Family ties cause trouble for LaGrotta

Jan. 30, 2008

By PAT LITOWITZ
New Castle News


(Second in a series.)

Family is Frank LaGrotta’s passion.

The state’s Attorney General targeted it as his Achilles’ heel.

While better known as a state representative, the Ellwood City resident takes greater pride as being a father figure to his niece and nephew, Alissa and Frank Lemmon.

“Frank’s strictly a family person,” LaGrotta’s mother, Loretta, said. “He doesn’t put himself first before anything.

“He’s like their dad.”

The relationship had its costs. LaGrotta called off his engagement when his fiancée asked him to cut back his ties with the children. Personal time also diminished.

Today, he endures his toughest challenge after claims that he hired his sister, Ann Bartolomeo, and niece for no-show state jobs.

LaGrotta, 49, faces two felony counts of conflict of interests. Bartolomeo, 46, and Alissa Lemmon, 24, are each charged with false swearing for allegedly lying to a state grand jury.

Under a court-mandated gag order, the three are not permitted to speak to the media.

Shortly into his first term in 1986 as 10th District representative, LaGrotta was thrust into a family crisis. Bartolomeo, eight months pregnant at the time, learned that her husband wanted out of the marriage.

“My granddaughter was a little over 3, not quite 3 1/2, and my daughter was pregnant with her little boy,” Loretta LaGrotta recalled. “They were living at my mother’s house. He just called (Ann) and said he wasn’t coming home from work.

“She called his mother’s house and wanted to know where he was. He was there. He got on the phone and he said, ‘I’m not coming home.’

“She called me crying.”

With her brother in Harrisburg, Bartolomeo was in the hospital preparing to give birth. Although her husband joined her in the delivery room, Bartolomeo knew that their relationship was over.

Shortly upon his birth, the child was rushed to the neonatal care unit of West Penn Hospital in Pittsburgh. Blood problems prompted the move.

“I had to call the priest to come in and baptize him,” Loretta said. “The priest said, ‘What’s the name? I go to Ann’s room, and I said, ‘What are you going call this baby?’ and she said, ‘Frank Christopher.’”

“He was supposed to be named ‘Christopher’ for his father.”

The first-term legislator returned home from the state capital to see his namesake at the hospital.

“My son put his arms around his sister and said, ‘As long as I’m alive, you’re not ever going to have to worry,’” LaGrotta’s mother said. “They became his children.

“He became as much a father as you can ever imagine. They come to him for everything. He has taken care of them in every way.”

Frank Lemmon, 19, knew early on that his uncle had accepted an extraordinary responsibility.

“In grade school, I realized it was unusual for an uncle to play that role in somebody’s life,” the Emory College student said. “To some people, I’m sure it’s a strange thing.

“But to the people who really know us ... they understand the situation.”

Like most fathers, LaGrotta attended his niece’s musicals and his nephew’s baseball games. He helped with homework and gave his “kids” rides to wherever they needed to go.

“Anytime we ever needed him for anything, he was there,” Lemmon said. “He was very involved in our lives, pretty much every aspect.

“He definitely went above and beyond.”

About the only thing unusual was LaGrotta’s parental nickname, “Ball Ball.”

“My uncle kept (a golf ball) in his car,” Lemmon said. “(Alissa) would say ‘Ball Ball’ when she wanted to play with it. I guess it became so ingrained in her that when she saw him she just associated the ball with him.

“That name stuck. I was born into it.”


LaGrotta also provided the children with financial support.

Savings accounts were established in their names with LaGrotta listed as custodian. Later, LaGrotta opened checking accounts for the pair. Again, the former legislator was on the banking records.

Attorney General Tom Corbett’s investigators singled out one of those accounts during their investigation. It became the basis for one conflict of interest charge against LaGrotta.

As it pertains to the Ellwood City resident, the state’s Ethics Act says that a conflict of interest exists if a public official uses his position for personal financial gain for himself or a family member.

Corbett trumpeted the findings against LaGrotta and his family on Nov. 14, 2007.

“This is a case of a public servant abusing his position of trust and power to financially reward his family members at the taxpayer’s expense,” he said.

However, Corbett failed to state what the conflicts were when he announced the charges.

The state claimed that a conflict arose because LaGrotta was named on a savings account in which Alissa Lemmon’s state paycheck was deposited. The inference being that LaGrotta had access to the money and, therefore, could use the funds. In other words, that was money he was not entitled to.

What the state did not disclose nor did not discover was that this particular account was opened when his niece was 3 years old.

The LaGrotta family gave the New Castle News permission to examine Frank Lemmon’s savings passbook. Because of ongoing litigation, The News was not allowed access to Alissa Lemmon’s banking records.

If Alissa Lemmon’s savings history mirrors that of her brother’s, then one of the state’s charges against LaGrotta lacks credibility.

Frank Lemmon’s savings account was opened on July 2, 1987, at the Ellwood Federal Savings & Loan Association. Today, the financial institution is known as ESB Bank.

Seven withdrawals took place during the 20-plus years of the account’s existence. LaGrotta made a majority of the deposits, with his nephew occasionally contributing funds.

In addition to date and amount of the withdrawals, notes described where the money went. They were as follows:

•March 14, 2001 — $2,500 (certificate of deposit)

•June 12, 2003 — $130 (police fine)

•Sept. 10, 2003 — $240 (guitar)

•Aug. 23, 2005 — $1,000 (college)

•Aug. 25, 2006 — $10,000 (certificate of deposit)

•Jan. 9, 2007 — $1,000 (certificate of deposit)

•Sept. 29, 2007 — $1,000 (Emory College)

“Anything that he would have done he would run by me,” Frank Lemmon said. “Not that I don’t trust him 110 percent, but he never did anything behind my back with any of that money.

“I always knew where money was.”

(Tomorrow: Although an acclaimed legislator, Frank LaGrotta was universally viewed as a lousy boss.)