NEWARK, N.J. – Two Essex County, New Jersey, men – a compliance safety and health officer (CSHO) with the U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and his brother – are scheduled to appear today on charges that they conspired to extort $6,000 in cash from a general contractor, U.S. Attorney Craig Carpenito announced.

Alvaro Idrovo, 44, of Bloomfield, New Jersey, and Paul Idrovo, a/k/a “Jose Diaz,” 46, of Nutley, New Jersey, are charged by complaint with knowingly and intentionally conspiring to commit an offense against the United States, specifically to commit an act of extortion under color of Alvaro Idrovo’s office or employment with OSHA. The defendants are scheduled to appear later today by videoconference before U.S. Magistrate Judge Leda Dunn Wettre.

According to the complaint:

Alvaro Idrovo was assigned to investigate an anonymous complaint concerning the misuse of an extension ladder at a North Bergen work site of Company 1. He told Individual 1, the owner of Company 1, that Individual 1 was in violation of OSHA regulations for not having the necessary safety training certificates for Company 1’s workers to be on ladders at the work site. Alvaro Idrovo falsely advised Individual 1 that he needed to obtain training certificates with a specific vendor named “Jose Diaz” or Individual 1 would be subject to exorbitant fines and possible arrest for the violation.

Individual 1 contacted the phone number supplied by Alvaro Idrovo, which actually belonged to Paul Idrovo, posing as “Jose Diaz,” who told Individual 1 that the required OSHA training certificates would cost $13,000 in cash and repeated Alvaro Idrovo’s false assertions that if Individual 1 did not get the training certificates that Individual 1 would be in big trouble with OSHA, including big fines and possible jail. In follow-up telephone conversations with Paul Idrovo, Individual 1 was able to negotiate the fee down to $6,000 in cash.

When OSHA officials learned of Idrovo’s attempt to extort Individual 1 while questioning Individual 1 on an unrelated matter, the OSHA officials referred the matter to federal law enforcement officials, who arranged for Individual 1 to make consensual recordings with both Alvaro and Paul Idrovo. During an April meeting surveilled by law enforcement, Individual 1 paid Paul Idrovo $6,000 in cash in exchange for ladder and safety awareness training certificates and a safety and health plan. Alvaro Idrovo thereafter attached copies of the training certificates and the plan to his OSHA reports regarding Company 1’s violation despite knowing that the training certificates falsely claimed that training had been provided to the noted individuals in March 2020, “Jose Diaz” had provided training, and the alleged training was OSHA certified.

The conspiracy charge carries a maximum potential penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

U.S. Attorney Carpenito credited special agents of the U.S. Department of Labor, Office of Inspector General, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Michael C. Mikulka in New York, and special agents of the FBI, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge George M. Crouch Jr. in Newark, with the investigation leading to the charges.

The government is represented by Senior Trial Counsel Leslie Faye Schwartz, of the United States Attorney’s Office’s Special Prosecutions Division.

LITTLE SILVER, NJ – Just two days into the new school year and one Jersey Shore school is already ending in-school learning after a child tested positive for COVID-19.  Michael E. Ettore, Little Silver School District superintendent said that for now, the district will switch to all remote learning.  The district includes the Markham Place School and Point Road School.

Ettore sent a letter to parents informing them that a student in 6th grade had tested positive for COVID-19

“This letter is to inform you that earlier this evening, I learned that an individual student from Markham Place School has tested positive for COVID-19. The District is coordinating closely with local public health officials and following CDC, State, and local health department guidance to ensure the health and safety of our community. Cleaning and disinfecting of all exposed areas has been completed,” Ettore said. “The school is also taking precautions to prevent the introduction and spread of viruses and other germs, and is cleaning frequently touched surfaces daily. However, in order to be safe, local public health officials recommend that students who were potentially exposed to the child who tested positive should remain home on remote instruction until the contact tracing process is complete.”

All students in cohort A of Grade 6 are expected to remain home starting tomorrow, September 10 for fully remote learning until further notice.

