Ex-Spring Valley mayor goes to trial Monday

WHITE PLAINS – Two years after federal prosecutors charged Spring Valley Mayor Noramie Jasmin with taking bribes from an FBI operative, she gets a chance Monday to convince a judge she didn't.

Jasmin's non-jury trial starts with opening statements before U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon in White Plains.

Jasmin, 51, faces charges she misused her position by demanding a 50-percent ownership in a catering hall and community center on village-owned property near the municipal building.

A grand jury charged Jasmin with wire fraud and extortion in an indictment that led to the longtime official losing re-election in 2013.

The development scheme came from Monsey-based financier Moses "Mark" Stern, working as an FBI operative to lessen a potential prison sentence since his 2010 arrest for stealing $126 million from Citigroup Global Markets Reality as part of a scam to build 11 shopping malls down South.

Stern also paid bribes to New York City officials on behalf of then state Sen. Malcolm Smith's effort to obtain the GOP mayoral nomination.

Federal prosecutors won jury convictions against the officials, including Queens Republican leaders and Smith, a Brooklyn Democrat, and a guilty plea from the Bronx GOP Chairman Jay Savino, who lives in Rockland County and worked for Clarkstown as a tax attorney. Savino became a cooperating witness.

For the Spring Valley project, Jasmin is accused of promising Stern and his FBI-agent partner they would get a development contract approved by the village Board of Trustees.

The investigation also snared Deputy Mayor Joseph Desmaret for taking $10,500 from Stern to support the same project.

Desmaret pleaded guilty to mail fraud and extortion in July and faces nine years in federal prison. His sentencing has not been scheduled, said his attorney Kenneth Gribetz.

Jasmin's lawyer Benjamin Ostrer sought the non-jury trial.

Ostrer declined comment on his trial strategy or if he will make an opening statement.

In court papers Ostrer argued that the FBI used a criminal (Stern) to lure Jasmin into potentially incriminating conversations that were recorded. He said Stern was so focused on trying to convince the FBI that he could provide useful information that he "misdirected the investigation."

Prosecutors countered that Stern's credibility was not an issue, given recordings of the former mayor and testimony from an undercover FBI agent.

Prosecutors apparently don't plan to use Stern as a witness against Jasmin.

Stern became a cooperating witness after catching the eye of the Rockland District Attorney's Office when his company, Richmond Mercantile USA Ltd., bought a dilapidated house next door to his mansion on Remsen Avenue for $600,000, then sold it for $1.85 million a few months later in 2006. The buyers used $1.75 million in mortgages that quickly went into foreclosure, county records show.

Rockland investigators discovered the potential criminality with Citigroup and informed the U.S. Attorney's Office. Stern pleaded guilty to still-sealed charges in March 2013, before the indictments of Jasmin and the New York City officials.

Stern, a political operative influential in the Satmar Hasidic community, wore a wire and taped conversations in the dual investigations, according to federal court papers.

The New York City-Spring Valley connection became Stern paying bribes and Smith promising $500,000 in state money for a sham road project to support Stern's phoney Spring Valley development.

Twitter: @lohudlegal