The Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Office of Inspector General, the Office of the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, the FBI and the IRS investigated the case.“Our tax-paying citizens are entitled to decisions based on the best interests of the public, not the best interests of corrupt public officials and bribe-paying contractors,” FBI Special Agent in Charge Stephen D. Anthony said in the news release.

From EJB on FB:

This is the "chief of staff" whose name is not identified in the federal indictment of Jim Rokakis* and Gus Frangos' former employee, Kenneth Tyson.

 The guy's name is Mr. Michael "Bag Man" Smedley. Gary Norton hired him as his chief of staff. You've seen words I've shared with Brandon King to get rid of him. He's the person who received my stolen pictures taken by two cops, Scott Gardner and Matt Balli, who burglarized my apartment and removed them from my personal computer. One I built with my own hands.

Smedley held the "viewing" party at "Our Place Lounge" and had my stolen property displayed on poster board. He told everyone to copy them onto their cell phones and share them "everywhere." This was the day my father died on September 23, 2009. Hi Mike. I haven't forgotten. All in conspiracy to help Norton.

Smedley attended my town hall meetings with his roommate, Trevelle Harp, when I first met them. He asked to be my chief of staff. He said he was a labor organizer but I forget which union. I never knew him to have a skill or to be "writing" literate. A chief of staff who couldn't write and had no prior municipal government or management experience. That shit would make no sense. I also knew people who knew him not to be honest. He was also fucking around with a friend's girlfriend in the background. I didn't want his kind of bullshit in my life. I passed.

After reporters like Tom Meyer received my stolen property, violated my privacy and published my pictures without my permission to help Norton, Smedley joined him as chief of staff. I didn't know at the time Gardner was involved in the theft when Ralph Spotts and deputy law director Ron Riley assigned him to investigate the criminal complaint I'd filed to learn the identity of the thief.

So once in office Norton, Smedley, Spotts, Gardner and Riley participated in a scheme on his first day of holding a press conference to call me a thief for purchasing the gun and laptop I'd paid for; and trying to get then Judge Sandra Walker to give cops a search warrant to enter my apartment. That was there way of covering up and investigation that would lead back to all of them.

I play pool. Since I was 15. At Eddie's Billiard's on E. 125th Street and Superior Avenue I learned an expression from my cousin, Darnell Ivory. "It's not the dating game. It's the waiting game." On the table he told me to be patient. Be patient when I'm playing another mutha fucka I know I can beat.

There are emailed messages Smedley and Norton received from me advising them to turn around and head down a more legally-compliant path. There are approximately 40 single-page editions of the East Cleveland Tattler that it couldn't have taken a skilled writer and designer 90 minutes to create and email to 400 people twice a month. Clyde Clodhopper and Julinda Mi'Adolla were fucking creative geniuses. I loved them.

But in each email they received from me was copied the Cleveland office of the FBI. The federal law enforcement agency's email address was always in plain site in the "CC" section to the emails I forwarded to Norton and Smedley; and 400 blind copied others. All the mainstream media outlets got them.

It's kind of like Al Pacino in "Devil's Advocate" with Keanu Reeves and Charlize Theron. Everything was right in Smedley and Norton's faces in plain English. Free will.

I identified a criminal act they committed by code. I wrote how to reverse it. I explained that persisting down the wrong path when you have knowledge you're wrong only compounds your crimes and lets investigators know you mean to do what you're doing.

In emails and articles I explained "wire fraud" and how placing a stamp on an envelope with false information on an income tax return is a federal offense; in addition to the false information on the tax return being a crime. Ernest Smith is going to deal with this shit because he's still stealing extra income by driving a city car as a councilman he personally uses. There is no legal duty a councilman performs that requires the use of a car. The car is extra money he's stealing from the taxpayers. Theft in office and he's already fucked. You tell them but they want to do what they want ... anyway.

So with all the advance and real time knowledge he had, and the historical perspective of knowing that over 30 East Cleveland elected officials and public employees had been criminally prosecuted and jailed between 1985 and 2009 "before" I left office, Smedley had to be Boo Boo the Fool to "keep" stealing and doing criminal shit. It only confirms that passing on this dumb, dishonest mutha fucka was wise. For Brandon King ... not so wise to keep him. Oh well. You tell 'em.

What you're seeing is just the tip of a growing iceberg. For everybody who's dealing with Smedley, and been dealing with him; he probably turned two years ago. The rest of y'all are already got.

Don't run. Don't cry. Anybody who came to me and asked if I thought they should do business with East Cleveland after I left was advised that these were some "dirty" and "already being investigated" mutha fuckas. And even if they didn't hear from me directly they read my words and warnings.

