Former Wildwood Mayor Faces Reindictment

COURT HOUSE — Former Wildwood mayor Gary DeMarzo is facing four counts of using city money to pay for personal legal bills. The charges, filed June 12, include two counts of official misconduct, one count of criminal contempt and one charge of corruption of public resources.
The most recent indictment comes on the heels of a previous indictment for similar charges filed in 2011. That indictment was dismissed in early April, 2012 by Superior Court judge Albert Garafolo.
The original indictment was filed after it was alleged DeMarzo used money from the city’s coffers to pay his attorney, Samuel Lashman, for services to defend him in a lawsuit brought on by DeMarzo’s fellow commissioners when DeMarzo was both a city commissioner and police officer.
In Garafolo’s dismissal, he noted the state’s failure to present evidence, “was fundamentally unfair, deprived the grand jury of its decision-making function, and was therefore unconstitutional.”
According to the newly filed indictment, DeMarzo is charged with disobeying the direct instruction of Judge Valerie Armstrong not to have the city of Wildwood pay his legal expenses.
“The grand jurors of the state of New Jersey for the County of Cape May, upon their oaths, present that Gary DeMarzo on or about the diverse dates in March 2010…did contemptuously, purposely or knowingly disobey a judicial order/final judgment, namely by disregarding the judicial order/final judgment of the Honorable Judge Valerie Armstrong, issued on Dec. 8, 2009 which denied Gary DeMarzo’s request to have the court order the City of Wildwood to pay his legal expenses and costs in the legal action of Commissioner Gary DeMarzo vs. Mayor Ernest Troiano, Marcus Karavan, Esquire, Commissioner William Davenport…and Gary DeMarzo thereafter in contempt of the order/judgment did authorize the payment of legal expenses and costs to Samuel Lashman, Esquire from funding belonging to the City of Wildwood…” reads Count Three of the indictment charging DeMarzo with criminal contempt.
“The indictment specifically states the facts and the criminal law that was violated by Gary DeMarzo,” Cape May County Prosecutor Robert Taylor told the Herald.
The newest indictment does not cite the same charges as the previous indictment. According to the prosecutor the indictment clearly states the facts and the criminal law violated by DeMarzo.
“These are not exactly the same charges as previously indicted,” said Taylor.
“I have not seen nor have I been officially served with any court document,” said DeMarzo in a press release. “I am sure this, too, will lead to my complete vindication and the continued lack of confidence and total embarrassment of Mr. Taylor. The public is smarter than he thinks and will continue to see this for what it is a political witch-hunt and a means to a cover up. I respond to Taylor’s latest disgraceful act with the famous immortal words of General Anthony Clement McAuliffe and his single-word reply to a German surrender ultimatum: ‘NUTS,” said DeMarzo.