According to administration sources, secretary of Governor David Paterson, Charles O’Byrne, has resigned on Friday, after a week of increasing criticism over his failure to pay income taxes for 2001-05 – an amount of $300,000 - on time, and not offering a tangible reason for the lapse.

A source told Newsday that O’Byrne has had to leave his $178,500 job primarily “because of the taxes.” O’Byrne blamed his tax delinquency on clinical depression, for which he has undergone treatment three times.

O’Byrne, a former Jesuit priest, has ties to the Kennedy family. The top aide to Paterson officiated at the wedding of John F. Kennedy Jr., and counseled the Kennedy family after he died in a plane crash. He was responsible for mapping out policy and politics as Paterson rose from the near powerless Democratic minority in the Senate to lieutenant governor and then governor.  

Lawyers for O’Byrne, seeking to end the controversy by releasing tax data, blamed the delay on “non-filers’ syndrome” related to his depression, which intensified the criticism. Though one of the tax attorneys said it was a common mental health problem for professionals, mental health and IRS officials said they had never heard of it!

Meanwhile, Paterson, who has repeatedly defended O’Byrne since the income-tax flap began a week back, said: “What I know is that Charles O’Byrne has been an outstanding secretary to the governor. He has been conscientious in terms of discharging his duties in the role.”

Most of Paterson administration officials refused to comply with requests for comments. However, one official close to the decision said O’Byrne’s resignation was accepted with regret by Paterson.