There was a "flood" of information council forwarded to the FBI during Joy Jordan's years as council president; and that's what you're seeing reflected in the dates. There was no need to entrap anybody with these dudes because their stealing from poor black people was intentional. Fuck 'em.

Look at the city. I didn't need a chief of staff at $85,000 a year as a $40,000 a year mayor. I'd been a chief of staff and a special assistant. The mayor, not the chief of staff, runs the fucking city and is who the voters elect. Y'all got fucked East Cleveland. Like the thieves. You didn't listen.

It ain't getting better. It only gets worse. You've got nothing but "dredges" in office and more dredges coming. There's one or two bright spots, but not enough numbers to make a difference in your elected offices.

All the laws elected officials and public employees are supposed to follow exist in documents they don't read. Smedley's got no respect for our ancestors: no respect for our people. He should rot in prison for what he's done to fuck over so many black people in our state's most vulnerable city

AND EJB posted this today:

Hey Jim. I got your message from Mansfield Frazier. Did he deliver mine? I can't help that your crooked azz didn't know the agency you and Gus Frangos created to profit off the misery you caused with your 3rd party tax lien sales was under a federal investigation as part of a multi-agency task force. I hope they get your azz. Sue me for writing it. Your boy, Kenneth Tyson, just got busted. More to come. I don't think your brother Alex, who's been working as a federal prosecutor, can help you this time. They should have got you with Jimmy Dimora and Frank Russo. You're worse.

To every resident of Cuyahoga County who has found their property foreclosed on to a 3rd party investor, these are the guys who wrote that insidious legislation in 1998 and got the general assembly to pass it. It only affects counties with populations of over 1 million. In Pennsylvania, Allegheny County's legal aid society filed a complaint challenging the constitutionality of selling off the property tax bill of that state's residents to an investor who then adds fees and comes after your house. In Ohio Rokakis bragged that he created his legislation to avoid a constitutional challenge. That doesn't make his legal success right.

Don Scott who owned Vel's on the Circle was one of my advertisers for a live call-in show I hosted on WERE around 2001. He wanted me to do on radio what I was doing with my newspapers, so he put the money up for the show. I called myself "The Most Dangerous Man in Cleveland Radio." Some of you may have listened.

I was hosting a series of shows on the third party tax lien sales Rokakis was engaged in as treasurer and blasting him for creating blocks of streets with vacant homes on them. My producer told me Rokakis called the station's general manager and complained. He was instructed to block Rokakis' name when I used it. So I called him the treasurer and gave everybody this punk's phone number.

Rokakis is the same racist garbage who defended the cops who George Voinovich's chief of police let Arthur Feckner and Leonard Brooks sell over $600,000 worth of fucking crack to black CMHA residents around Woodhill Estates in 1985.

Rokakis was on council. He was interviewedin 1989 by ABC's Diane Sawyer who asked him about police flooding drugs into CMHA, "Would you have supported the police if this had happened in a white neighborhood?"

Rokakis answered: "I'm looking at the lives of the police. Some of these officers ended up being divorced."

One of Feckner and Brooks' CMHA customers bought crack from them. He closed the windows to his apartment and turned on the gas to the stove. He chained himself to the refrigerator. Darlice Ogletree was CMHA's chief of police. In 1989 I was CMHA's chief of communications. Darlice told me how the guy lit the pipe and blew himself up with the unit near E. 93rd and Woodhill. I saw it firsthand. Rokakis didn't give a shit about him.

As East Cleveland's mayor I wrote Rokakis a letter telling him not to sell anymore of the city's properties that way. Mayor Frank Jackson felt the same way and had expressed the same concerns to this mutha fucka that he was wiping out our housing stock and defunding our schools. He ignored us both. So does the current treasurer. The county council should immediately abolish the practice; and stop doing business with that racist Rokakis, Frangos and their black-neighborhood-destroying and life-killing-organized crime gang. As far as I'm concerned every black person working for them is a complicit "self-hating" sellout.

I started walking East Cleveland's streets politically in 1994. Brightwood, Woodlawn,Hower, Delmont ... every street around Lakeview and Euclid Avenue was full. There may have been one vacant house on Brightwood and Woodlawn each. The same with the other streets. Most of the streets between Euclid and Lakeview were full.

I knew University Circle wanted that area, and I knew Rokakis seemed to be targeting the area for third party sales. With each new vacant house a nuisance was created that made the surrounding neighbors uncomfortable and caused them to sell their homes and leave. Emmanuel Onunwor starting in 1994 had also engaged in some fairly destructive community development practics after Mayor Wallace Davis hired to manage the city's block grant funds. Lee Fisher's drug house board up policy was ridiculous and probably the first real attack on black neighborhood instability. But nothing destroyed black homeownership in East Cleveland, Cleveland, Cleveland Heights, South Euclid, Euclid, Shaker Heights, Garfield and Maple Heights like Rokakis 3rd party tax lien sales.

