ELYRIA — A former Elyria lawyer has been snared in the Cuyahoga County corruption probe that has spilled into Lorain County.

Timothy Armstrong, who represented several area school districts in their legal fights with property owners over how much land was worth and what property taxes should be paid on the property, was indicted last week on a federal conspiracy charge.

The indictment accuses Armstrong, who recently closed his Elyria law office and moved to Huron, of funneling bribes to a public official whose description matches that of Cuyahoga County Auditor Frank Russo.

Russo and Cuyahoga County Commissioner Jimmy Dimora, who also are considered targets in the wide-ranging probe, have not been charged and have denied wrongdoing.

Armstrong’s indictment came a little more than a week after Lorain Community Development Director Sandy Prudoff was placed on paid leave after the FBI told city officials that he was a target in the ongoing corruption investigation.

Prudoff has not been charged.

Armstrong was indicted along with Santina “Sandy” Klimkowski, a Russo lieutenant in the Cuyahoga County Auditor’s Office and a former member of the Maple Heights school board, and Bruce Zaccagnini, a former partner with Armstrong in the now-defunct Cleveland law firm Armstrong, Mitchell, Damiani and Zaccagnini.

The law firm closed in December 2006 after Louis Damiani’s death in September of that year, and Armstrong opened an office in Elyria shortly thereafter.

The indictment accuses the firm’s partners, including Armstrong, of funneling about $1.3 million in bribes to Russo and Klimkowski between March 1998 and March 2009.

The law firm represented an unnamed company widely believed to be VAS Enterprises, which performed property tax appraisals for Russo’s office, according to the indictment. The law firm had effective control over VAS’s books and finances, the indictment said.

VAS money was given to the law firm, and either Damiani or Zaccagnini would then write checks to the firm’s partners. The partners were then told — often by Post-It notes left on their desks — how much money they would have to contribute from those checks for kickbacks and when the bribes were due, the indictment said.

Between March 1998 and September 2001, Damiani had dinner meetings with Klimkowski and gave her the bribes to pass on to a public official matching Russo’s description, the indictment said.

Beginning in September 2001, the dinner meetings ended and Damiani simply began giving Klimkowski $10,000 in cash to give to Russo, according to prosecutors.

Damiani began giving Klimkowski $3,000 and later $4,000 as her own personal kickback in March 2005, the indictment said.

When Damiani fell ill in June 2006, Zaccagnini began delivering the bribes, the indictment said.

In August 2006, Klimkowski told Damiani during a meeting near a Strongsville mall that Russo would give VAS a three-year contract worth about $6 million. Two days later, she told Damiani the contract would be worth about $5.7 million with a $95,000 add-on, the indictment said.

The indictment said VAS’s services weren’t worth what Russo’s office paid for them. The company was paid nearly $21.5 million between 1998 and 2008, according to the indictment.

After Damiani’s death, the kickback scheme allegedly continued at Belcuy Partners, a new firm set up by Zaccagnini and an unnamed relative of Damiani. Armstrong, Mitchell, Damiani and Zaccagnini made nearly $9 million through its business dealings with VAS, while Belcuy Partners pulled in about $3.7 million.

Armstrong does not appear to have been involved in Belcuy Partners, according to the indictment, which also accuses Klimkowski of taking kickbacks while on the Maple Heights school board.

Armstrong was a well-known presence in Lorain County already and continued to work with several of his clients here after the firm that bore his name closed.

Barb Bechtel, treasurer for Firelands Schools, said Armstrong has done work for the district for more than a decade.

When his law firm dissolved, she said the district decided to keep working with Armstrong to handle its property value disputes.

“He was always totally above board,” she said. “I respected Tim and his work for us.”

Armstrong also did work for the Avon, Avon Lake, Amherst, Clearview, Elyria and Lorain school districts, according to Lorain County Board of Revision records. He sent letters to the Board of Revision on Tuesday that informed county officials he would no longer be representing Avon Lake, Amherst and Elyria schools.

Lorain County Auditor Mark Stewart said Armstrong primarily represented the interests of school districts before the Board of Revision.

“If the land had a value of $500,000 and someone paid $1 million for it, he would ask to have the value increased,” Stewart said.

Property taxes, most of which go to fund school districts, are based on the appraised value of the land.
Anthony Giardini, attorney for Lorain Schools, said Armstrong contacted him a couple weeks ago and told him he was closing down his law practice and wanted to give him the files for cases he was working on for the districts. Armstrong didn’t tell him the reason behind the decision, Giardini said.

“He’s one of the last people in the world I could think would have anything to do with something like that,” Giardini said.

But he also said he will probably review the work Armstrong did for the district and discuss it with the school board.

Armstrong and his attorney, John Pyle, both declined to comment.

Contact Brad Dicken at 3290-7147 or bdicken@chroniclet.com.

---

Print this story
Report an inappropriate comment

---

In order to comment, you must agree to our user agreement and discussion guidelines.

Need help? Email Us.

---