Search warrant served in City of Pittsburgh P-card investigation

PITTSBURGH — Channel 11 has confirmed through multiple sources that the City of Pittsburgh was served a search warrant Tuesday by the Allegheny County District Attorney’s office in relation to the city’s use of P-cards.

This issue has been in the spotlight since May and has been the subject of an internal investigation by the Office of Municipal Investigations, as well as long discussions with City Council and the Controller’s office.

As Channel 11 has reported, the city’s payments to a contractor working for the Department of Parks & Recreation were first uncovered after that contractor was charged with ethnic intimidation.

>> City of Pittsburgh accused of improperly paying former city employee turned contractor

Pittsburgh’s Controller, Rachael Heisler, then raised questions about contractor Mario Ashkar’s previous employment with the city, his firing, his controversial rehiring, and how he was being paid.

In May, Deputy Mayor Jake Pawlak admitted the city’s payments through a P-card to Ashkar’s PayPal account, Princess Jafar, were a violation of policy.

Controller Heisler said there were no time sheets or records detailing the work Ashkar performed, and she questioned how he was referred to Parks & Rec after being fired from Public Safety.

The Mayor’s office referred the case to OMI and did not provide the records Heisler requested.

Channel 11 confirmed through sources Tuesday the search warrant was delivered to the City Solicitor’s office.

When reached on the phone for comment, Olga George, the press secretary for Mayor Ed Gainey, said she could neither confirm nor deny the receipt of a search warrant.

George said Channel 11′s questions would be answered Wednesday during a news conference scheduled for Mr. Pawlak and the city’s solicitor, Krysia Kubiak.

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