Ocean County Prosecutor Bradley Bilhimer has released the names of the two individuals who were stabbed on the beach on Labor Day weekend in Point Pleasant.

The victims are identified as Alex Galdamez, 22, and William Mazariegogo, 18, both of West Haverstraw, New York. Both victims sustained multiple stab wounds. Both victims are in serious but stable condition at Jersey Shore Medical Center. A 17 year-old male juvenile from Newark, New Jersey, has been charged with two counts of Attempted Murder.

TOMS RIVER, NJ – Toms River Mayor Maurice “Mo” Hill who has been touting his township as a diverse community, welcome to all has fired his openly gay business administrator, Don Guardian as he continues to recover on medical leave.

On June 9th, during zoom meeting, Guardian passed out and suffered a serious medical episode. He was in town hall, conducting a zoom meeting with members of the township council and passed out. Nobody in the meeting realized Guardian was no longer at his desk, participating in the meeting until the meeting was over.

The entire Toms River council and legal advisers held the entire meeting while Guardian lay on the floor in distress in his office.   Guardian did not participate in that meeting, which he typically hosts.  After the meeting, a participant at that meeting went to check up on the business administrator to find him laying on the floor.  Guardian is now recovering from a possible stroke and has not been to work since.

This week, while Guardian was preparing to return to work after being on medical leave since June, he got his pink slip by Mayor Hill.  Hill replaced Guardian with former DPW Director Lou Amoroso.  Amoroso’s promotion came with mixed reactions from current and former township employees.

While Mo Hill’s handpicked councilmembers praised Amoroso as a local hero, some reached out to Shore News Network with a warning that Amoroso might not be the right guy for the job.

Amoroso previously served as business administrator for former Mayor Thomas Kelaher.  Kelaher this week would not say why but confirmed that Amoroso was demoted from the position under his administration.

Others worried about Amoroso’s deep political involvement in Toms River as an area for concern. Amoroso is a political enforcer for Mayor Hill.  We have been in receipt of hundreds of pages of township emails, internal memos, and personal accounts by township employees regarding Amoroso, but have yet to sift through them for relevant findings.

One source at town hall says Amoroso did not like Guardian and often made homophobic slurs against Guardian, including calling the openly gay administrator a “pillow biter”.

Guardian was a front line fighter against discrimination against the LGBT community.  He found himself in the very unique position of being an openly gay Republican mayor of Atlantic City, one of the most diverse cities in New Jersey.

After losing his last election, former Mayor Thomas Kelaher hired Guardian because of his experience successfully managing a large city like Atlantic City.   Guardian was the city’s first-ever openly gay mayor and first Republican mayor of Atlantic City in nearly 15 years at the time of his victory.

Guardian ushered in a new era of LGBT acceptance in Toms River, establishing a gay pride day, in which the Toms River Council and Mayor Hill attended.

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TRENTON, NJ –  Alright New Jersey, this is no longer about containing a virus and more about containing an election.

There’s a growing consensus that none of this is about protecting lives and limited exposure to a potentially deadly virus.  During the height of the pandemic, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy shut down businesses but said it was alright for thousands to gather for large scale protests.

He said it was unsafe to vote in person, but it was safe to wait in line for hours upon hours at Motor Vehicle Commission offices.   It’s not safe to eat indoors at restaurants, but it’s perfectly safe to go indoors to grocery shop each week.  Teachers are at risk of dying from the virus, but elderly and teenage grocery store clerks are perfectly safe.

Now, it’s not safe for in-person voting, but it is safe to trick or treat? The very nature of the holiday is, in reality, a pandemic’s worst nightmare.  Millions of children in New Jersey going door to door, taking candy from a stranger’s hand and going to the next door.

Or, maybe it’s not, because studies have shown that’s now how the coronavirus spreads. It spreads from prolonged indoor exposure where COVID-19 hitches a ride on airborne droplets and lingers in the air.

