ALLENTOWN, Pa. \u2014 Lehigh County Commissioner Zach Cole-Borghi watched Tuesday as the county district attorney\u2019s office and an informant laid out a small part of the many drug-related charges against him.<\/p>\n
The confidential informant, referred to as \u201cRandy\u201d throughout Tuesday’s preliminary hearing in county court, testified he delivered a pound of marijuana to Cole-Borghi in May 2024.<\/p>\n
Randy said he picked up a vacuum-sealed package at a \u201cstash house\u201d on Washington Street in Allentown before meeting Cole-Borghi outside a home on Sixth Avenue in Bethlehem.<\/p>\n
During that transaction, Cole-Borghi, 35, said he works \u201cin politics\u201d and revealed his role as a county commissioner, according to the informant.<\/p>\n
Randy \u2014 who already was working as an informant for the Lehigh County Drug Task Force \u2014 said he called detectives that night.<\/p>\n
Lehigh County District Attorney Gavin Holihan announced more than 100 additional criminal charges Wednesday against County Commissioner Zachary Cole-Borghi.<\/p>\n
That call brought Cole-Borghi into the task force\u2019s long-running investigation into the Death Before Dirt drug ring, South Whitehall Township Detective Chadbourne Ellis testified Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Authorities bought or seized about 3,000 pounds of marijuana and related products through that investigation, which started in 2019, according to Ellis.<\/p>\n
Senior Judge Jackie Taschner on Tuesday ordered Cole-Borghi to face county court action on four charges. He\u2019s scheduled to be arraigned May 14 on those counts.<\/p>\n
Preliminary hearings for the other 104 charges against him are set for April 8.<\/p>\n
Objections abound<\/p>\n
Gary Asteak, Cole-Borghi\u2019s attorney, on Tuesday repeatedly objected throughout the hearing, often urging Judge Taschner to not allow hearsay testimony.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can call Pee Wee Herman or you can call her Shania Twain. I don\u2019t care.”<\/p>\n
Senior Judge Jackie Taschner after approving a request for anonymity<\/p>\n
But Asteak vehemently opposed using a nickname for the informant.<\/p>\n
Asteak said anonymity \u201cdepriv[es] him\u201d and \u201cemasculates\u201d his ability to cross-examine the informant, who he said \u201cposes a risk to the public.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Taschner upheld Assistant District Attorney Craig Scheetz\u2019s request to not publicly identify the informant.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can call Pee-Wee Herman or you can call her Shania Twain. I don\u2019t care,\u201d Taschner told attorneys.<\/p>\n
Scheetz suggested calling the informant \u201cJohn,\u201d but Asteak asked for a less-biblical pseudonym in the week leading up to Easter.<\/p>\n
Interstate ring<\/p>\n
Cole-Borghi was arrested Aug. 28 at Bethlehem City Hall, where he worked as the open records officer.<\/p>\n
The next day, Lehigh County District Attorney Gavin Holihan announced the commissioner was among 22 people arrested after a three-year grand jury investigation into Death Before Dirt, which allegedly spanned four states \u2014 Pennsylvania, New York, Illinois and Wisconsin.<\/p>\n
Police destroyed two clandestine drug labs and seized $100,000 in cash; cryptocurrency; at least 25 firearms, including ghost guns and semi-automatic rifles; 2,000 pounds of marijuana; THC liquid; cocaine; and MDMA pills, also known as “molly,” he said.<\/p>\n
Several others charged in connection with the drug ring also appeared Tuesday morning in Lehigh County Court, including Joseph Rosario \u2014 who allegedly served as \u201cregional manager\u201d for Dirt Before Death in Allentown \u2014 and Anthony Zuzio.<\/p>\n
The ring also manufactured knockoff luxury clothing items, authorities allege.<\/p>\n
Cole-Borghi was arrested again last week in Bethlehem on more than 100 new charges, some that allege he used his cell phone and City Hall to conduct drug transactions.<\/p>\n
Lengthy criminal complaints contained more than 150 pages of transcripts of messages allegedly sent between Cole-Borghi and cooperating sources for the prosecution. Those messages show negotiations on the price of drugs, including marijuana\/THC products and cocaine, as well as arranging for delivery and purchase.<\/p>\n
And prosecutors during Tuesday\u2019s hearing added two new conspiracy charges against the commissioner, who appeared in court in handcuffs and a blue county-issued T-shirt and pants.<\/p>\n
Cole-Borghi remains in custody in lieu of $500,000 cash bail.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALLENTOWN, Pa. \u2014 Lehigh County Commissioner Zach Cole-Borghi watched Tuesday as the county district attorney\u2019s office and an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3228,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154,69984,49601,1222],"class_list":["post-154166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-death-before-dirt","tag-lehigh-county-court","tag-zach-cole-borghi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154166\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}