Court outburst nearly lands lawyer in jail

Pete Fiorentino, a former City Council attorney, came very close to being held in contempt of court yesterday as he declared himself the victim of a "kangaroo court" during a challenge of his ballot nominating petitions to run for the state House.

Fiorentino claimed the challengers broke the law by doing their legal paperwork with the help of a fax machine in the local office of state Rep. Mike O'Brien, the Democrat he hoped to unseat in the May 18 primary.

Commonwealth Court Judge Johnny Butler denied Fiorentino's request to toss the petition challenge, saying the faxed paperwork did not justify that ruling.

"This is a joke!" Fiorentino yelled in court. "This is a kangaroo court, your honor."

Butler told Fiorentino he had never held an attorney in contempt of court, but was getting ready to make him the first.

"I think your behavior is crossing the line," the judge warned.

Fiorentino asked for a brief recess, which he spent comforting his crying wife, and then tearfully said he was dropping his candidacy because the judge would not give him a "fair shot."

O'Brien, who represents the 175th District, which extends from South Philadelphia to Port Richmond along the Delaware River, later dismissed the complaints about faxed legal paperwork as a non-issue.

"Obviously at the end of the day he had no ground to defend against our questions on the validity of his petitions," O'Brien said. "He chose to launch into a series of personal attacks against a staff member to cloud the issue."

Mary Isaacson, O'Brien's chief of staff, and Democratic City Committeeman Peter Butterline filed challenges two weeks ago against Fiorentino and Daryl LaFountain, another candidate.

LaFountain found the faxed paperwork and his attorney, Larry Otter, asked the court on Monday to dismiss the challenge. Otter compared the faxes to the ongoing "Bonusgate" investigation in Harrisburg, which resulted in the March 22 conviction of a former state representative and two legislative staffers for using state resources for campaign purposes.

A line at the top of some of the pages in the legal challenge were printed "Rep. Michael O'Brien's Office," a sign that it had been faxed from there.

Isaacson and Butterline dropped the LaFountain challenge on Tuesday, but pressed forward on the Fiorentino case.

Isaacson said she dropped the challenge because her attorney, John Sabatina, told her LaFountain was close enough to the required 300 valid signatures on nominating petitions that having him removed from the ballot "would be very difficult."

Fiorentino incorporated Otter's legal filing into his case after a hearing on the validity of the signatures on his petitions started Monday. The hearing was continuing yesterday when he decided to leave the race.

Otter noted that he told Sabatina last week that a state fax machine was used for the challenge.

"Report it to the attorney general," Sabatina responded, according to Otter's legal brief.

Fiorentino and LaFountain say they have reported the faxes to the state Attorney General's Office and the U.S. Attorney's Office. LaFountain said he has a meeting today with the U.S. Attorney's Office to discuss the issue.