Investigator should have never gotten the job

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Buffalo City Court building. Photo by Garrett Looker.

A man who two years ago admitted to tampering with evidence and lying about it in court was, until last week, employed as a state human rights investigator in Buffalo.

As of Friday morning, he was no longer employed by the Division of Human Rights, Investigative Post has learned.

The individual, Eliezer Rosario II, was hired last July to investigate claims of discrimination in the agency’s local office. But, when Investigative Post inquired about his employment last week, a spokesperson for the agency said Rosario was “no longer an employee of the Division.”

From July 8 through Thursday, Rosario, 45, worked as a Human Rights Specialist, an entry-level position with the division that starts at $68,500 annually. Employees in that role receive claims of discrimination and perform the initial investigatory steps, including taking statements and gathering evidence. 

If a case has merit, a specialist will draft a decision memo for an agency director to review. The division could then prosecute the case at a public hearing. The majority of the division’s cases are related to claims of employment discrimination.

A state government source familiar with the case said division leadership only learned of Rosario’s past after Investigative Post inquired. His separation from the agency followed shortly after. An attorney representing Rosario said he resigned.

“My understanding is he was a probationary employee there and that he turned in a resignation and resigned, and was not fired,” attorney Nelson Torre told Investigative Post.

The concern regarding Rosario arose from his March 2023 guilty plea to two misdemeanor charges, one for tampering with evidence while working as a state parole officer and the other for lying about doing so. Rosario resigned from his position as part of the plea agreement, The Buffalo News reported at the time.

The charges, originally felonies, stemmed from a November 2020 incident in which Rosario was searching an East Side boarding house where parolee Anthony Davis was staying. With Buffalo police officers recording the search via body-worn cameras, Rosario found a bullet and an identification card for Davis and placed the items next to each other so he could take a photograph of them. 

“How ’bout that … ID with the bullet,” Rosario said, according to video of the incident published by The News.

Rosario later signed a deposition stating that the items were found together, according to charging documents.

A spokesperson for the Division of Human Rights declined to answer questions about Rosario’s employment. The spokesperson also declined to make Acting Commissioner Denise Miranda or one of her deputies available for an interview. However, in a statement, they said all work by investigators like Rosario “is later reviewed and checked by multiple supervisors.” 

Rosario could not be reached for an interview, though Torre — who is defending him in a lawsuit filed by Davis — spoke briefly to Investigative Post. He suggested someone at the Division of Human Rights had a “vendetta” against Rosario.

Justin Ginter, Rosario’s defense attorney in the original case, said he had “no concerns” that he could have performed his investigatory duties well.

“I don’t have any concerns personally that he wouldn’t do his job and everything that would need to be done as part of the investigation,” Ginter, of the firm Lipsitz Green Scime & Cambria, said.

Rosario worked as a state parole officer from 2018 until his resignation in 2023. Prior to that, he worked as a parole officer for Erie County.

Turmoil leads to Rosario’s hiring

The state government source — who was not authorized to speak publicly about Rosario’s case — said Rosario’s hiring came at a time of internal turmoil at the Division of Human Rights.

Last March, Gov. Kathy Hochul fired the agency’s commissioner, Maria Imperial. The Albany Times Union reported at the time that the move was related to an impending audit from the state comptroller’s office. 

Ultimately released in October, the audit found the division lost, miscategorized or failed to process a majority of the housing discrimination complaints it received. For the complaints that were investigated, auditors found the division took months, sometimes years, to begin investigating when they have 30 days to do so by law.

Hochul replaced Imperial with Denise Miranda, who was previously in charge of the state Justice Center for the Protection of People With Special Needs. As part of the transition, Miranda reassigned the division’s human resources manager and outsourced that work to her old agency, according to records obtained by Investigative Post.

“They got rid of pretty much everyone, including the HR department,” the source told Investigative Post.

The Justice Center performed all HR functions for the division from April through October, including hiring. Records show Rosario was hired July 8. 

A Justice Center spokesperson refused to answer questions about Rosario’s hiring, including whether a background check was performed or if the hiring manager was made aware of Rosario’s guilty plea.

Matt Janiszewski, a spokesperson for Hochul, declined to comment on Rosario’s hiring and resignation but said the administration “always follows the legal requirements for background checks and vetting, and holds our employees to high ethical and professional standards.”

The agency now has an internal human resources manager, the source said, though recent job postings for the division list the Justice Center as the point of contact.

Rosario also employed at UB

The Division of Human Rights was not Rosario’s first state government gig following his resignation as a parole officer. For about a year, from August 2023 through July 2024, he worked at the University of Buffalo, a spokesperson confirmed.

At UB, Rosario worked as an instructional support associate, a role akin to a teaching assistant. The position pays $55,000 annually. Rosario earned $48,400 during his time with the university according to spokesperson John Della Contrada.

Della Contrada said the university was not made aware of Rosario’s guilty plea or conviction prior to his hiring. He declined to comment further on his employment.

J. Dale Shoemaker