ALBANY – Albany County District Attorney David Soares misled the public by suggesting – as recently as Monday – that a grand jury is probing the Dirty Tricks Scandal, when the actual “prober” is only Soares himself, legal sources told The Post.
Soares, who issued a report on the scandal in September that wrongly concluded that then-Gov. Eliot Spitzer wasn’t involved in the effort to use the State Police to smear Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno (R-Rensselaer), failed to allow his most important witness – former top Spitzer aide Darren Dopp – to appear before a grand jury, which could have considered criminal charges against the aide, it was learned.
Dopp testified instead before two of Soares’ deputies under what Dopp’s attorney has said was a grant of immunity – meaning no criminal charges could ever be brought.
“There was no grand jury that my client appeared before,” said Dopp’s lawyer, Michael Koenig, a former federal prosecutor.
“I don’t think any witness went before a grand jury.”
Dopp, who was suspended for over a month in the wake of a July report on the scandal by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, revealed in his testimony that Spitzer, despite repeated claims to the contrary, was at the center of the plot against Bruno.
A law-enforcement source told The Post, “It seems certain that Soares never brought anybody before a grand jury, even while he was issuing subpoenas in a grand jury’s name.”
Had Soares conducted a grand-jury probe, members of the panel would have the final say on the contents of a final report.
By conducting a “probe” without direct grand-jury involvement, Soares alone will determine what will be in a final report.
Former Albany County District Attorney Paul Clyne, a criminal-procedure law expert who was defeated by Soares at election in 2004, said Soares “has clearly left the impression with everyone that he has had a grand-jury investigation going on when, I believe, he really doesn’t.”
Soares refused repeated requests for comment.
His spokeswoman, Heather Orth, said, “The DA will not be commenting on any matters until the findings of his investigation have been released.”
The report is expected by Monday.
Soares, a close Spitzer political ally, raised eyebrows in September by issuing a personal “report” that used unsworn testimony – including testimony from Spitzer – to conclude that the then-governor wasn’t involved in the plot and had even sought to stop it.
Soares and his aides have claimed for months – in leaks to the media – that a grand jury was probing the scandal, focusing on the possibility – raised in a letter to Soares by the state Public Integrity Commission – that Dopp lied in a sworn statement about the scandal in July.
As recently as Monday, Soares wrote a controversial letter to Gov. Paterson seeking a “waiver of grand-jury secrecy” involving scandal-related documents turned over by Spitzer “pursuant to a grand-jury subpoena.”