My name is John O’Hara and 20 years ago I was wrongly convicted by the corrupt Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes. I lost my law license, and, for 20 years I was a convicted felon because I voted. My conviction was overturned when newly elected DA Ken Thompson found evidence hidden by Hynes in a box that cleared me.

In 2017 when I ran against the Brooklyn machine for Civil Court Judge the Daily News reported that Brooklyn under boss Frank Carone and his Law Firm Abrams and Fenstersterman ran an illegal fund raiser for judicial candidates. The Carone money was used for a mailer that called me and four other judicial candidates running against the machine unqualified, because we chose to not appear in front of the county’s judicial screening panel that is controlled by Frank’s Seddio and Carone.

Carone’s Law Firm Abrams and Fensterman is now holding a fund raiser for Judge Lopez-Torres– a one-time reformer—now running against Judge Elena Baron. The money will give the Lopez-Torres campaign the ability to similarly attack Judge Elena Baron and pay campaign consultants to put out untrue literature calling Lopez-Torres the true progressive. Only the press can stop this poisoning of the truth that the Seddio and Carone so-called progressive machine uses to stay in power.

In 2017 Frank Carone’s law firm Abrams and Fensterman did a fund raiser to illegally fund an attack mailing piece on 5 independent judge candidates who spent their careers dedicated to honest practice of law.

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In the last couple of months, Frank Carone has emerged as a central architect behind the city’s $173 million real estate deal with the Mayor and the notorious Podolsky brothers. The city paid the Podolsky three times the amount the slum buildings were worth. Their real estate firm pleaded guilty to dozens of felonies in 1986 in relation to their miss treatment of tenants in their properties.

The Daily News reported that Carone enjoys unfettered access to City Hall since Mayor de Blasio took office in 2014. The mayor and his pay to play developers need the Brooklyn Courts to get their mega projects built.

They include the Allure Group, which made millions off the Rivington House scandal where City Hall illegally changed a deed that prevented the closing of the AIDS nursing home to build luxury housing. Carone and Seddio were paid by SUNY to close LICH Hospital 6 months after they bought it, losing millions for the city and state. Carone repeatedly emailed the mayor’s office regarding the Department of Homeless Services’ threats to stop renting apartments in a decrepit “cluster site” homeless building on Mosholu Parkway in the Bronx.

Mayor Bill de Blasio, First Lady Chirlane McCray, Kings County Democratic Party Chair Frank Seddio and Kings County Democratic Party Attorney Frank Cerone greet the crowd of dignitaries at last nights annual gala. All photos by Kadia Goba

Thanks to the recent news articles we are getting a clearer picture of a major’s citywide power broker Carone who has become the mayor’s fixer on deals that reward the slum landlords, developers, scammers and thieves.

Now Seddio and Carone want to keep control of the conveniently mismanaged and patronage rich Brooklyn Surrogate Court. Today’s power and money are found not so much in the voting booth as in the machine-controlled judicial election process. A generation ago, Robert Kennedy called the “The Surrogate Court A Political Toll Booth Exacting Tribute from Widows and Orphans.”

Surrogate Court races are more about the money behind the candidates then the person running for the office. Judge Elena Baron is the only candidate in this race who is not backed by the political bosses.

There is only one woman who can stop the grave robbers. That woman is Judge Elena Baron who is taking on the Brooklyn machine in her race for Surrogate Court. Elena can win. She already beat the political bosses in 2017 when Baron was elected to the Civil Court by the people.

Voters understood the importance of Elena Baron’s independence from the entrenched political insiders, who according to the NY Times pick almost all the judges in Brooklyn.

This year Judge Baron’s election for Surrogate Court Judge is Brooklyn’s last chance to wrestle control of the courts from the corrupt bosses and phony reformers.