MARTINIANO

It might not be illegal or unethical but I think it’s pretty funny when a witness for the prosecution meets with a defense attorney to go over his testimony.

I'm told that’s exactly what happened Wednesday night.

Robert Martiniano met up with Cheryl Coleman – the attorney representing his friend Michael LoPorto against 22 felony counts of possessing a forged instrument – at LoPorto’s restaurant.

LOPORTO

On Thursday, Trey Smith, the special prosecutor who brought the 22 felonies against LoPorto, called Martiniano as a witness to tell the jury what he knew about the 2009 Working Families Party primary, or more specifically the actions by LoPorto leading up to the primary.

On the stand, I thought Martiniano’s testimony was pretty benign in that it didn’t help or hurt LoPorto all that much. He did say the two of them went to Fallon Apartments on Sept. 12 to get Working Families Party voters sign absentee ballot applications. They would go to the door, have the voter sign an application and leave blank everything else – in particular the reason why the voter would be unable to make it to the polls three days later and the spot where the voter tells the Board of Elections to whom the ballot should be delivered.

He also said that those spots were, by a cursory look at the handwriting - later filled in by someone else other than the voter but it doesn’t directly tie LoPorto to the crimes for which he is charged.

COLEMAN

On the flip side, I don’t think he helped LoPorto either since it did set up the next witness of the day, former City Clerk Bill McInerney, who was by all accounts the mastermind behind the entire Democratic Party operation to win the WFP line back from the GOP. Whether or not that’s enough to convict LoPorto is anyone’s guess. It’s up to the jury.

In the end, I still think Martiniano’s involvement in the whole thing is pretty funny. Some two years ago he was so miffed when the State Police didn’t call him as a witness and made such a stink about it in the papers they eventually called him in. And I’m 101 percent sure he is the only one out of probably a dozen or more who could have been called in by the State Police who was upset he wasn’t.

SMITH

Now we know one reason why he might have been snippy with Smith Thursday - to the point where he was even arguing over whether he was better educated with his two masters degrees and a doctorate on the horizon than the people living in the projects who had their vote stolen – but when questioned by Coleman it was like two friends meeting in a park.

As I said, it’s not unethical or illegal for Cole man to talk to Martiniano but I’m pretty sure Smith didn’t know about it. Even if he did, I’m not sure what he would have done differently. As I mentioned, Martiniano and LoPorto are buddies - and marinara is thicker than water.