Kickbacks, a corpse, a killing, and kinky sex

POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y. - When the town assessor's body was fished from the Hudson River in fall 1997, it was only the beginning.

"The citizens don't know what to expect every time they pick up the newspaper," says John Mylod, a longtime citizen of Poughkeepsie. "As they say commonly these days, you can't make it up. It's really as bizarre as it can be."

Some of the recent news in this comfortable corner of the New York City commuter belt:

The town personnel director, a mother of two, is shot to death leaving church choir practice.

A political boss is convicted of running a shakedown scheme.

The town water supervisor fires a bullet into his head as police come to his door.

The aforesaid official is then accused of orchestrating and videotaping a lesbian tryst in a town pump station.

One of the women in the alleged taped tryst is the personnel chief, with whom the water boss admits having an affair. The other woman accuses him of paying for and taping the sex, and of coercing her to kill the personnel director.

The arena for this skulduggery is the Town of Poughkeepsie, which hugs the better-known Hudson River city of the same name.

Details of the federal probe into the town's web of scandal have been seeping out ever since assessor Basil Raucci disappeared Oct. 4, 1997.

When Raucci, 55, disappeared, the FBI showed interest, but wouldn't say why. Only later was it revealed that federal officials had been investigating the town government.

Prosecutors describe systematic extortion: A paving company would be told it could get contracts for a $5,000 payoff; a contractor would pay $15,000 to clear up bureaucratic problems with the town. And so on.

Money reportedly went to the town Republican Party and corrupt officials. Raucci, court documents allege, was the money collector. Agents were keeping tabs on him through a businessman informer.

Raucci disappeared the day after an FBI agent confronted him in a hotel. Divers scoured the river for days. A passer-by found the body. His death was ruled a suicide.

More whiffs of something rotten came in 1998, when two town officials were convicted on corruption-related charges. But the degree of Raucci's alleged involvement would come to light only last year, among even more jarring revelations.

Probe pointed to party boss

By 1997, William Paroli was the chairman for both Dutchess County and his town of 41,000 for the Republican Party, which traditionally dominated both.

Paroli, 72, was arrested May 26. He was accused of controlling the shakedown scheme, as well as having town employees work on his property.

Paroli professed his innocence and spurned a deal with the feds.

He quit as a GOP boss, but held on to his $58,000-a-year job as county elections commissioner despite requests from Gov. George Pataki and others to step aside. While fighting the feds on one front, he waged an unsuccessful battle to undo an election result that unseated his son as county clerk.

Meanwhile, on the day Paroli was arrested, Fred Andros, head of the town's water department, resigned.

The next day he pleaded guilty in federal court to conspiracy, admitting extorting bribes from contractors. Prosecutors say Andros, like Raucci, worked with Paroli. It seemed the water chief might be a crucial witness against the party boss.

But the story was about to get a lot more lurid. Enter Dawn Silvernail.

Silvernail, a friend of Andros, supervised a highway rest-stop cleaning crew. She and Andros were intimate for a time, according to court documents summarizing her statements to prosecutors.

Last year, Silvernail claimed, Andros coerced her into killing the town personnel director, Susan Fassett, because he feared Fassett was "going to blow his deal with the Feds" - an apparent reference to his single plea-bargain charge in the corruption probe.

Silvernail said she reluctantly agreed to kill Fassett.

On the night of Oct. 28, according to her statement, Silvernail parked next to Fassett's Jeep Cherokee at a Methodist church, reclined her passenger seat, loaded her .45-caliber pistol and lay back to wait for Fassett to leave choir practice.

Fassett got into her car. Silvernail sat up and emptied her gun into Fassett's window, killing her, then slid over to the driver's seat and sped away, according to the police account of her confession.

Pump-station porno show

Court documents show Andros claimed he had nothing to do with Fassett's murder.

Silvernail also claimed the water chief paid her $350 to have lesbian sex with Fassett at a town pumping station last year, and that he videotaped the sex and joined in himself. There were several other encounters for pay, according to Silvernail's account in court papers.

Silvernail confessed and pleaded innocent to second-degree murder. Silvernail's lawyer, D. James O'Neil, has since said that her statement to police was "involuntary."

Andros denied to his interrogators that he had sex with Silvernail, but admitted to an affair with Fassett. He said Fassett had a lesbian relationship with Silvernail but didn't corroborate Silvernail's tale of a tape.

Police came to search Andros' house Dec. 29. As they entered, they heard a gunshot. Andros, who was upstairs, had fired a gun into his chin.

The bullet did not kill him. Andros was indicted on second-degree murder as he lay in an intensive-care unit.

Probe goes on

As Andros was led, shackled, into county court on Feb. 17, the Town of Poughkeepsie struggled to make sense of it all: Raucci, the assessor, drowned; Paroli, the political boss, indicted; Fassett, the personnel director, shot to death; now Andros, a civil servant who had worked for the town for decades, facing a murder charge.

Not to mention five people, including Andros, convicted in the federal corruption probe.

Paroli has not been linked to Fassett's murder. But in federal court in White Plains a day after Andros entered his plea, he sounded nothing like his old, defiant self.

Speaking softly, Paroli told a judge he did indeed conspire to shake down contractors.

In a plea bargain, Paroli pleaded guilty to a count of conspiracy to commit extortion. The deal includes a fine of $4,000 to $40,000; community service; up to $20,000 in restitution to the town and his resignation as county elections commissioner.

After Paroli's plea, U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White said the federal probe is continuing. The murder case remains unresolved, a grand jury is looking at the evidence, and the Town of Poughkeepsie is staying tuned.

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Who's who in town's scandals

Key figures in the sex and corruption scandals that have engulfed the Town of Pougkeepsie:

Fred Andros, 60: Head of the town water department who pleaded guilty in federal corruption probe. Accused of second-degree murder in death of Susan Fassett.

Susan Fassett, 48: Town personnel director shot to death as she left church choir practice.

William Paroli, 71: Local Republican boss accused of running an extortion scheme targeting developers.

Basil Raucci, 55: Town assessor, body found floating in the Hudson River; later implicated in extortion scheme.

Dawn Silvernail, 50: Highway rest-stop worker charged with second-degree murder in death of Fassett.