Yaede administration suspends CFO John Barrett
HAMILTON >> Township Chief Financial Officer John Barrett was suspended with pay late last week after the Mayor Kelly Yaede administration brought tenure charges seeking to remove the embattled public official.
Barrett received an email Friday afternoon notifying him of the suspension, his attorney confirmed.
He turned in his township-issued laptop to Hamilton Business Administrator David Kenny on Monday morning at the township municipal building following the township filing tenure charges against him Jan. 4.
The laptop had been a serious point of contention between Barrett, Kenny and the mayor’s chief of staff Marty Flynn, who had previously barged into Barrett’s CFO offices demanding he turn it over.
Instead of complying, Barrett called 9-1-1, complained of workplace harassment and left the municipal building with his laptop in tow.
Yaede antagonist David Henderson captured Barrett in a Facebook Live video posted on his account handing over the much-talked-about computer, retrieving belongings from his office and notifying staff inside the township tax office of his indefinite suspension.
During the five-minute video, Barrett proclaimed he is innocent of the administrative charges brought against him in a seven-count complaint which includes allegations of misappropriation of funds, employee misconduct and inefficient job performance.
FBI Probe
And then he dropped a bombshell, telling township employees he has spoken to the FBI about potential criminal wrongdoing within the Yaede administration, encouraging others to do the same if they’re aware of any “improprieties.”
“Ladies, I want to announce to you I’ve been suspended by Mr. Kenny,” Barrett said. “I wish you all the best. I will return. I will be found innocent of these bogus charges I wish you the very best. Keep doing a great job for this township, in spite of what’s happening with this administration. I will tell you this, that you should not feel threatened by what happened to me. If you see any improprieties in this township, report it to the prosecutor and the FBI, just like I did. I wish you the very best, and please keep your heads held high this time.”
While he had previously written of contacting local authorities with allegations of criminal wrongdoing against members of Mayor Yaede’s inner circle, this was the first time Barrett publicly acknowledged meeting with the FBI concerning any alleged wrongdoing.
Barrett declined to comment on the statements he made in the video when reached by phone.
Colin Bell, Barrett’s attorney, declined to divulge why Barrett felt compelled to talk to federal investigators.
“I don’t think I can get into that,” he said in a phone interview Monday afternoon. “I will say this: Mr. Barrett has very serious concerns about illegal practices, what he believes to be illegal practices, and he has expressed those concerns to appropriate authorities. I can’t get into any further detail.”
The Trentonian has learned that Barrett spoke to the FBI on “multiple” occasions, but it’s unclear what he told investigators during those meetings.
An FBI spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether it has launched an investigation into the Yaede administration, based off information Barrett may have provided during those interviews.
Township council president Jeff Martin, a Democrat, said he wasn’t aware of any FBI probe of the Yaede administration.
“I know as much as you do from that video,” he said.
Mayor Yaede said in a statement she texted over to The Trentonian she was “not surprised by any allegations made by Mr. Barrett.”
She implied a motive for the CFO claiming “very serious concerns have come to light” about Barrett, who also works as a financial consultant for the Borough of Hawthorne in Passaic County and serves as borough administrator of Spring Lake Heights.
Yaede claimed the tenured CFO, who cannot be fired without cause, was “simultaneously” doing work for Spring Lake Heights while he was performing work duties for the township.
The tenure-charge complaint also cited Barrett’s high-profile Jan. 2 workplace encounter with Kenny and Mulrine as an act of insubordination amounting to theft of township property.
The tenure complaint went on to accuse the CFO of improperly spending nearly $34,000 in township funds between 2011 and 2017, abusing sick time, making false statements on a 2018 best practices questionnaire and installing hidden cameras in the CFO office.
The administration called it an “invasion of privacy of co-employees,” claiming the allegations are serious enough to cost Barrett his job.
Barrett, who views himself as a whistleblower, hasn’t been shy about dishing dirt to authorities on the Yaede administration.
Last month, Barrett filed a state ethics complaint alleging that Kenny and township employee Richard J. Mulrine, Yaede’s brother-in-law, had provided unauthorized approval on two recent purchase orders, including nearly $5,000 in reimbursements to the mayor for hotel lodging expenses she had incurred.
In an email sent Dec. 13, 2018, Barrett contacted officials in the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs’ Division of Local Government Services with explosive allegations.
Barrett accused Mulrine of “theft of time” in that email and said he reported the alleged matter to the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office.
Home Visits
The Trentonian on Monday also obtained a “confidential memo” Barrett purportedly sent local authorities in March 2017.
His name doesn’t appear anywhere on the memo, as the author identified themselves only as a township employee.
The memo delves into two Dec. 23, 2016 home visits that Yaede paid to two township couples.
One of those individuals was Dawn Muziani. Yaede and a police escort Geoff Nielsen, visited the Muzianis at their township home, according to the anonymous memo, which outlined the authorities were being alerted because “township property and personnel were used for personal matters by Mayor Kelly Yaede, against township policy.”
The confidential memo stated the “mayor proceeded to confront both Mr. and Mrs. Muziani with accusations that can be provided by them directly to your office.”
The memo included a contact number for the Muizanis. The Trentonian repeatedly attempted to reach the Muzianis to ask about the mayor’s visit, but they did not respond to multiple messages seeking comment.
For her part, Yaede acknowledged stopping by the Muzianis home after she said she hired a private investigator at her own expense after she was allegedly informed Dawn Muziani was stalking her.
“I indeed had to hire a private investigator due to being followed,” the mayor said in a statement.
The mayor identified Dawn Muziani as of her best friends. She said the private investigator employed an orchestrated plot to prove Dawn Muziani was following her.
Yaede said she went to the Muzianis home that day to inform her she no longer wanted contact with her. She claimed she was accompanied by her police escort so she’d have a witness to the encounter.
Yaede claimed she didn’t pursue criminal stalking charges against Muziani “out of respect” for her three children.
The mayor shared a screenshot of text messages Dawn Muziani allegedly sent her in August and November. One of them said, “No matter what you feel about me I hope you know I would never want anything to happen to you? Are you OK?”
The memo also outlined a visit Yaede paid to John and Barbara Costantino the same day.
The memo claimed the mayor told the Constantinos, who did not respond to messages left at a listed number, “not to tell anyone of the visit, as she would deny it and create trouble for them.”