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Jul 5

2018

Buffalo not enforcing its fair housing law

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 The heating in her apartment was acting up and her knee problems made carrying groceries up the stairs difficult. So, Gloria Adkins had gone with a friend to look at an apartment in Black Rock, planning to ask the landlord if he had anything else available. After he said he did, she steeled herself to ask the all-important question: Did he take Section 8, a federal program that helps poor people pay their rent? She remembers him saying no: too much hassle, too much paperwork. Most people would have let it go. But Adkins knew that refusing to rent[...]

Posted 7 years ago

Jul 2

2018

Lehner family sues over police diver’s drowning

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The family of Officer Craig Lehner filed a wrongful death lawsuit Monday against City Hall and the Buffalo Police Department. Lehner drowned during a dive training exercise in the Niagara River last October with the department’s Underwater Recovery Team. The lawsuit contends the city and police department “violated and departed from” the rules and regulations guiding dive training. Several of the allegations in the filing are similar to the findings in an Investigative Post story published earlier this year, which exposed shortcomings in the dive team’s training, equipment, and safety procedures. The lawsuit, filed in state Supreme Court, contends: Lehner[...]

Posted 7 years ago

Jun 29

2018

Heaney offers his take on corruption trial

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WGRZ anchor Maryalice Demler interviewed Jim Heaney on Friday regarding the Buffalo Billion corruption trial. Heaney discussed what he found striking in the testimony thus far. For starters, he said testimony has established the degree to which state officials tried to cover their tracks. They used private emails – later deleting some of them – and messaging devices that destroyed text shorty after sending. Also noteworthy, he said, was testimony about the placement of Cuomo operative Todd Howe in the economic development agency headed by Alain Kaloyeros. Heaney said Howe’s involvement raises all sorts of questions about the possible role of[...]

Posted 7 years ago

Jun 28

2018

Cuomo flunkies cross the line

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A former Cuomo flak testified the other day that another of the governor’s minions attempted several years ago to dissuade donors from continuing their support of Investigative Post in retaliation for its reporting on corruption in the Buffalo Billion program. “There was an effort made by people that Todd [Howe] knew that had donated to Investigative Post in the past, there was an effort to get them to stop doing that,” said David Doyle, a former spokesman for Alain Kaloyeros, the disgraced nanotech guru on trial along with three developers who just so happened to be major contributors to Cuomo’s[...]

Posted 7 years ago

Jun 28

2018

Lehner family to file wrongful death lawsuit

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The family of Officer Craig Lehner intends to file a wrongful death lawsuit against the Buffalo Police Department and the City of Buffalo in the coming weeks, an attorney for the family confirmed to Investigative Post. The family had previously signaled its intention to do so with the filing of a notice of claim. Lehner drowned during a training exercise in the Niagara River last October with the police Underwater Recovery Team. Investigative Post subsequently reported that inadequate training and equipment contributed to his death. Dangerously fast currents typical of the Niagara River were also a factor. On the day Lehner drowned,[...]

Posted 7 years ago

Jun 26

2018

Buffalo Billion project kept hush-hush

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Executives at LPCiminelli kept the state-affiliated nonprofit overseeing Buffalo Billion projects in the dark about a second project the company was awarded under a no-bid contract, a key witness testified Monday in the ongoing corruption trial. The company was chosen – quietly – to build a lab and office for biotech company Albany Molecular Research Inc. before LPCiminelli had even submitted their response to the Request for Proposals to build a factory for SolarCity that prosecutors said was rigged in their favor by Alain Kaloyeros and lobbyist Todd Howe. Kevin Schuler, a former LPCiminelli executive who has pled guilty to[...]

Posted 7 years ago

Jun 15

2018

What to watch for in Buffalo Billion trial

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 On Monday, Buffalo businessman Louis Ciminelli, will face trial in federal court in Manhattan, accused of taking part in a scheme to rig the bids for the construction work on the huge factory for SolarCity. Federal prosecutors say Ciminelli and other executives at his company worked with Alain Kaloyeros, the state official in charge of Gov. Cuomo’s Buffalo Billion initiative, to secretly tailor the bid specifications so their company would get the contract. Kaloyeros, who is also facing corruption charges, presided over a system of non-profit organizations that were exempt from the usual state oversight, even as they handed[...]

Posted 7 years ago

Jun 11

2018

Buffalo police didn’t participate in dive training

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Eight months after Buffalo Police Officer Craig Lehner drowned in the Niagara River’s fast currents, divers from several local law enforcement agencies participated in a three-day swift water dive training in Amherst and Tonawanda. Officers from the Buffalo Police Underwater Recovery Team did not participate, however. A department spokesperson did not respond to calls and a text from Investigative Post inquiring as to why the department didn’t participate. Over the past several months, Investigative Post has exposed the failure of the Buffalo police dive team to adequately train and equip Lehner for that fatal dive in the Niagara River last October.[...]

Posted 7 years ago
Investigative Post