EXCLUSIVE: Joseph Spicuzzo, Middlesex's corrupt ex-sheriff, denied parole

• Spicuzzo, serving 9 years for job bribery scheme, denied parole.
• Current sheriff fired investigators who got jobs through bribery.
• Judge dismissed fired workers' lawsuits.

NEW BRUNSWICK – Disgraced former Middlesex County sheriff and Democratic Party chairman Joseph Spicuzzo has been denied parole from state prison where he is serving a nine-year sentence for trading jobs for bribes.

It was not immediately clear Friday why the state Parole Board denied his request two weeks ago. He has served just two years of his sentence, which also included a $55,000 fine and loss of his public pension.

Spicuzzo, who turns 70 this month and suffers from a host of medical problems, will have to wait at least another year in the slammer before he can try again. His new parole eligibility date is Nov. 19, 2016.

The current sheriff, meanwhile, has scored a series of legal victories related to the Spicuzzo scandal.

In June, a Superior Court judge in neighboring Somerset County dismissed the wrongful termination lawsuits filed by investigators fired last year for getting their jobs through bribes.

That included an investigator who had no idea his relatives had paid Spicuzzo a bribe for his job — a fact conceded by the county and the judge, but ultimately dismissed in favor of efforts to remove Spicuzzo's "taint" from the department.

Sheriff Mildred "Millie" Scott on Friday declined to comment either on the parole decision or the lawsuits. Previously, she has described her actions as an attempt to remove wrongdoers from her employ.

Spicuzzo, who ran the sheriff's office more like a crime family than a law enforcement organization, was sentenced September 2013 after pleading guilty to accepting $112,000 in bribes from eight people from 1996 to 2008.

An investigation by State Police and a state grand jury found that Spicuzzo took payments ranging from $5,000 to $25,000, some of which were passed off as supposed "training" fees or Democratic Party contributions, court records show.

Most of the bribery hires were of investigators — a position considered "at will" under the law, meaning these employees serve at the whim of the elected sheriff.

While Spicuzzo's two middlemen also were convicted — Darrin P. DiBiasi was sentenced to a year in jail while Paul A. Lucarelli got three years of probation — none of the employees who benefited from the bribery scheme faced any criminal charges in exchange for their cooperation in bringing down their former boss.

But their testimony, unbeknownst to them, did not shield them from losing their jobs. Soon after Spicuzzo's sentencing, the Attorney General's Office provided Scott with the grand jury transcripts and investigation reports that she used to suspend and fire seven employees.

After their firing last year, former investigators Christopher Jarema, Richard Mucia, Thomas Varga, Giancarlo Russo and Officer Bruce Kentos sued Scott and the county claiming they were unfairly punished for their involvement in the investigation. The former employees argued that they were victims of Spicuzzo's venality and that other employees who benefited from bribery were not fired.

Judge Thomas Miller earlier this year dismissed the employees' claims under the state's Conscientious Employee Protection Act, ruling that testifying under oath in a criminal investigation years after the fact does not constitute "blowing the whistle."

Then in June, Miller dismissed the remaining claims brought by Jarema, Mucia, Varga and Russo, explaining that as at-will employees they were not entitled to the job protections afforded civil service employees. Kentos' lawsuit continues.

While the law prevents employers from firing at-will workers for discriminatory reasons, Miller said "people who have paid bribes are not a protected class" under the law.

"It is beyond debate that an individual, especially one hired in a law enforcement capacity, is unfit to serve in such a position if the position is obtained through graft rather than merit," Miller said in an order dismissing Varga's suit. "Law enforcement officers are held to a higher standard than other public employees."

Of these four investigators, only two — Varga and Mucia — personally paid bribes for their jobs.

Varga was hired in 2008 after he gave Spiccuzzo $25,000 cash in a manilla envelope.

Mucia, who did landscaping for Spicuzzo, was hired in 2002 after handing an envelope stuffed with $10,000 to his cousin DiBiasi to give to Spicuzzo. While Mucia eventually admitted this to a grand jury, Miller noted that he lied about this to State Police.

Russo began as a dispatcher in 1993 and was made an investigator in 1998. He learned afterward that his father had paid Spicuzzo $5,000 for the job.

Likewise, Jarema, who was hired in 2005, after two of his relatives arranged to give Spicuzzo $10,000. While Jarema was unaware of his family's plan, and the judge found Jarema's testimony on this "credible," officials nevertheless argued that Jarema should still lose his job because it was ill-gotten.

Jarema this weekend said the process, while clearing his name, did not end in justice.

"The county attorney, Undersheriff Kevin Harris, the hearing officer and Judge Miller all conceded I was innocent," he said in an email. "But after it was said that I did no wrong, Judge Miller thinks if I continue to work at the department it would 'denigrate' its integrity and hurt the spirit of law enforcement.

"I worked there for nine years with an immaculate and unblemished record. So now all of a sudden I have no integrity and can't function in law enforcement?"

In his opinion dismissing Jarema's case, Miller put it this way:

"A law enforcement agency, like Caesar's wife, must be above suspicion."

Staff Writer Sergio Bichao: 908-243-6615; sbichao@mycentraljersey.com