Trick or treating is a contact tracer’s worst nightmare if that’s how the virus is spread, but it’s not.  It’s not spread by touching credit card processing machines and it’s not spread by touching voting machines.

No, folks, this is not about containing a virus, especially not after Governor Phil Murphy just gave the green light for Halloween.   Now, we’re not saying there should not be a Halloween this year, we’re saying that if Halloween is safe, in-person voting is also safe.

“As far as this moment in time, Halloween’s still on in New Jersey,” Murphy told NJ.Com this week. “Obviously, it’s not gonna be a normal Halloween. We’re gonna have to do things very carefully. I’m sure we’re gonna have protocols that we’ll come to. And God willing, the virus stays under control.”

The very thought of Halloween and trick or treating is against everything the Governor has been preaching for the past six months, which many believe is nothing but a bunch of overreacting, knee-jerking, political propaganda to stop in-person ballot machine voting this coming November.

Halloween and trick-or-treating is a huge cross-contamination risk…again…”IF” that’s how this virus is spread.  As far back as May, the CDC and health officials all agreed, COVID-19 does not spread easily on surfaces.

So why no indoor voting?  Lines can form out side, one voter allowed in at a time, wear a mask, sanitize on the way in, sanitize on the way out and you’re done.

If you’re worried about in-person voting, then sure, go ahead and vote by mail.

No, this is no longer about containing a virus, this is about containing an election and containing President Donald J. Trump. If Halloween can happen, so can in-person voting.

The biggest danger New Jersey faced during the pandemic was when Governor Murphy sent thousands of infected senior citizens into unprotected and unprepared nursing homes, killing nearly 10,000 senior citizens, the bulk of the death county of COVID-19 in the state.

TOMS RIVER, NJ – On Tuesday, September 8th, 2020, members of the Toms River Police Department Special Enforcement Team were conducting surveillance on the east end of the Township. During this surveillance, officers observed suspicious activity that resulted in two separate motor vehicle stops.

The first motor vehicle stop and subsequent investigation led to the arrest of Jameer Jones, 26 of Toms River. Mr. Jones was found to be in possession of approximately 202 grams of cocaine and packaging material. The second motor vehicle stop, which was related to the first stop, led to the arrest of Gregory Deas, 47 of Asbury Park. Mr. Deas was found to be in possession of $33,703.00 in U.S. currency.

TRENTON, NJ – New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy this week increased the number of states on the mandatory quarantine list to 35, representing 65% of the nation by state, nearly 80% by population.  Despite the quarantine, both Murphy and New Jersey Department of Health Commissioner Judith Persichili said there’s no evidence at all that COVID-19 is being imported across New Jersey’s borders.

“It feels like we can’t find, Judy, unless you see otherwise, any evidence that some returning person or persons have lit up a flare up of some sort,” Murphy said of the travel quarantine.

Despite liberal media news reports today that 250,000 people have been infected by the Sturgis motorcycle rally, Persichilli said there is only one case on record of anyone bringing COVID-19 across the state line in recent weeks.  That case was one individual from the Sturgis bike rally.

“We’ve had no major outbreaks either from the travel advisory. We did, through really good case investigation and contact tracing, identify an individual who had been to the Sturgis gathering, and it was the contact tracer who really nailed the questions and got the answers,” Persichili said.  “I just wanted to call that out. It just shows the value. The person went into quarantine and there’s no outbreak.”

TOMS RIVER, NJ –  There’s an old saying, “If you see smoke, there’s fire.”

These days, there’s a lot of smoke around the law firm of Dasti, Murphy & McGuckin, one of Ocean County’s largest pay to play, political patronage professional firms.  Now, it has been revealed that one of the firm’s partners, Jerry Dasti is laundering money from at least one Democrat to fund Republican campaigns here at the Jersey Shore.

