Staff photo / Ed Runyan Attorney Martin Desmond makes arguments before Visiting Judge Mark K. Wiest on Wednesday in the Mahoning County Courthouse as Mahoning County Prosecutor Gina DeGenova listens. To DeGenova’s left is Linette Stratford, chief assistant prosecutor for the county.

YOUNGSTOWN — Visiting Judge Mark Wiest spent about 40 minutes Wednesday listening to arguments from attorney Martin Desmond, Mahoning County Prosecutor Gina DeGenova and an attorney for DeGenova before deciding to dismiss the petition Desmond filed asking for a special prosecutor to be appointed to investigate alleged wrongdoing by top county officials.

Desmond filed a request for a special prosecutor in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court Oct. 9, alleging that the issues Desmond raised in a federal civil suit he filed against DeGenova, County Administrator Audrey Tillis and the county commissioners in late 2022 also were evidence of criminal conduct.

The suit and the request for a special prosecutor were over the firing and rehiring of county maintenance worker Ricky Morrison in early December 2022. The county’s insurance carrier later settled the lawsuit out of court, paying Morrison $175,000.

But the request for a special prosecutor contained new allegations from DeGenova’s estranged husband, Steve Zawrotuk. He claimed that while he and DeGenova were still together in late 2022, he overheard a conversation between DeGenova and Commissioner Carol Rimedio-Righetti in which Rimedio-Righetti admitted that Morrison’s firing was “politically motivated” because of Morrison’s support for Rimedio-Righetti’s opponent in the November 2022 election, Geno DiFabio.

Desmond’s litigation has alleged that terminating Morrison under those conditions was illegal and a violation of Morrison’s civil rights.

Wednesday’s hearing, held in the Mahoning County Courthouse,was the first one Wiest, a retired former Wayne County Common Pleas Court judge, held in the matter.

Early in the hearing, Wiest seemed to be asking for Desmond to explain how his allegations that “there is a lot of lying going on and a lot of fraudulent, false emails, false statements about this coverup of this firing of this employee, who I understand was almost immediately reinstated and actually sued the county and recovered, settled the case for $175,000.

“I mean how do you get from there to this whole list of felonies?” the judge asked Desmond. “I just don’t see it.”

Desmond said the Zawrotuk / Rimedio-Righetti conversation shows that “they were going to cover up the unlawful termination, a violation of Mr. Morrison’s civil rights. That is a crime,” he said.

“There has to be an investigation,” Desmond said. “This is a public corruption case. This is vitally important to this community to find out exactly what happened, to find out who is responsible, to find out who committed the crimes. And if crimes were committed, there needs to be a prosecution.”

Attorney Todd Raskin, who represents DeGenova, said Judge Benita Y. Pearson of U.S. District Court in Youngstown, who oversaw the civil case, dismissed DeGenova from the suit on the grounds that she had immunity as the county prosecutor. He said Wiest could dismiss this petition “on that basis alone.”

He said there also is “ample basis” to exclude Zawrotuk’s testimony because of DeGenova’s “marital communication privilege” and because any statements made out of court by DeGenova “to her husband are “statements by a witness who did not see or hear the incident in question but learned about it through secondhand information,” according to a U.S. Department of Justice glossary of legal terms.

“The reality of this case is that Mr. Desmond, by filing this petition, has attempted to influence the outcome of the prosecutor’s election. And in fact, he may very well have been successful in that regard because Ms. DeGenova was unsuccessful in her election bid.”

Desmond said Judge Pearson’s ruling dismissing DeGenova from the civil suit cited “absolute litigation privilege,” not based on the “merits” of the allegations against her. He added that the marital communications exclusion is not absolute.

In dismissing the case, Wiest noted that he was the visiting judge in the criminal case 25 years ago in Mahoning County of a former county commissioner convicted of “theft in office and some other corruption-type crimes, and there was evidence of corruption and abuse of power and using county employees for his own personal business and his own county commissioner campaign.

“But the only thing I read about here (in Desmond’s petition) is you’re saying these people lied a lot, and they’re lying because they want to cover up this firing of this gentleman who, as it has been pointed out, was reinstated with full pay and benefits,” the judge said.

“Lying is a crime. You have perjury and falsification, but we’re dealing with that here. We’re dealing with people you say are trying to cover up a firing. And I just don’t see it, and I’m going to … dismiss this case.” He added that Desmond can appeal it, which Desmond said he planned to do.

When DeGenova was asked afterward for her thoughts on the dismissal, she said, “I’m just happy to move on with my life. I wish attorney Maro well in her new endeavor, and I hope for the continued success of the prosecutor’s office.”

The results of the election were finalized Tuesday night, giving Lynn Maro an 818-vote advantage over DeGenova in the election, winning by 0.76 of a percent.