DA: 'Just not acceptable'

Spota blasts Wm. Floyd superintendent as two former officials plead guilty to stealing from the school system

BY KARLA SCHUSTER AND EDEN LAIKIN | STAFF WRITERS

January 31, 2006

Daniel Cifonelli, a William Floyd School District official outside the Riverhead Courtroom on Friday January 6, 2006. His case was posponed. (Newsday/Daniel Goodrich)

Two former William Floyd school officials pleaded guilty yesterday to stealing from the district and two others were arraigned for faking credentials to hire a relative, as a widening corruption probe ensnares more of the district's top administrators.

"It's clear ... that there's something terribly wrong in this district," Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota said yesterday, blasting schools chief Richard Hawkins. "The superintendent is the person who has to answer to the community for this. He's the leader. I don't know how in God's name the superintendent of schools can continue to say ... that all these crimes occurred and he and every other administrator in that place were blind to it and couldn't have prevented it. That's just not acceptable. "

Spota would not say whether prosecutors are focusing on Hawkins. Their investigation exploded into public view in June 2004 with the arrest on theft charges of former school treasurer James Wright and is now before a special grand jury empaneled last September to examine Medicaid fraud and school corruption countywide.

Upholding his responsibility

Hawkins said in a written statement that he has "never once shirked the responsibility one assumes as a leader when something happens on the leader's watch ...

"None should ever be painted with the same brush as those who have stolen from the district we have all worked so hard to build. "

The district also released two prepared statements, one of which vigorously defended Assistant Superintendent for Business Dennis Fidotta, who was arraigned yesterday on an indictment for soliciting a phony reference letter for a colleague's relative who was later hired as a school accountant.

Fidotta, the district said, was "instrumental" in exposing the thefts by Wright and former Assistant Superintendent for Business Daniel Cifonelli, both of whom pleaded guilty yesterday. Fidotta was also "the leading force" behind reforms instituted after Wright and Cifonelli's arrests and will continue to serve as chief financial officer, the district said.

" ... the district recognizes the seriousness of this matter. However, the district also recognizes that Mr. Fidotta has accomplished much on behalf of the district," the statement said. "Thanks to the efforts and leadership of Mr. Fidotta, today we have a strong and secure school business function. "

Those changes have transformed the district and helped restore public trust, said school board member Robert Vecchio. "The district is managed entirely differently from the way it was operating three or four years ago," he said.

Spota's office, meanwhile, says Fidotta is not the good-government reformer the school district describes.

"Mr. Fidotta was instrumental in the invention of credentials that allowed a relative of a school administrator to get a job she wasn't qualified for ..." said spokesman Bob Clifford.

Yesterday, Cifonelli and Wright admitted to stealing nearly $1.5 million between them from William Floyd and the state Teacher's Retirement System. Judges yesterday promised each prison terms of no more than two to six years when they are sentenced in April. Both are also being investigated for federal tax evasion.

"He held a position of trust," Assistant District Attorney Maureen MacCormack said of Cifonelli, 71, of Port Jefferson Station. "This was not a situation where he was stealing to put food on the table. This was plain avarice. "

Cifonelli and his attorney, Paul Gianelli of Hauppauge, declined to comment.

'Every administrator' knew

Wright, 57, of Bohemia, also pleaded guilty to changing federal grant forms so the district would not have to return money to the government. His attorney, Eric Naiburg of Central Islip, suggested many officials knew Wright was "fudging" the forms.

"There's no question that every administrator in the school district knew, or had to know," Naiburg said.

Prosecutors say Fidotta and retired Assistant Superintendent for Personnel and Administration Michael Schildkraut also faked documents - to hire Schildkraut's daughter-in-law.

Both Fidotta and Schildkraut declined to comment after they pleaded not guilty to an indictment charging each with filing a false instrument and official misconduct. Both were released without bail.