Wednesday, February 11, 2015

Whole lotta DOB inspectors busted for bribery


From the Daily News:

Nearly 50 city building inspectors, construction contractors and two alleged mob associates surrendered to authorities early Tuesday as part of a massive pay-to-play scheme where builders are accused of paying city employees to fast-track their projects.

A solemn stream of suspects, a mix of men and women, were led out of the 1st Precinct stationhouse in Tribeca early Tuesday in handcuffs and loaded into four vans as dawn broke across the city and a light snow fell.

The suspects said nothing as they were paraded past reporters. Most lowered their heads and tried to cover their faces with their coats as they were taken to court, where bribery charges are expected to be filed against them Tuesday afternoon.

The arrests come as construction in the city has dramatically increased in recent years.The arrests come as construction in the city has dramatically increased in recent years.

Some of the suspected schemers tried to hide their faces while being escorted by police. The arrests come as construction in the city has dramatically increased in recent years. The scheme had been playing out for years, officials said. E

About a dozen of the suspects are city building inspectors, and the rest are private and contractors scooped up in yearlong probe led by the Department of Investigation and the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office Rackets Division, a police source told the Daily News.

Two suspects have mob links, the source said.

38 comments:

Anonymous said...

And this is why Queens looks like crap. Lock them all up for life!

ron s said...

I'm shocked! Shocked!

Anonymous said...

There was more than just developers and contractors, landlords and other bottom feeders used HPD inspectors to try and force older tenants to get out of their apartments so that the landlord could charge more to the next victim.

http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20150210/bushwick/city-inspectors-accepted-450k-bribes-erase-code-violations-da-says

Anonymous said...

Wow finally someone woke up and realized that this was going on. This is nothing new and it'll just keep going on. It's not going to stop.

Anonymous said...

These guys are public sector entrepreneurs! They didn't leave money on the table.
____

George Washinton Plunkitt became wealthy by practicing what he called "honest graft" in politics. He was a cynically honest practitioner of what today is generally known as "machine politics," patronage-based and frank in its exercise of power for personal gain. In one of his speeches, quoted in Plunkitt of Tammany Hall, he describes the difference between dishonest and honest graft: for dishonest graft one worked solely for one's own interests, while for honest graft one pursued the interests of one's party, one's state, and one's personal interests all together.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Plunkitt

Anonymous said...

It's about time. When are you coming to Queens to clean up.

Anonymous said...

I live in North Flushing and have been watching two houses under construction completely illegally. One without a permit and one with a stop work order. Neighbors have left multiple complaints on 311 over the past few months.
NOTHING HAS HAPPENED. The complaints remain active.
The contractors know they're not going to get caught.

SHAME ON DOB.

What elected official is going to have the guts to clean this mess up????????

Anonymous said...

If the governor is a crooks it is normal for the employees to become crooks.

JQ said...

it's hard to resist reappropriating claude rains famous line from casablanca.

even though this is good news,in the 2 years when they were trying to haul these lowlifes a lot of vile development was able to rise and infect neighborhoods.And a lot of people had to suffer and worry about the state of their residences and livelihood.

our bleeding heart mayor has taken a page from the architect of honest graft.It may be why these lowlifes thought they had such impunity.

all these transients,tourists,hipsters and celebrities who have took over these homes and apartments will be sleeping a little harder now,for their presence has been made possible by criminals.

this house of cards is gonna crash and burn like an avalon building.

Jerry Rotondi said...

For the moment, this presents a heart warming scene ,where crooks are the losers and justice prevails. In a few more years there will be a repeat of the same scenario. About 8 years ago there was a suggestion made to some chief DOB officials that the only way to put an end to this kind of corruption was to conduct surprise polygraph tests of DOB building inspectors. Was that advice headed? Are you listening Mr. Mayor? That sounds like a good idea to me that should be implemented. DOB inspectors are the weakest link in the chain of corruption. The buck could stop there employing the use of polygraphs. In the security industry, this is standard operational procedure to guarantee loyalty and honest dealings.

Anonymous said...

Certain elected officials are part of the problem. Take Paul Vallone, for instance. He lives in Northeast Flushing and looks the other way as often as he can. The Vallone law firm represents developers...perhaps some of those who are connected to this latest scandal. Maybe DOI and the FBI needs to scope a few politicians who might be getting launderd mob money fed to them as campaign contributions, etc.

Anonymous said...

Queens has the "honor" of having a long history of borough presidents that were crooked or narrowly escaped conviction themselves. What kind of vigilance can we expect from Melinda Katz who supports and is supported by the building industry? If the people of Queens took the time to pull their heads out of their asses and vote wisely, things might improve in the next millennium. In the meantime, dumb acts as dumb is. Good night and good luck.

Anonymous said...

Wasn't it, in about 1991, that 9 building inspectors from Queens were pulled in by this same DOI? The result being that we did not have enough building inspectors to adequately police Queens. What a choice...you either have enough crooked inspectors or you have only a skeleton crew of honest ones. We wind up gettting screwed from either end.

