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Judge John J. Russo wants Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty to clarify whether he's criminally investigating the Common Pleas court process for assigning attorneys to poor defendants.

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CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The county's administrative judge is calling on Prosecutor Timothy McGinty to clarify the type of "investigation" he is conducting into the use of the court's arraignment room -- or ask an outside agency to take over the probe.

Judge John J. Russo, the elected Administrative/Presiding judge of the Common Pleas court said McGinty has refused to clarify whether a recent records request to the court was part of a criminal investigation or just part of his own fact-finding mission into how the judges assign attorneys to poor defendants when they first appear in court.

McGinty's office says once they have the records they'll know what there is to investigate.

Because the letter, given to the court last week, used the word "investigation," judges have raised concerns about whether they should be hearing cases involving prosecutors from his office. McGinty's office also technically legally represents the judges, which poses further potential conflicts, Russo said this week.

"Due to the lack of clarity in Prosecutor McGinty's recent request for information about our arraignment room practices and his use of the word "investigation," some Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court Judges are rightly questioning whether there is a conflict in hearing cases brought by his office," Russo said in a statement Thursday. " I do not believe that anyone on our bench has used, or would use, the arraignment room for political gain. But if Prosecutor McGinty believes there is something worth investigating, then I would ask that he request Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine's office or the Ohio Supreme Court to conduct it."

The issue has resulted in at least one murder trial being postponed in Judge Pamela Barker's room and also resulted in a motion to disqualify McGinty and his entire office from the voluntary manslaughter case involving Cleveland Patrolman Michael Brelo.

Barker was a target of McGinty's request in which he asked for information related to 10 or more weeks she spent in the arraignment room this year as she faced a well-financed Democratic challenger for her seat on the court. Barker has denied her race had anything to do with her willingness to take other judge's stints in the arraignment room.

McGinty's office has declined repeated requests from The Plain Dealer to clarify whether or not the request was part of a criminal investigation.

When asked last week McGinty's office replied, "This is public information and we are hoping for cooperation."

A later emailed statement from McGinty said, "I ran on a pledge that I would stamp out public corruption. That means we have a duty, if there is even a hint of corruption, to look into it. The people of Cuyahoga County deserve nothing less, especially after all the damage that Jimmy Dimora and Frank Russo did to the public's confidence in their government. All we are interested in is the truth."

Thursday, McGinty sent the following response to Russo's statement: "The administrative judge might be correct that an investigation is needed. But that cannot be determined until he produces the public records we requested. Our letter could not possibly be more clear or more specific," he wrote in an email. "One judge, just before her election, spent more time in the arraignment room assigning attorneys from a predetermined "candy list" than she normally should in an entire six-year term. If that's mere coincidence, then the records will reveal it. The sooner the court produces the public records, the sooner this issue can be resolved."

Russo declined to comment further but, through a court spokesman, said that he never said any type of investigation was warranted.