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Cuyahoga deputy deemed unfit to be officer at prior job
A Cuyahoga County sheriff’s deputy who shot at teenagers twice while assigned to the controversial downtown patrol unit was previously deemed unfit by a suburban police force, a Marshall Project - Cleveland, News 5 investigation has found.
During a nine-month stint with the Mentor Police Department in 2021, personnel records show Isen Vajusi lacked confidence, failed field training and had “difficulty in stressful situations.”
He also “hesitates because he is afraid of making a mistake” and once fell asleep on duty after a late-night phone call with his girlfriend, the records show. Supervisors determined that Vajusi’s performance was so poor that he needed to be terminated. He resigned instead.
Vajusi is on paid leave after shooting at a 19-year-old in May. He’s also accused of shooting and injuring a 15-year-old in October.
A’aishah Rogers, the mother of the teen injured in October, called it “alarming and disgusting” that Vajusi shot another teenager soon after shooting her son.
“These are people we entrust to police our streets,” she said. “Are they just hiring anybody?”
– Mark Puente
Dottore company ordered to repay couple over receiver fees
The court-appointed receiver at the center of the legal troubles with Cuyahoga County Domestic Relations Judge Leslie Ann Celebrezze was ordered to repay hundreds of thousands of dollars for unauthorized expenses and overbilling a Strongsville couple.
In a June 10 order, visiting Judge Debra Boros told receiver Mark Dottore that he could only bill Jason and Crystal Jardine about $205,000 for running their businesses as a court-appointed receiver during their divorce.
Celebrezze has admitted to steering lucrative cases to Dottore. She approved nearly $500,000 in fees for his company, Dottore Cos. LLC, between January 2017 and June 2023, The Marshall Project - Cleveland reported.
Dottore must repay the money within 90 days, the judge ruled. Dottore said he will appeal the ruling. Celebrezze did not respond to a request for comment.
Receivers are meant to be a neutral party assigned to handle marital property such as real estate, cash and businesses in contested cases.
The judge’s ruling also said the tens of thousands of dollars paid to a law firm that Dottore selected were not authorized in the receivership order and that neither the couple nor Dottore are responsible for the fees.
Celebrezze, Dottore and Dottore Cos. LLC are also the targets of an FBI and federal grand jury investigation. The judge also faces a yearlong suspension by the Ohio Supreme Court’s Disciplinary Counsel. Celebrezze has admitted in court papers to being in love with Dottore.
Celebrezze’s troubles started after The Marshall Project - Cleveland in 2023 investigated the ties between her and Dottore, a lifelong friend.
When state judges appoint receivers, no oversight agency exists to monitor their work. In Cuyahoga County, the billing invoices are not listed on the court’s online docket. People must spend hours — as The Marshall Project - Cleveland did — to compile the totals.
Boros’ order is filled with phrases like “not a reasonable expense” and "outside the authority of the receivership order.”
For one $31,000 expense, Boros found that four individuals were being paid to do the same work and so the fees were unreasonable.
– Mark Puente
‘Like repeatedly having a door closed in my face’
A pair of reports from the Fair Housing Center detail the stubborn consequences of criminal convictions for apartment-seekers in Cuyahoga County.
The nonprofit advocacy group surveyed more than 100 Greater Cleveland renters in one report — most identifying as Black, and employed or job-seeking — and 60 landlords or property managers in the other, collectively in control of more than 6,000 rental units.
In a forthcoming third study, Senior Research Associate Austin Cummings tested for bias by using avatars of various genders and races, and some with criminal backgrounds, to apply online for an apartment. (Spoiler alert: Race matters, underscoring the double whammy for people of color with criminal records.)
The studies funded by the federal government track decades of research on the post-conviction challenges of access to housing, which is required as a condition of parole and integral to successful reentry.
“Housing is public safety in a lot of respects,” Cummings told The Marshall Project - Cleveland. “It provides stability for individuals. What the report also illustrates is that for returning citizens and justice-impacted families, it's a really important element to finding economic stability.”
The research surfaces hidden barriers like costly application fees, local ordinances prohibiting group homes, and landlords who expressly reject qualified applicants, charge steeper security deposits, rely on artificial intelligence to screen applications and ban renters with criminal backgrounds, which might be illegal under federal law.
Survey respondents who were denied apartments cited criminal convictions more often than their ability to pay.
Landlords said they most frequently review income and prior evictions, but they check criminal backgrounds as often as credit scores and more often than rental histories. They said sex-related offenses and domestic violence are the most disqualifying criminal convictions. Convictions for selling drugs are three times as disqualifying as drug use or possession.
Two-thirds of landlords said they lack written policies for screening applicants. Most ignore federal antidiscrimination guidelines about the use of criminal background checks. And a few admitted to flat-out denying anyone with a criminal conviction.
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, under Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, issued guidance in 2016 and 2022 highlighting how the disproportionate incarceration of Black people perpetuates negative outcomes when later seeking affordable housing.
While the federal government does not recognize people with prior convictions as a protected class, HUD in the 2022 guidance determined that “using criminal history to screen, deny lease renewal, evict, or otherwise exclude individuals from housing may be illegal under the Fair Housing Act.” The federal agency said landlords “frequently employ policies or practices that exclude individuals with criminal involvement from housing, which should raise red flags for investigators.”
Advocacy groups recommend that renters with criminal backgrounds understand their rights while urging leaders to pass model antidiscrimination laws like the Fair Chance at Housing Act.
– Doug Livingston
Around the 216
- Over 170,000 Ohioans have had their driver’s license suspensions and registration blocks lifted as a result of a new state law meant to help people legally drive again. Signal Cleveland
- The cost of the new Cuyahoga County jail, slated to open in Garfield Heights in 2029, stands at nearly $1 billion, according to the county’s consultant. Fencing is being erected and foundation work is scheduled to begin by year’s end. Cleveland.com
- The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled in favor of an Akron-area woman who said she was discriminated against and denied a promotion because she is straight and white. Cleveland.com