Middle Villager said...

"Violated the public trust", "sold out their integrety"...if that is all it takes to get arrested why didn't they pick up all the Queens politicians?

Anonymous said...

Deblasio should fire the DOB Commissioner and appoint a former federal prosecutor. Or Deblasio should resign.

Broadway Baby said...

Call Vallone's office when 311 doesn't respond and get a double kick in the behind! He will milk the district dry then move away just like he did in Astoria.

Anonymous said...

DOB....department of bribery!

Anonymous said...

Start following the money trail that links politicians to this daisy chain. DOI....please complete your job.

Anonymous said...

No one from CB7?

Anonymous said...

We have not heard any screams of outrage from community boards to safeguard us from corruption in the building industry.

Anonymous said...

People are powerless. The mob has more money than God. They can buy contractors by the dozen and fly to Paris just to have lunch. The only time the people can empower themselves is at the polls. But when voters put a developers lobbyist like Paul Vallone into office, there isn't much hope. Who gets represented here...constituents...or developers who have Vallone on retainer? Wise up you dopes!

Anonymous said...

What has Councilman Peter Koo done to purge his district of corruption...whether it is contractors or crooked DOB inspectors and officials? Council member Julia Harrison did plenty, but her call for investigations into the likes of Tommy Huang caused her to be branded, at the behest of the Staviskys,, Mc Laughlins, as "anti Asian". I guess she was doing her job too well.

Anonymous said...

Now is the time for a little financial forensics to be applied. Everyone is scurrying to move their crooked money...local officials....politicians...etc. Just follow the money trail. Moving money is easier to spot. When a pol is nabbed, I recommend bringing back the town dunking stool. Then hang the crook on a gibbet until he rots. No club fed for a betrayer of the public trust.

Cheers said...

Just a momentary elation...next year it will be business as usual. Time to get drunk and fugghettabout it!

Anonymous said...

Didn't some figure head at CB 7 abruptly resign recently?
Hmmm

Anonymous said...

An honest question: how real is the mafia in queens these days?

Anonymous said...

I would be more excited but for the fact that most of these people will walk with no fine, no jail time, no stigma for being a crook.

All that after a multi-million dollar investigation we will see: NOTHING AT ALL!!!!!!

NYC at its best would put Tammany to shame.

Anonymous said...

Surprise Surprise, this has been going on for years.
What difference does it make?

Anonymous said...

Bar owner by the name of Dwyer was mentioned. Was that Bourbon Street on Bell Blvd. that was mentioned?

Gary W said...

Never mind Federal oversight of the NYPD, how about Federal oversight of the DOB!!

Anonymous said...

Donald O'Connor was Asst. Chief at the Queens DOB and he was relevant with regard to the Huang projects in Bayside and Queens Blvd.

ISSAM ABOURAFEH -- engineer for the Huangs.

He was involved with the Queens Blvd. Huang Project where the young fellow was KILLED.

This phase of the investigations -- should be the tip of the iceberg. There should be many more phases coming.

Anonymous said...

BOTTOMLINE:

THE CITY OF NY and the DOB need to be held accountable for the sins of their employees. The lack of oversight by the DOB is inexcusable.

We need to file a "Special Negligence" law suit against the City of New York and the NYC DOB.

Therefore, we need to find a lawyer willing to handle the matter. It is a big road to hoe -- but we believe it can and should be done.

There are a number of very well informed savvy individuals that have been harmed by various construction sites that would make strong plaintiffs in such a case.

Anonymous said...

What about a well known billionaire landlord who bribes DOB, HPD, Sanitation, Housing Court Judges, etc, etc. Been doing it for over fifty years?

Anonymous said...

For the past 13 years, the TNP trucking company has been using a residential lot as their main trucking lot and everyone knew about it. Todays market price for each tractor trailer parking spot is 700 minimum a month So the company saved over a million dollars throughout this time. Funny thing is, they are quietly closing the case without any penalty to the owner so I wonder who benefited from that money

Anonymous said...

Did I miss something at CB7? Did Kelty resign? Been preoccupied lately.

Anonymous said...

This is one case where I would insist on Muslim law for thieves. Cut off their hands!

Anonymous said...

See Queenscrap Article:

http://queenscrap.blogspot.com/2009/05/dob-tours-queens-construction-site.html

O'Connor was seen at Huang's Development site on 223rd Street in Bayside after the collapse of the neighbor's retaining wall. So was Inspector Mascussi who was arrested in the 2012 roundup.

He must have made visits to Huang's Queens Blvd. site at some time.

Maybe O'Connor will be dropping a dine on some "notorious" developers. We can hope.



Anonymous said...

So O'Connor got promoted from Asst. Chief Inspector in Queens to Manhattan Chief of Development.

Bigger income!

Lives were ruined obviously by all this wrongdoing. The City and the DOB & HPD should be held accountable.

It is called "Special Negligence Lawsuit" Municipalities can be sued for the wrongdoing of their employees.