An email sent from Ocean County GOP finance committee chairman Jerry Dasti, Esq, addressed to members of the finance committee detailed exactly how such a scheme works.  A Democrat lawyer and political donor,  Nick Montenegro wanted to donate to the campaign of Ocean County Surrogate Jeffrey Moran’s 2018 election.

Dasti took Monetenegro’s donation and laundered it for the party. In Ocean County, several factions of Democrats and Republicans work together to ensure each side continues getting public appointments and contracts no matter who wins any given election.  It’s a practice that has been rumored to be going in on Ocean County for decades.  Now, there’s evidence that details one such transaction. When Republicans are in power, enough of the contracts are awarded to Democrat firms in order to keep both sides happy.  When the Democrats are in power, it works the other way.

After Dasti helped Moran win his re-election, his firm’s annual pay to play contract from Moran and the Ocean County Surrogate Court has more tripled.

In 2017, the law firm of Dasti, Murphy, McGuckin, PC earned just $13,817 in legal fees from Ocean County Surrogate Jeffery Moran’s office.  In 2018, Dasti, a partner with the firm, according to an email released by an Ocean County GOP insider was caught laundering a campaign donation for Moran from a Democrat party donor.

In 2018 and 2019, Dasti’s firm received over $40,000 each year for legal services provided to the Moran and the courts.

A known Democrat, Montenegro donated to the campaign by writing a $300 personal check to the personal account of Dasti.  Dasti then deposited that check into his own personal bank account then wrote a check to the campaign for Moran in the amount of $300 to hide Montenegro’s donation from the public eye, and from the eye of the New Jersey Election Commission.

“T (Theresa Mondella), Nick Montenegro is sending me $300,” Dasti wrote. “But since he is a d (Democrat), the check is made payable to me and I’ll turn it around for u later this week.”

The check was made out to Dasti, according to a letter sent to the NJELEC by the campaign treasurer.  Dasti, according to Holman, then wrote a check out from himself to the campaign to hide the fingerprints from the state that the donation came from a Democrat.

That email was sent on December 5th, 2017.    Frank Holman, now the Ocean County GOP Chairman served as campaign treasurer for Moran’s campaign.   Also included in the letter were Jack Sahradnik of Berry, Sahradnik, Kotzas & Benson PC;  GOP fundraiser Theresa Mondella and former GOP Chairman George Gilmore.

Sahradnik, Dasti and Holman each donated $2,600 of their own money to the campaign, leaving the door open, possibly for more straw donors.  In total, $50,000 was raised for Moran, a former Toms River School District Elementary School principal’s political campaign. About two dozen pay-to-play firms donated to Moran’s successful re-election campaign that year.

We reached out this week to all of the parties still holding executive positions within the party about this illegal transaction.

Jerry Dasti threatened us with legal action if we pursued this, saying simply, “It has already been addressed.”

Sahradnik, Mondella, Moran, Holman and Montenegro all refused to return phone calls after several messages were left for them during the week.  We called Moran three times from Monday to Wednesday at his office at the New Jersey Surrogate Court and left messages, but he never called back.

We then found a letter written on March 7, 2019, by Ocean County GOP Chairman Frank Holman, explaining to the  Daniel Horowitz at the New Jersey Law Enforcement Commission that there was an error in his 2017 campaign finance report filed with the state.  It was, of course, an honest mistake, and let’s just fix it up.

“As previously promised, attached you will find a copy of a 12/15/17 email that was recently provided to me together with a copy of the R-1, pages 1 and 2, for the Moran campaign as originally filed,”  Holman wrote. “I incorrectly assigned the $300 contribution in the name of Jerry Dasti not knowing at the time that the contribution was actually received from Nick Montenegro. I have enclosed a copy of Mr. Dasti’s check.”

Holman said it was the only campaign contribution made by Montenegro to the campaign.   However, Holman did not reference in his NJELEC letter, the December 5th, 2017 letter from Jerry Dasti, explaining that he was acting as a straw donor for Montenegro.  We were unable to obtain the December 15th email referenced by Holman.

