George Norcross used his ‘overwhelming political influence’ to extort business rivals, prosecutors say

New Jersey prosecutors have dismissed George E. Norcross III’s attempts to reconsider the tactics he used to succeed in land deals on the Camden waterfront as nothing more than “hard business negotiations” and urged the judge to let a jury decide whether he violated An influential Democratic politician is the law in his pursuit of lucrative property.

The argument, laid out in a 146-page court filing late Friday, comes two months after Norcross — an insurance executive and chairman of the board of Cooper University Health Care — forced Mercer County Superior Court Judge Peter Warshaw to dismiss the 13 racketeering charge. points. against him and five others this summer, claiming the charges were fatally flawed.

But prosecutors insisted in court filings that the cases were better suited to a jury and argued that the indictment clearly described how Norcross and his co-defendants criminally profited from their control of the Camden government and gained the upper hand in business deals.

“By leveraging Norcross’s reputation for unfettered control of local government and overwhelming political influence in New Jersey, Norcross Enterprise essentially took over Camden’s waterfront,” New Jersey Assistant Attorney General Michael D. Grillo and Deputy Attorney General Adam D. Klein wrote: later adding, “This is not a hard bargain by any means, and the grand jury had every right to call it extortion.”

How Warshaw handles the matter in the coming months will determine the future of one of the most ambitious corruption investigations the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office has pursued in years. The judge set a date in January to hear arguments on whether the case should be allowed to proceed.

A grand jury indicted Norcross and others in June, alleging they manipulated the state tax credit program to their advantage and used threats and intimidation to drive out competitors seeking land deals in Camden.

Since then, Norcross and his allies have relentlessly criticized the case – in court and in the press – and accused Attorney General Matt Platkin of waging “legal jihad” against them. They claim he is abusing his power to criminalize common business negotiation tactics and legitimate lobbying of government officials.

“This charge has no bearing on the trial,” their lawyers wrote in September. “Calling this a criminal charge is both too trivial and too generous.”

” READ MORE: “A crime thriller without a crime: George Norcross’s lawyers urge the judge to dismiss the racketeering case.”

At this point in the case, prosecutors only have to prove that the indictment alleges theoretical crimes that, if proven in court, would constitute violations of state law. The debate over whether the evidence supports the theory that Norcross and his co-defendants committed these crimes is usually left to the jury stage.

In court filings Friday, prosecutors said the unelected Norcross and his allies’ conduct went far beyond the law and accused them of using their “brute political power and functional control of the levers of government” to threaten rivals and gain leverage. in business negotiations.

“Nowhere should the promise of a level playing field be simpler than in the case of elected government—yet Norcross Enterprise extorted property and coerced action by insinuating to its victims that if they did not do what George Norcross wanted, “they would lose any potential business opportunity.” in Camden and truly suffer at the hands of the city,” they wrote.

They also rejected Norcross’s contention that many of the charges, based in part on charges dating back to 2012, had expired under state law. They said the racketeering conspiracy led by Norcross continues to profit from its illegal activities to this day—largely by obtaining and selling tax breaks associated with many of the business deals charged in the indictment.

Also charged in the case are Norcross’ brother Philip, CEO of law firm Parker McCay; former Camden Mayor Dana L. Redd; William Tambussi, an attorney who represented Norcross and local governments; and businessmen Sidney R. Brown and John J. O’Donnell, who collaborated with Norcross on waterfront development deals. Each of them pleaded not guilty.

The attorney general’s office on Friday also responded to the defense team’s disclosure last week of a 2023 letter from the U.S. attorney’s office in Philadelphia showing that federal prosecutors declined to pursue a case against Norcross last year.

Tambussi’s lawyers wrote in a court document that the letter said Norcross and his co-defendants “committed no crime” and portrayed the current case against them as based on evidence previously rejected by federal authorities.

The Office of the Prosecutor General noted that there is no such wording in the letter. “This lawyer suggests that letters from federal prosecutors stating that no crime occurred signal his intent to circumvent the judicial process and instill a biased version of the investigation in the press, the public and, worst of all, the prospective jury,” prosecutors wrote.

They added that the attorney general’s investigation “has produced new evidence that is quite different from” other investigations by federal prosecutors in Philadelphia and New Jersey.

Read the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office: