Westchester & Fairfield County Business Journals' 122616

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WESTCHESTER & FAIRFIELD COUNTY

BUSINESS JOURNALS

DECEMBER 26, 2016 | VOL. 52, No. 52

2 | ROOFTOP SPORTS

6 | GROCER'S DEBUT

YOUR ONLY SOURCE FOR REGIONAL BUSINESS NEWS

westfaironline.com

State’s first legal incubator will aid Fairfield trauma victims BY PHIL HALL phall@westfairinc.com

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onnecticut’s first legal incubator is due to open in early 2017 at the Center for Family Justice, a Bridgeport-based nonprofit that provides services to trauma survivors affected by domestic violence, sexual assault or child abuse. “A legal incubator is like a business incubator,” said Jennifer Ferrante, who has joined the Center for Family Justice staff as the coordinator for the new service. At the center’s office at 753 Fairfield Ave., “We are going to be housing four attorneys here on site,” she said. Two of the first attorneys who applied and were accepted in the program are recent law school graduates. “They are their own bosses,” Ferrante said. “They have their own independent law practices. But we are going to be supporting them in multiple ways. We give them subsidized office space and supplies. We give them training in business management and provide them with networking and mentoring opportunities and referrals, along with a collaborative work environment. At the end of the two years, they will hopefully have all of the tools that they can go out into the community with a sustainable law practice and be able to go out and earn a living.” Ferrante, a Westport resident, previously was a litigation associate at the white-shoe New York law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, where » LEGAL INCUBATOR, page 8

BEATING DOWN DISEASE

SEE PAGE 4

Stuart Cameron intensely works the punching bag at Lexington Avenue Gym in Mount Kisco despite symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. Photo by Bob Rozycki.

Catskill developers accused of rigging village election BY BILL HELTZEL bheltzel@westfairinc.com

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loomingburg is a bucolic gateway to the Catskills in Sullivan County, but beneath the surface, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office, a cynical scheme was hatched by develop-

ers to take over the local government in the hope of transforming the Sullivan County village into a Hasidic Jewish enclave while making hundreds of millions of dollars. Three real estate developers were arrested on Dec. 15 and charged in U.S. District Court in White Plains with conspiracy to corrupt the electoral process. Shalom Lamm, 57, of Bloomingburg; Kenneth Nakdimen, 64, of Monsey, and Volvy “Zev” Smilowitz, 28, of Monroe, are accused of recruiting outsiders to vote in the village so that they could build the Chestnut Ridge townhouse community unimpeded by public opposition or government oversight. All three pleaded not guilty at their initial appearance in feder-

al court. Bail was set at $200,000 each. The criminal case mirrors a lawsuit filed last year by Bloomingburg and Mamakating, a town that encompasses the village. The municipalities accused Lamm, Nakdimen and associates of racketeering, fraud, bribery, intimidation and voter fraud. U.S. District Court Judge Katherine Forrest dismissed the case for failure to establish a racketeering claim and for filing too late under the statute of limitations. The criminal case also follows a 2014 lawsuit by Chestnut Ridge developers against village and town officials, accusing them of preventing Hasidic Jews from buying houses, establishing a religious » CATSKILLS, page 8


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