DISGRACED former Gov. Eliot Spitzer will be subpoenaed within weeks to give his first public testimony in the Dirty Tricks Scandal if, as expected, a state commission charges his former aide Darren Dopp with violating state law.
Dopp lawyer Michael Koenig, a former federal prosecutor, has concluded Spitzer’s testimony would be crucial to back up his client’s claim that the former governor gave the go-ahead for every step in the plot that used the State Police to gather purportedly damaging information on now-former Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno (R-Rensselaer), a source close to the situation told The Post.
“If Dopp is telling the truth, then Spitzer was at the core of the scandal,” said an investigator involved in the case.
The state Public Integrity Commission is expected to charge Dopp, Spitzer’s one-time communications director, with two civil violations of the Public Officers Law as soon as today in relation to the scandal, sources close to the commission said.
If he is charged, Dopp would be able to challenge the accusation in a trial-like public proceeding that would grant Koenig access to all scandal-related records gathered by the commission, and the power to subpoena witnesses.
Dopp, unlike two other former Spitzer aides, has refused to reach a settlement with the commission that would involve an admission of guilt and a public censure, insisting everything he did was at Spitzer’s direction.
The commission, dominated by Spitzer appointees, won’t charge the ex-governor with breaking the law, sources said.
The Post earlier this month published excerpts of Dopp’s under-oath interview with Commission Executive Director Herbert Teitelbaum last fall that appeared to back up Dopp’s claim that the commission was trying to avoid holding the then-governor responsible for the scandal.
Meanwhile, Dopp, suspended as one of Spitzer’s most trusted aides in the wake of the Dirty Tricks Scandal, is providing fascinating new details of the political role played by controversial former State Police Lt. Col. Daniel Wiese, who is under investigation in connection with the scandal.
Dopp said Wiese, a close friend and neighbor of former Gov. George Pataki, often mediated disputes between Pataki and Spitzer.
“Danny was the guy who would set up meetings between the governor and the attorney general. I know of a handful of occasions when he did it,” Dopp told The Post.