Exit, Cammarano

by: Rosi Efthim

Thu Jul 30, 2009 at 03:19:55 PM EDT

Cammarano was stubbornly working at his desk, and swearing to stick it out without resigning the day after he was arrested for taking $25,000 in cash bribes - including $10,000 just days ago - from Solomon Dwek, acting as the government's cooperating witness.  

But immediately after last week's early-morning federal law-enforcement sweep hauled in a motley crew of pols and rabbis on corruption and money laundering charges, the pressure was on to step down. Gov. Corzine called for all of those in public office to step down, the day of the arrests. The locals had their say too, at a protest rally Saturday [VIDEO], and again outside City Hall in the rain Monday night, and in crudely-made signs popping up on local telephone poles.

But in the end, it looks like a deal brokered by Gov. Corzine - and transacted by attorneys from the Governor's office coming to terms with Cammarano's own lawyers - is what sealed the deal.

Cammarano is a lawyer, too, and was the protegee of Democratic uber-lawyer Angelo Genova, the Democratic Party's go-to guy on election and campaign finance law. And that makes it all the more repulsive, if the charges against Cammarano are true; he must have known precisely, and in detail, what a vicious twist of justice he was perpetuating.

At just 32, Cammarano was a rising star of the Golden Boy variety, who managed a fragile alliance of Old Hoboken forces and New Hoboken blood, and rose through a complex and dramatic election, to Mayor of the hottest place to live in the state of New Jersey.

Done, now.