantano agreed and the matter was dropped.
When Marin testified, Key made much of his age. Marin is 18. Key said it was unlikely that Marin was the superintendent of a building. But Marin said he was of age to be superintendent and had an agreement with the building owner.
BPD Lt. Vincent Kearney said he did a driver’s license check on Rivera, a voter registration check, checked a law-enforcement database for voter and residency checks, and interviewed the superintendent and owner of the building. Kearney said he did not discover documentation putting Rivera in the Ampere Parkway house before March 2016.
But Key said ordinary people do not necessarily change their voter registration and driver’s licence addresses as quickly as a police officer would.
Mendez testified for Rivera.
Under questioning by Key, he said he met her online and they had chatted for a year. They met face-to-face for the first time on April 10, 2015. They began to date a week later and became engaged July 5, 2015. They moved into his apartment in early July 2015 and around Thanksgiving 2015, she gave him the engagement ring he wore. He took it off and the attorneys and the judge inspected it for an inscription of the date, inside the ring.
He said he had purchased a ring for her, online, in June 2015 and produced the bill, and that he and Rivera opened a joint banking account Aug. 2015.
Celantano said that was not relevant to where Rivera lived but Key believed otherwise
“They have a relationship that’s entwined,” he replied.
After the hearing, Berger said it was his understanding that Judge Celantano has 45 days to respond.
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