PARSIPPANY — On October 25, 2015 the Township’s Hearing Officer, retired Rockaway Township Police Chief, Joseph Devine, Devine Leadership Concepts, ruled in favor of Captain Carifi and stated that Parsippany lacked jurisdiction to proceed against an officer who retired over a year and a half ago and retired in “Good Standing.” However, Parsippany’s Town Council was never made aware of Chief Devine’s ruling.
Devine Leadership Concepts was hired by the Township of Parsippany-Troy Hills to serve as a “Hearing Officer” in disciplinary proceedings/employment matters within the Township of Parsippany-Troy Hills Police Department.
Parsippany Police Chief Paul Philipps testified under oath in front of Morris County Superior Court Judge Ahto in Morris County Superior Court on November 10, 2014 that there was not going to be any administrative action taken against Captain Carifi. Then Carifi was subsequently served with a Preliminary Notice of Discipline on Christmas Eve the following month.
Devine was quick to criticize the Township’s actions by stating in his ruling that the “Service of the Preliminary Notice of Discipline on Christmas Eve does little to enhance the credible intent of this process. Since a period of one year, eight months and 24 days transpired between Captain Carifi’s retirement and service of the administrative action on Christmas evening 2014”.
Even after being served with the administrative action on Christmas Eve, three months later in March of 2015, Chief Paul Philipps certified under oath in front of Superior Court Judge Ahto that Captain Carifi did in fact retire in “Good Standing”. This was also mentioned as a basis for Chief Devine’s ruling.
On October 9, 2015, Pre-hearing motions were argued in front of the Township’s Hearing Officer, Joseph Devine. Ed Bilinkas and Christopher Deininger appeared on behalf of Captain Carifi. Both Denis Driscoll, a partner in Inglesino, Webster, Wyciskala & Taylor, LLC., and Steven Trimboli, represented the Township.
According to the transcript both sides wanted Chief Devine to rule on certain aspects of the case in their favor should it move forward.
Bilinkas and Deininger wanted the Hearing to be open to the public, which would allow anybody to come and observe the hearing. They also wanted to be able to call to the witness stand Township Attorney John Ingelsino and Mayor James Barberio.
Driscoll and Trimboli were against these positions and wanted Chief Devine to rule that the Hearing would be closed to the public, that Ingelsino and Barberio could not be called to the stand to testify and that the Hearing Officer issue a confidentiality order prohibiting Carifi’s attorney’s from discussing or disclosing any information about the case with the public/press.
However, these were all moot points since Chief Devine ruled that Parsippany lacked jurisdiction against Captain Carifi to proceed in the first place.
In further development, Parsippany Focus attended a Civil Court hearing held in Morristown Superior Court on November 4 & 5, 2015, in which the head of Parsippany Police Department’s Internal Affairs testified that Captain Carifi’s file was tampered with and certain documents and emails were removed from the file.
Upon further questioning by Mr. Deininger, it was discovered that this was never to happen and that the file is suppose to remain intact and never is suppose to change. It was also revealed the items that were removed showed the direct involvement of John Ingelsino in Captain Carifi’s case.
When questioned about the documents being removed from the file, it was discovered that they may have been removed after a meeting that Lt. Keith Veletto had with Chief Paul Philipps and Parsippany’s attorneys.
Through OPRA requests, Parsippany Focus has learned that this administrative action that was recently dismissed by Chief Devine, cost the Township over $90,000. Regarding the total amount that Inglesino, Webster, Wyciskala & Taylor, LLC., and Aurora Information Security & Risk have billed the Township regarding Captain Carifi is approximately 1.9 million dollars.
Finally, court documents show that Federal Court Judge Caproni from the Southern District Court of New York, found Aurora’s Founder, Matthew Ferrante to be not credible during a recent Court case, which was recently decided in October of 2015.
Ironically, Captain Carifi’s computer expert, John Luich from eForensix, a regular of Fox news and also a former employee with the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office, has previously documented in Court submissions that Aurora and Mr. Ferrante were in fact misleading the Court in their submissions.