On Monday, we spoke with Shreve Marshall‚ Director of Review and Investigation at the New Jersey Election Enforcement Commission.   Marshall said he could not comment on the matter but advised Shore News Network to send copies of all the documents and letters we have obtained.  It was just one of many alleging campaign finance violations, ethics violations, and corruption allegations we from various sources, including anonymous letters to our company post office box in Jackson Township.   We have been sifting through those files for months as the pieces of the puzzle fall into place.  A pattern of widespread corruption is starting to emerge.

According to Wikipedia, making a political contribution in another person’s name is illegal, as is agreeing to be the named donor with someone else’s money.

Two weeks ago, New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal arrested five people for engaging in a straw donor scheme in North Jersey. The method used in that bust was similar to the method employed by Dasti. In May of 2018, the Toms River Township Council appointed Ben Montenegro, a partner at Nick Montenegro’s law firm to the Toms River Township MUA where he serves as a commissioner.   Ben Montenegro is also a Democrat, but the divided Toms River council voted unanimously on the appointment.

“That is the type of bipartisanship we should see in town,” said newly elected Democrat Toms River Councilwoman Laurie Huryk at the time of Montenegro’s appointment.

LAKEWOOD TOWNSHIP, NJ – A Lakewood Yeshiva that has been doing construction without permits has been granted approval to use several trailers to operate a private school.  The school has been under fire for taking down trees and constructing a driveway without proper permits, but the Lakewood Planning Board said all of that is irrelevant to the matter before them, which was whether or not to grant official approval to continue.  The board approved the application by a 5-0 vote.

The property is located at 420 Cross Street and Simcha Gellerman is seeking to convert the existing single-family home into a private school, build a basketball court and to place several trailers, which appear to be 5 according to the plan submitted to the planning adjacent to the home.

The planning board said the placement of the trailers is temporary until a proper facility could be built on the site.

Residents who sent emails worried that the traffic on Cross Street is bad right now and that adding more school traffic would make the situation worse.

Say what you want about President Trump or Vice President Pence, but the third highest-ranking elected official in America just got duped by a salon owner in San Francisco.  If the President died today and the vice president died tomorrow, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, by succession would become President of the United States.   Once that sinks in, let this one sink in.  As one of our friends, Stafford Township, New Jersey Councilman George Williams said, the third person in line for our country’s nuke codes, just got punked by a barber.  Can you imagine what Pelosi would fall for should she ever get her hands on the highest office in the land?

While millions of Americans are out of work—Nancy Pelosi is getting her hair done in a shut-down San Francisco salon that her party forced to stay closed for everyone else

This is liberal privilege at its worst.

Pelosi should be embarrassed and ashamedpic.twitter.com/RGig2m8Wmb

— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) September 1, 2020

Pelosi now says the whole thing was a setup and Erica Kious, the owner was an insider on the job.

“This business offered for the Speaker to come in on Monday and told her they were allowed by the city to have one customer at a time in the business,” Nancy Pelosi’s team said in a statement.

“I trusted that,” Pelosi later said of the promise that it was legal for her…and nobody else to get her hair done.

“I just had my hair washed. I don’t wear a mask when I’m washing my hair. Do you wear a mask when you’re washing your hair?” asked Pelosi, who was maskless in the video.

Now, Pelosi is even demanding an apology from Kious.  “It was a setup, and I take responsibility for falling for a setup,” Pelosi responded. “I think that this salon owes me an apology for setting me up.”

HAIR DRYER PROTEST:
Protestors gather outside of @SpeakerPelosi house in #SanFrancisco. They chant about freedom and place hair dryers on a tree.
WATCH 4PM Press Conference from SF eSalon Owner Respond to Pelosi on #CBSNBayArea at https://t.co/peHOt8n9a9 pic.twitter.com/BsKCIhQk8b

— Rob Tooke (@RobTookeTV) September 3, 2020

This weekend, women protested outside of Pelosi’s home hanging their blow dryers on a nearby tree.