PRESS RELEASE
SEPTEMBER 27,
2016
More than 21 months ago, the
Village Board and Village Attorney received a report alleging that a Village the employee had utilized two background‑search firms (Transunion/TLO and Lexis
Nexis) with one of the firms’ extensive, law-enforcement databases accessed
under the pretense of the employee being the Village’s “Chief of Police”. In
the latter case, this enabled the employee to undertake the most invasive
searches of individuals’ backgrounds. The searches that were made were not for
a legitimate governmental purpose or work-related in any way. Additionally,
families, friends, and associates of certain individuals were also searched
without any lawful or legitimate purpose, including certain Village-Board
candidates, sitting Village Trustees and Village employees.
At that time, the Village’s
investigation of the searches was taken over by the then-Village Attorney.
Approximately two weeks later, the employee in question was separated from
service.
Not receiving any further
information concerning the extent of these searches and being concerned about
the Village’s legal obligations to address these matters, in April 2015, when
Mayor Maura P. Sperry's administration took over, the Board engaged the services
of two forensic‑investigation companies, one of which focused on computer and
IT‑related matters and the other on finance-related matters. The two
finance-related reports were completed by Cramer CPA, P.C. in December 2015 and
January 2016, and the results of each have been forwarded to appropriate
external agencies, including the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office and
the New York State Comptroller’s Office. The determinations in these reports
included a clear pattern of employees’ theft of services and other financial
improprieties.
Due to the complexities of
the IT-related information that was uncovered during the nearly 18-month
inquiry, the IT-forensic report that was conducted by Radius Investigations was
recently finalized. This latest report now enables the Village Board, with the
advice and guidance of its attorney, to comply with both federal and state laws
requiring the Village to notify in writing all individuals who may have been impacted
by these illegal and impermissible searches.
Some of the targets of these
illegal searches included elected Village officials, Village employees and
Village residents. The former employee who conducted these searches did so
using computers connected to both the Village of Mastic Beach and the Village
of Northport. Consequently, the Village yesterday mailed out written notices to
nearly 500 individuals in accord with the Village’s statutory obligations,
including among others New York State Technology Law, Section 208 and New York
State General Business Law, Section 899-aa.
Accordingly, Mastic Beach
Village Board, through its attorney, has turned over the IT-forensic the investigation report and related information to various state agencies,
including the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office and the New York State
Attorney General’s Office.
Mayor Maura P. Sperry stated,
“There have been loud cries over the past 18 months about the nature of The village’s IT investigation and whether it was even needed. It has been labeled
by detractors as merely a ‘witch hunt’. Certainly, the results of the reports
the Village has received prove otherwise and make unequivocally clear the
serious transgressions that occurred, including the digital violation of individual
privacy and confidentiality.” Mayor Sperry concluded, “The residents of Mastic
Beach Village need to know my administration continues to take very seriously
our obligations to provide transparency and accountability to our
constituents.”
# # # # #
MAYORAL
STATEMENT
SEPTEMBER 27,
2016
With the release of the
Village’s IT-forensic investigation findings, and after more than 21 months of
public vitriol leveled against former Deputy Mayor Bruce Summa and me, we have
been fully vindicated.
During the past 21 months,
Mr. Summa and I have been publicly accused of seeking to destroy families,
committing heinous crimes and abusing our governmental power. Nothing could be
further from the truth.
Make no mistake, this is an extremely dark day in the Village of Mastic Beach. Mine and Mr. Summa’s
commitment to transparency and accountability has come at a tremendous personal
cost not just to us but to our families and friends, many of whom were the
subjects of these illegal and invasive searches. Nonetheless, we undertook our
elected positions with an unyielding commitment that no individual should ever
be afraid of her/his government or fear retribution for expressing one’s
fundamental Constitutional right of free expression, even if that expression
opposes the current political majority’s viewpoint. I continue to have faith in
our system of government and now look to our law-enforcement agencies to hold
accountable those who shredded the Constitutional rights of the hundreds and
hundreds of innocent victims whose backgrounds were illegally searched and the
digital invasion they suffered. Justice demands nothing less.
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