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The Staten Island Democratic Party is fighting a court ruling that kicked two of its candidates for the state Supreme Court off the Nov. 6 ballot for running afoul of election laws by failing to turn in the formal minutes from the party's nominating convention without explanation.

Last week, a panel from the Appellate Division, Second Department issued a unanimous ruling to kick judicial candidates Anthony Catalano and Orlando Marrazzo Jr. off the Democratic Party line, reversing a ruling by Staten Island Supreme Court Justice Alan Marin.

The four-judge panel acknowledged that while the party did submit a verbatim transcript of the Sept. 20 nominating convention to the New York City Board of Elections and that the stenographer who wrote it up attested to its accuracy, neither the party chair nor the secretary certified the transcript.

Additionally, the panel said, the party failed to submit certified minutes of the convention, which is required by statute, and has made no attempts to rectify the issue or explain why the minutes weren't filed.

Courts have found that failing to file the convention minutes is not a “fatal defect” per se, the panel found, but any delay in filing the minutes should be brief.  

“This failure is inexplicable given that the convention chair read to the delegates, at the outset of the convention, an authorization letter from the party's state chair which expressly stated that the Election Law requires that within 72 hours of the adjournment of the convention, the duly certified minutes must be filed with the Board of Elections,” the panel wrote.  

Justices Alan Scheinkman, Mark Dillon, Valerie Brathwaite Nelson and Angela Iannacci joined on the decision.

The Second Department will hear the party's motion for leave to appeal the ruling to the state Court of Appeals on Wednesday, said elections lawyer Martin Connor, who is representing the party in the matter. The court will likely render a decision on the motion on the same day, he said.

If the Second Department's ruling stands, Catalano, Staten Island's public administrator, would be booted off the ballot entirely. Marrazzo, however, will still appear on the ballot on the Reform Party line.  

Catalano became a judicial candidate for state Supreme Court this year after losing a Democratic primary fight for Surrogate's Court judge to Assemblyman Matthew Titone.

Brendan Lantry, an attorney with the Staten Island-based Menicucci Villa Cilmi who chairs the Staten Island Republican Party, said the issues affecting the Democratic Party have not affected the GOP's strategy for getting U.S. Rep. Daniel Donovan re-elected and getting State Assemblyman Ron Castorina elected as a Surrogate's Court judge.

“The decision by the Second Department doesn't change in any way the plan for the Staten Island Republicans,” Lantry said.

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