Will any of NJ's powerful fall after murder-for-hire ringleader's aid to feds?

Will anything else actually come of Sean Caddle’s cooperation with the feds?

After the Hudson County political operative pleaded guilty to federal charges of murder for hire, observers of the legal system were surprised to learn that a judge let him await sentencing at home with an ankle monitor after admitting to a heinous crime.

Additional intrigue swirled when his attorney Ed Jacobs announced during Caddle’s plea hearing that Caddle “has been working, collaborating, with the FBI in developing an important investigation.”

But a year and a half later, the sole indictment linked to Caddle appears to be the case of Tony Teixeira, the former chief of staff to Senate President Nicholas Scutari. It remains unclear whether prosecutors are building other cases using information provided by Caddle.

Teixeira pleaded guilty last November to one charge of tax evasion and one charge of wire fraud, confirming in court that he conspired with Caddle to overcharge political campaigns, political action committees and nonprofits for work done by Caddle's consulting firms and split the bogus profit, and that he failed to report the gains to the IRS.

“I truly expected that there'd be a major political scandal,” said Jack Arseneault, a criminal defense attorney at Arseneault & Fassett. “I thought there would be a lot of bodies and he would get other people because of his evidence of their complicity in illegal schemes — it would get other people to roll as well.”

Galdieri murder: Early leads in NJ murder for hire case included Russian mafia, art deco painting and meth

More to come?

Others think there's more to come.

“I think it’s highly improbable that Mr. Caddle’s cooperation is only with respect to Mr. Teixeira,” said Charles McKenna, a former chief of the criminal division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey and former chief counsel to Gov. Chris Christie.

Caddle is scheduled to be sentenced on June 29. It’s the fifth date for the proceeding after the court repeatedly pushed back the hearing to determine Caddle’s punishment.

When a cooperator is sentenced, that typically means he finished the job authorities asked him to do — which would include testifying at a trial that occurs as a result of the cooperation, former prosecutors and criminal defense attorneys said.

“It would be unusual if he were sentenced before any trial, unless they think because of his background or the crime they could never use him,” said Joseph Hayden Jr., a former deputy attorney general in the organized crime and special prosecution section of the Division of Criminal Justice. “If the case is small and there’s a plea, or there’s no case, that might help. But usually the prosecutors don’t want the jury to see the benefit the cooperator gets.”

Incentive to cooperate

A cooperator’s incentive to aid investigators is leniency at sentencing, so once he is sentenced, prosecutors wouldn’t have that bargaining chip. And the more a cooperator accomplishes while helping the feds — such as supplying information that leads to indictments — the better the chances he gets a shorter prison sentence.

A judge will weigh how significant and useful the assistance was, the truthfulness and reliability of the information, the nature and extent of the assistance, any danger or risks the cooperator faced, and the timeliness of the assistance, according to sentencing guidelines.

Caddle faces life in prison, though in his plea agreement prosecutors wrote they would recommend 12½ to 25 years if Caddle satisfied all of the terms and conditions in the document.

More: Complete coverage, timeline for murder-for-hire case that has NJ political world abuzz

The judge making the determination, John Michael Vazquez, gave longer sentences than prosecutors suggested for the two hit men Caddle said he paid to kill Michael Galdieri of Jersey City. George Bratsenis received 16 years in prison, more than the recommended 12½ to 15 years, and Bomani Africa received 20 years, even though prosecutors proposed 15 to 18 years.

Bratsenis was the first person to confess to authorities the details of Galdieri's murder, and after being confronted with the information that Bratsenis gave up, Africa followed with his own confession, prosecutors and Vazquez said during their sentencing hearings.

Former prosecutors said Caddle has already received a good deal — home confinement instead of waiting for his sentencing date behind bars.

Caddle’s date could be pushed back again. But in a March conference call, Vazquez — who is resigning from his post on the federal bench in September — called it a “firm sentencing date” and scheduled Caddle’s interview with probation.

“We plan to be ready to proceed June 29,” said Matthew Reilly, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office. The office declined to comment on a list of questions from NorthJersey.com about Caddle's cooperation.

Lee Cortes, the executive assistant U.S. attorney, said during the March call, “At this point, [Caddle’s] cooperation with the government is really at a conclusion.”

'Mother Teresa doesn't commit crimes'

The extent of Caddle’s cooperation is unclear, but the timeline for any active cooperation in the field would have been short.

Caddle proffered — or offered up proof to the government — on Sept. 23, 2021, and signed his plea agreement on Nov. 4.

It was just four months after that initial proffer session that Caddle entered a guilty plea in the murder of Galdieri, who was his former friend and associate, and his attorney announced that Caddle was a cooperator in the public record. The label rendered him essentially radioactive, making it unlikely for people to confide their crimes to him.

Much of what Caddle did in the four months that he was working below the radar for the FBI remains a mystery. But a super PAC created by former state Sen. Ray Lesniak — for whom Caddle worked for years as a trusted political consultant — paid Caddle $2,500 on Dec. 15, a month before he pleaded guilty.

Lesniak told NorthJersey.com that in “no way, shape or form” did Caddle try to get him on a wire, or did Caddle seem to be working with the federal government. “I have not had any weird experiences,” Lesniak said.

Lesniak said the check was an initial retainer and that Caddle didn’t do any work on behalf of the group boosting the campaign of Bayonne Mayor Jimmy Davis. Lesniak shut down the group shortly after.

Caddle’s cooperation also could have involved recounting past criminal actions he witnessed or took part in. Keeping him on home confinement could have made it more convenient for federal agents to reach him for the typical frequent debriefs.

It could be prosecutors thinking, “We don't think he's a flight risk; it'll make it easier on us, if he did give us a box of documents, to just call him in here as opposed to reading them over from the jail,” said Arseneault. “On some levels, that makes sense. It still shocks me that the only cooperation that it appears he's provided is against Teixeira.”

But prosecutors don’t want to rely solely on the word of a cooperator. They would need corroborating evidence.

“He’d have enormous credibility problems given the nature of his plea, unless he had tapes,” Hayden said.

McKenna said that when he was a prosecutor, he would tell juries, “‘He's a bad guy, but Mother Teresa doesn't commit crimes, so she doesn't hang out with bad people. He commits crimes; he hangs out with bad people.’ Juries get that. They would be offended by a murder-for-hire guy if you were going against this guy for tax evasion.”

Robert Mintz, a former deputy chief of the Organized Crime Strike Force Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office, agreed.

“Typically prosecutors like to swim upstream when it comes to cooperators,” Mintz said. “In a case where the charges against the cooperating witness are serious, they will only consider cutting a deal if in exchange for that, they will get information that will lead to substantial evidence of other substantial crimes.”

It remains to be seen if Caddle’s work caught any big fish.

McKenna asked, “When’s that shoe going to drop — and how explosive is it going to be?”

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Will any NJ elites fall after murder plot leader's aid to feds?