It made neighborhoods even worse when the third party investors weren't taking care of the properties. They still don't. It's why I wrote the vacant property registration ordinance that's still on the books though unenforced in East Cleveland.

If these fucks Rokakis and Frangos were doing business with weren't going to take care of the properties I was going to make them pay. Leaving a property vacant in East Cleveland for 5 years should be about a $5000 bill to the owner per house by now, plus penalities. And it's a 1st degree misdemeanor. I'd ruthlessly enforce it now as mayor and fill the city's treasury with every vacant property owner's money; and their presence in the city's jail.

By the time I took office Rokakis had foreclosed on over 27,000 homes through the 3rd party investors and had stopped adding new totals. The 27,000 figure was about three years old.

After he and Frangos left the county treasurer's office they wrote legislation to create the county landbanks. Not only did their 3rd party sale legislation create the blight, they're now controlling the properties they made vacant. And more to the point, these two mutha fuckas right here worked very closely with George Michael Riley who opened that illegal construction and demolition debris landfill on Noble Road.

What did these malicious racists do? Pay Riley to dump the vacant homes they created in the same black neighborhood behind the homes of black people; and created even more blight that took a few lives along the way. Estimates are that more than 1000 landbank homes may have been dumped illegally in 96 percent black East Cleveland.

Every child who attends Collinwood High School, Shaw High School, Apex Charter at Christ the King or Caledonia who was exposed to the deadly toxic air from the Noble Road should never forget the names of James Rokakis and Gus Frangos.

I have never seen such racist evil in my life; and anyone who is affiliated with them deserves this community's never-ending scorn and disgust.

To the state and federal agents investigating acts surrounding these two men, remove this evil from among us. I'm reminded of John 3:20.

"Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

https://photos.app.goo.gl/M549qsth9WYsWH9z7

Here is the land cleared by the Cuyahoga County Land Bank - taxpayers paid to have this property primed for Cleveland Housing Network -Eden PSH scheme witing out $118K in back taxes, contract steering to Baumann demolition contractor, and illegal use of  $250K in public monies to purchase 3873 W 25 and demo - tax generating industrial property. Detroit Shoreway Development Corporation will get $1500K/unit in developer's fees for this sick project -estimated 83 units, if the transfer happens.

This is NOT just one employee - connect the dots:

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndoh/pr/business-owner-indicted-paying-cash-bribes-cleveland-demolition-employee

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndoh/pr/former-cleveland-housing-network-official-sentenced-prison-taking-bribes-and-steering

https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndoh/pr/cuyahoga-county-land-bank-employee-indicted-soliciting-and-accepting-improvements-his

https://www.cleveland.com/court-justice/2018/12/cleveland-wont-discuss-status-of-engineer-charged-in-federal-corruption-case.html 

Ewais is listed on the city’s website as an engineer and the construction inspection chief in the Office of Capital Projects’ division of engineering and construction. He has worked at the city since 2006.

 From Eric J Brewer 12/11/18:

The Cleveland building department FBI investigation plot thickens. Damien Borkowski has resigned. He was convicted ex-inspector Rufus Taylor's supervisor. He's really the player who could move demolition contracts. Taylor was small time in comparison.

Borkowski's tight with William Baumann, his son and grandson that all, individually, received emergency demolition work from the department Ronald O’Leary supervised. T&T is a black-owned demolition contractor Borkowski favored. Borkowski’s name was shown on T&T's website with his endorsement. That's an illegal way to use his public job.

Ayonna Blue-McDonald and that crew down there better be careful. This shit ain't over. Everybody's already caught. They just don't know it yet.

 From Eric J Brewer:  

Hey Jim. I got your message from Mansfield Frazier. Did he deliver mine? I can't help that your crooked azz didn't know the agency you and Gus Frangos created to profit off the misery you caused with your 3rd party tax lien sales was under a federal investigation as part of a multi-agency task force. I hope they get your azz. Sue me for writing it. Your boy, Kenneth Tyson, just got busted. More to come. I don't think your brother Alex, who's been working as a federal prosecutor, can help you this time. They should have got you with Jimmy Dimora and Frank Russo. You're worse.

To every resident of Cuyahoga County who has found their property foreclosed on to a 3rd party investor, these are the guys who wrote that insidious legislation in 1998 and got the general assembly to pass it. It only affects counties with populations of over 1 million. In Pennsylvania, Allegheny County's legal aid society filed a complaint challenging the constitutionality of selling off the property tax bill of that state's residents to an investor who then adds fees and comes after your house. In Ohio Rokakis bragged that he created his legislation to avoid a constitutional challenge. That doesn't make his legal success right.

