Federal Election Monitors Requested After Campaign Workers Caught Intimidating Rival's Supporters
Oct 19, 2011 (Menafn - WPIX-TV - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) --ELMONT, Long Island -- Days after operatives for a Republican candidate were captured on video using racist and sexist language while placing signs for their candidate on their opponent's campaign headquarters, the Democratic opponent got major legal firepower on his side, and a formal petition for federal election monitors. It's placed the Republican incumbent on the defensive.
"We say to the federal government, 'Come in and grab this snake by the head,'" was the message Frederick Brewington had regarding the case of two workers for eight-term incumbent Republican John Ciotti of the Nassau County Legislature. Brewington is a prominent civil rights attorney who the Long Island Press calls one of the most powerful people on Long Island . He was instrumental, among many major cases, in getting John White's manslaughter conviction in 2007 commuted by then-Governor David Paterson.
Now Brewington has filed a legal request with the U.S. Department of Justice asking for federal observers to monitor the November election for Nassau County Legislature. The legal action stems from the October 8th incident in which John Ciotti campaign worker Vinnie Prisco and another campaign worker, identified only as Charlie, placed Ciotti campaign signs on property rented by Democratic candidate Carrie Solages as his campaign headquarters in Elmont.
Mickey Solages, 26, the sister of the candidate, was one of three volunteers working in her brother's office that day.
"Go ahead, take 'em down," Prisco taunts Mickey Solanges on video that Ms. Solages, a hobbyist videographer, took of him. "I'm gonna wait here for you to take 'em down."
And wait Prisco did, while the campaign volunteer's camera caught him making an obscene gesture at her, with children and families from businesses adjacent to the Solages campaign office looking on.
As the video shows, Prisco then begins to make a series of offensive comments while his partner eggs him on. The first comment is directed at a woman who happened to drive past and saw what was going on and stopped to express her outrage about the confrontation.
"Despicable. Absolutely despicable, and disrespectful," the woman says. In response, Prisco makes a comment to his fellow campaign worker, "Call animal control so we can arrest them."
The messages continued. Fully aware that he is on camera, Vinne Prisco calls the woman shooting the video a pig. The encounter continued with what Ms. Solages calls the final insult. Prisco, who is white, says on video to Solages, a black woman of Haitian descent, "Don't worry, we will put them on the back of the bus where they belong."
"I hope [my video recording] shows you can't intimidate people to get someone elected. Let it be a fair process," Mickey Solage told PIX11 News in an exclusive interview before appearing with lawyer Frederick Brewington at a newsconference. "I hope it shows that you can't intimidate people the voters have the right to elect who they want, and do it on their credentials, and not on intimidation,"
While Ms. Solages was at the newsconference with attorney Brewington and her brother, Democratic candidate for county legislature Carrie Solages, the building in which they were making their presentation got a surprise visitor. John Ciotti showed up, saying he wanted to apologize to Mickey Solages.
Ciotti was turned away. He did request, however, that Vinnie Prisco, the campaign worker Ciotti dismissed from his campaign, be fired from his local government job as a sanitation supervisor.
"Calls for his firing? As a citizen, I find that odd," was the reaction from Mickey Solages's personal attorney, Gino Giorgini, who questioned why a request for dismissal from a government job would be filed for a person who was allegedly was doing campaign work on his own time. "It's the connection [between Ciotti and Prisco] that I question," Giorgini said.
The civil rights lawyer now fighting for Democratic candidate Carrie Solages had even stronger words for Republican John Ciotti about Ciotti's campaign operative Vinnie Prisco. "What he should say is Vinnie Prisco should be arrested!"
Mickey Solages filed a police report shortly after she was confronted by Prisco and his fellow campaign worker. Solages filed the report at the Nassau County Police precinct directly across the street from the campaign office where the incident took place. Police determined that there was no grounds for them to take action.
On Wednesday morning, however, Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice released this statement: "My office has received a complaint, and we are investigating to determine if any of Mr. Prisco's actions were criminal."
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