ALBANY – In a different type of blind justice, Lt. Gov. David Paterson insists race did not play a role in his decision to replace a white staff photographer with a black one because he doesn’t see black and white – literally.
Paterson, in his sworn deposition in a lawsuit against him, claimed his blindness prevented him from knowing the race of either photographer when he made the staffing changes in 2003, when he was Senate minority leader.
Paterson has been legally blind since developing an infection in infancy that left him blind in one eye and with very limited sight in the other.
“Given my visual impairment, I did not know for certain the race of either,” Paterson, the state’s first black lieutenant governor, testified in the case.
Paterson’s current chief of staff, Charles O’Byrne, yesterday dismissed the statement as a “Paterson quip, a joke.”
“If you know anything about David Paterson, it’s that he never used his blindness as an excuse for anything,” said O’Byrne, who said he was in the room during the deposition.
But in a decision first reported by the New York Law Journal yesterday, US Northern District Court Judge Norman Mordue found it no laughing matter.
He rejected attempts by Senate Democrats to throw out the case, saying there is sufficient evidence “from which a jury could find that plaintiff was terminated so that Sen. Paterson could hire an African-American photographer in his place.”
In the lawsuit, Joseph Maioriello claims he was told by Paterson’s former Senate chief of staff, John McPadden, that he was being let go because a number of minority senators wanted to replace him with “a minority photographer, a black photographer.”
Maioriello, 57, of Schenectady, testified that he was told, “You got to remember who Sen. Paterson is. Sen. Paterson is black.”
McPadden denied the claim, saying he merely told Maioriello that his replacement was black when asked but assured him that was not the reason he was being replaced.
He later testified Maioriello was fired for poor performance.
Maioriello, who worked “at will” for the Legislature for 26 years on a series of two-year appointments, is claiming termination based on race, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and loss of opportunity for employment benefits.
He is seeking $1 million in punitive damages and $500,000 in lost wages and benefits, according to the law journal.
Paterson, in his deposition, countered that the decision against reappointing Maioriello was simple politics – he was a holdover from former Minority Leader Marty Connor, who was ousted by Paterson in 2003.
O’Byrne said Paterson, when he became minority leader, inherited 143 staffers and replaced 23, including a black deputy chief of staff with a white one.
“Since [Maioriello’s] loyalty to me was, in my mind, in question since he had been Sen. Connor’s photographer, I perceived a need to have someone in that position whose loyalty to me was not in question,” Paterson said, according to court documents.
He said he hired El-Wise Noisette, who worked for years as the photographer to then-Comptroller Carl McCall, at the urging of his staff and Sen. Malcolm Smith, who supported Paterson and eventually succeeded him as minority leader.
Neither Maioriello nor his lawyer returned calls for comment.