Kappy: Cuomo appointment clears legal cloud for Peter Rivera

(via thepereznotes.com)

Ex-Daily News Bronx bureau chief Bob Kappstatter is out with a new column in Jordan Moss’s new Boogie Down-themed blog BronxMatters.com about Assemblyman Peter Rivera’s recent appointment by Gov. Andrew Cuomo to run the state Labor Department.

Kappy theorizes that questions surrounding Rivera’s support for a moribund Bronx non-profit seem to have been answered by Cuomo’s decision to tap him for the Labor Department role. After all, Mr. Clean Up Albany would never appoint someone with the taint of corruption on them, would he?

Gov. Cuomo’s appointment also apparently quashes once and for all a dark legal cloud Rivera’s been living under involving his pumping major state funding to the just about moribund Neighborhood Enhancement for Training Services (NETS) non-profit.

David Griffith, his former law partner and campaign treasurer, was sentenced to six months in prison after pleading guilty last June to federal mail fraud involving NETS. He made no agreement to testify against Rivera.

It’s doubtful Cuomo, the former state Attorney General, would have given Rivera the job, pending state Senate confirmation to replace Colleen Garden, if there were any loose investigative threads still hanging in that case.

Kappy also reports that Louis Sepulveda, an ally of state Sen. Ruben Diaz Sr., is better positioned to succeed Rivera in the Assembly, even though the assemblyman’s chief of staff is running for the seat as well.

Read the rest of the column here. (And as a former intern for Kappy from years ago, I must say its good to have the old grizzly bear back in action. Can’t wait to read more!)