Power on Trial: Lawyer has no ‘independent recollection’

The long way around

While former businessman Harendra Singh, during his testimony, often found it impossible to answer yes or no — saying he couldn’t or that he needed to explain, William Savino — with lawyerly precision — took the long way ‘round in answering queries from prosecutors and defense attorneys.

Savino, of Rivkin Radler LLP of Uniondale, testified Wednesday in the trial of former Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano, his wife, Linda, and former Oyster Bay Supervisor John Venditto.

Asked if he reviewed documents related to Oyster Bay town’s concession agreement with Singh and other documents, Savino looked to his firm’s invoices.

“It doesn’t look here like I reviewed these documents,” he testified. “I’m going to go with the invoices because I do not have an independent recollection.”

Savino was asked where he went for a meeting on whether the town should lend its good credit to back Singh’s loans.

He said he and another lawyer from his firm, “drove to some location in Hicksville or in Bethpage. It was a nondescript group of stores,” Savino said. Asked to look at a photograph of the location said, “I recognize that as the nondescript — I’m searching for the words — strip mall.”

He was asked who was at the meeting.

He said he remembered a couple of lawyers, but otherwise, “I don’t have a recollection of the other attendees at this meeting.”

In earlier testimony, Singh testified that Mangano and Venditto were at the April 2010 meeting; and the Nassau police officer assigned to drive Mangano said he dropped the then-county executive and his chief deputy, Rob Walker, off at the location — which was Venditto’s campaign headquarters.

Savino also was asked about handwritten notes he made, wherein, he said, there were “indicators” that he had a telephone conversation with Mangano.

“I don’t have an independent recollection of the telephone call between me and Mr. Mangano,” he said Wednesday afternoon.

No recollection

Savino, throughout his time on the witness stand, often would direct his comments directly to the jury — and sometimes, in sweeping the courtroom with his eyes and with hand gestures, up toward the judge.

After a time, and following several statements of “I have no direct recollection,” several jurors sat with arms crossed before the late afternoon break.

At one point, as his testimony — which was based only on telephone records, invoices, emails and handwritten notes, rather than any recollection — wore on, a few jurors turned toward each other appearing to be laughing.

Still later, one juror rubbed her hands across her face.

By day’s end, Savino finally was excused after cross-examination and redirect.

Into the void

David Salony, former executive chief of Singh Hospitality Group, was the third former employee in three days to testify about nonprosecution agreements with the federal government.

In all three instances, the former employees, in exchange for truthful testimony, will not be charged with evading taxes on wages they received, over multiple years, in cash.

Earlier in the week, Paul Evwiehor, a former manager at the Water’s Edge in Long Island City, and his wife, Melissa, who once handled human resources for Singh’s businesses, testified that they received half of their wages on the books and half off the books.

The benefit to Singh was that he did not have to pay Social Security and other employee-related taxes; the benefit to the workers was that they did not pay state and federal taxes on cash wages.

Salony testified that he made about $105,000 in wages — most of which was paid to him via checks made out to cash.

“Do you have a prosecution agreement with the government . . . ” Assistant U.S. Attorney Raymond A. Tierney asked at one point.

Salony, blushing, corrected the prosecutor, saying “a nonprosecution agreement.”

“And what happens if you don’t tell the truth on this case?” Tierney said.

“Void,” Salony responded. “Void.”

Tasteful dry runs

Early on, Singh testified that his restaurant group did not hold tastings.

Instead, he said, the group held “dry runs,” wherein friends and families of Singh and his workers would gather at a restaurant, order from a new menu and then tell restaurant managers what they thought.

On Wednesday, Salony introduced a new term for the same practice, calling it a “dry run.”

Federal prosecutors have said that Linda Mangano told them that while she worked for Singh — in what Singh said was a no-show job — that one of her duties was “food taster.” In his testimony, Salony said that while he saw Linda Mangano at dry runs, he never knew she worked for Singh.

Cool kids

When Salony took the stand on Wednesday, Linda Mangano waved to him.

The two attended the same high school in Bethpage, he said under questioning from prosecutors.

On Wednesday, the subject came up again.

“You went to high school with Linda Mangano?” her attorney, John Carman, asked.

“I did,” he said.

“You were in the cool gang?” Carman asked, as the courtroom erupted in laughter.

To which Tierney objected.

And to which U.S. District Judge Joan M. Azrack sustained.

“I know we are all dying to know,” she said before going to a morning break.

But, alas, the subject didn’t come up again before he was excused as a witness.

Idea man

Salony at one point was asked about Singh as a manager and as a worker.

He said Singh worked hard.

He also was asked by Carman about Singh’s contributions to menus, to logos and to restaurant makeovers.

He had good ideas? Carman asked.

“I wouldn’t agree with that,” Salony responded as the courtroom, surprised, burst into laughter.

“So most of his ideas were bad?” Carman asked.

“I would agree with that,” Salony said — as the laughter continued.

Number, please

A Nassau County employee seemed to be a tad surprised when I called straight into the Nassau County executive’s office during the lunch break at the Mangano/Venditto trial on Wednesday.

“Did you go through another number?,” he asked, after I filled him on the fact that the number we were talking on had been projected onto a big screen as U.S. Assistant District Attorney Catherine M. Mirabile began questioning William Savino, a partner in the politically powerful Rivkin Radler law firm.

“Nope,” I answered.

“Was it shown in a side room?” he asked, sounding, to my ears, hopeful that the audience viewing the number to County Executive Laura Curran’s office had been limited in number.

I told him nope, that the number was part of a prosecution exhibit of Savino’s handwritten notes on a sheet of yellow-lined paper shown to spectators and jurors in a courtroom at the Alfonse M. D’Amato U.S. Courthouse in Central Islip.

He thanked me for the head’s up — because apparently the numbers used for officials during the administration of former County Executive Edward Mangano remain the same under the new administration.

That supposition proved to be correct after I placed a call to the second number that showed up on the projection screen.

It went to voicemail, for the county employee charged with handling Curran’s schedule.

Savino, whose firm, according to earlier testimony, helped the Town of Oyster Bay find a legal way to indirectly guarantee loans to former restaurateur Singh, was to continue testifying after lunch break.

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