Don Scott who owned Vel's on the Circle was one of my advertisers for a live call-in show I hosted on WERE around 2001. He wanted me to do on radio what I was doing with my newspapers, so he put the money up for the show. I called myself "The Most Dangerous Man in Cleveland Radio." Some of you may have listened.

I was hosting a series of shows on the third party tax lien sales Rokakis was engaged in as treasurer and blasting him for creating blocks of streets with vacant homes on them. My producer told me Rokakis called the station's general manager and complained. He was instructed to block Rokakis' name when I used it. So I called him the treasurer and gave everybody this punk's phone number.

Rokakis is the same racist garbage who defended the cops who George Voinovich's chief of police let Arthur Feckner and Leonard Brooks sell over $600,000 worth of fucking crack to black CMHA residents around Woodhill Estates in 1985.

Rokakis was on council. He was interviewedin 1989 by ABC's Diane Sawyer who asked him about police flooding drugs into CMHA, "Would you have supported the police if this had happened in a white neighborhood?"

Rokakis answered: "I'm looking at the lives of the police. Some of these officers ended up being divorced."

One of Feckner and Brooks' CMHA customers bought crack from them. He closed the windows to his apartment and turned on the gas to the stove. He chained himself to the refrigerator. Darlice Ogletree was CMHA's chief of police. In 1989 I was CMHA's chief of communications. Darlice told me how the guy lit the pipe and blew himself up with the unit near E. 93rd and Woodhill. I saw it firsthand. Rokakis didn't give a shit about him.

As East Cleveland's mayor I wrote Rokakis a letter telling him not to sell anymore of the city's properties that way. Mayor Frank Jackson felt the same way and had expressed the same concerns to this mutha fucka that he was wiping out our housing stock and defunding our schools. He ignored us both. So does the current treasurer. The county council should immediately abolish the practice; and stop doing business with that racist Rokakis, Frangos and their black-neighborhood-destroying and life-killing-organized crime gang. As far as I'm concerned every black person working for them is a complicit "self-hating" sellout.

I started walking East Cleveland's streets politically in 1994. Brightwood, Woodlawn,Hower, Delmont ... every street around Lakeview and Euclid Avenue was full. There may have been one vacant house on Brightwood and Woodlawn each. The same with the other streets. Most of the streets between Euclid and Lakeview were full.

I knew University Circle wanted that area, and I knew Rokakis seemed to be targeting the area for third party sales. With each new vacant house a nuisance was created that made the surrounding neighbors uncomfortable and caused them to sell their homes and leave. Emmanuel Onunwor starting in 1994 had also engaged in some fairly destructive community development practics after Mayor Wallace Davis hired to manage the city's block grant funds. Lee Fisher's drug house board up policy was ridiculous and probably the first real attack on black neighborhood instability. But nothing destroyed black homeownership in East Cleveland, Cleveland, Cleveland Heights, South Euclid, Euclid, Shaker Heights, Garfield and Maple Heights like Rokakis 3rd party tax lien sales.

It made neighborhoods even worse when the third party investors weren't taking care of the properties. They still don't. It's why I wrote the vacant property registration ordinance that's still on the books though unenforced in East Cleveland.

If these fucks Rokakis and Frangos were doing business with weren't going to take care of the properties I was going to make them pay. Leaving a property vacant in East Cleveland for 5 years should be about a $5000 bill to the owner per house by now, plus penalities. And it's a 1st degree misdemeanor. I'd ruthlessly enforce it now as mayor and fill the city's treasury with every vacant property owner's money; and their presence in the city's jail.

By the time I took office Rokakis had foreclosed on over 27,000 homes through the 3rd party investors and had stopped adding new totals. The 27,000 figure was about three years old.

After he and Frangos left the county treasurer's office they wrote legislation to create the county landbanks. Not only did their 3rd party sale legislation create the blight, they're now controlling the properties they made vacant. And more to the point, these two mutha fuckas right here worked very closely with George Michael Riley who opened that illegal construction and demolition debris landfill on Noble Road.

What did these malicious racists do? Pay Riley to dump the vacant homes they created in the same black neighborhood behind the homes of black people; and created even more blight that took a few lives along the way. Estimates are that more than 1000 landbank homes may have been dumped illegally in 96 percent black East Cleveland.

Every child who attends Collinwood High School, Shaw High School, Apex Charter at Christ the King or Caledonia who was exposed to the deadly toxic air from the Noble Road should never forget the names of James Rokakis and Gus Frangos.

I have never seen such racist evil in my life; and anyone who is affiliated with them deserves this community's never-ending scorn and disgust.

To the state and federal agents investigating acts surrounding these two men, remove this evil from among us. I'm reminded of John 3:20.

"Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed."