Attorney tells officials not to discuss lawsuit Resident berates council members for talking about suit BY PATRICIA A. MILLER Staff Writer Your lips should be sealed.That's the advice assistant Brick Township Attorney Jean Cipriani gave anyone named in Mayor Daniel J. Kelly's lawsuit to determine if appointments made by Township Clerk Virginia Lampman were valid during her brief time as acting mayor. "I would advise anybody to confer with their own attorneys, which I am not for the purpose of this litigation, before making any comment," she said at the Feb. 13 council meeting. Cipriani offered her opinion after resident Richard Gross attempted to read a letter in which he questioned why six members of the council "verbally attacked" Kelly at the Feb. 6 caucus meeting over what "appears to be improper appointments." "I was very, very, very upset over what went on," Gross told the council. "When I got home, I wrote the following letter. Should not any discussion be held until after the court rules? Why did George Gilmore and Virginia Lampman attack the mayor?" Council President Stephen C. Acropolis said he disagreed with Gross' characterization of what happened at the meeting. "If you want to make a comment, write a letter to the editor," he said. "But to get up and say that this council attacked anyone, I don't think that's the case." Gilmore never asked Kelly to rescind his court action, said Councilman Anthony Matthews. Matthews said he was disappointed that Kelly had chosen "confrontation over cooperation." Cipriani said that unlike the caucus meeting, there was no action to be taken that night. "In this room there are many, many people who are plaintiffs or defendants in this matter," she said. "Mr. Kelly's attorney is not here. The council's attorney is not here. The employees' attorney is not here." She said she could not advise anyone as township attorney on the matter because Township Attorney George R. Gilmore was named in the suit. "This is active litigation," she said. "It is pending litigation." Gross started to read his letter again. "You have about two minutes," Acropolis said. The major issues in Kelly's suit are the Lampman's appointment of the Toms River firm of Gilmore and Monahan to replace Starkey, Kelly, Bauer and Kenneally as township attorney, her removal of former Democratic Councilwoman Kimberley Casten as municipal prosecutor and her removal of Planning Board member Kevin Aiello to replace him with Dominick Rappoccio. The controversy stems from longtime Mayor Joseph S. Scarpelli's sudden resignation on Dec. 8 and his subsequent guilty plea in federal court in January to accepting bribes from an unnamed developer. Scarpelli appointed Lampman to serve as acting mayor. She made the appointments at the Jan. 1 organization meeting. Kelly's suit contends that Lampman served only two days as acting mayor. Any rights she had as acting mayor ended when Scarpelli's resignation became effective on Dec. 8, according to the suit. "If there is ever a reason for Brick to have an ethics committee, this incident last week proved it," Gross continued as he read his letter. "For the council to allow the case to be heard and the public commenting when only one side of the issue was heard is 100 percent wrong." "You're getting close to the end of five minutes," Acropolis said. Rappoccio, who is named in the suit, told council members they were "going in the right direction." with the new ethics committee. "You've got a good start," he said. "It's not who you have on it. It's the people on that board who are ethically strong."