Eric Adams's buddies indicted for campaign finance fraud

 

 AMNY

Mayor Eric Adams on Monday insisted he’s “very clear” about telling donors to “follow the rules” when giving to his campaigns for public office, after six contributors to his 2021 bid for mayor were indicted Friday for allegedly orchestrating a straw-donor scheme to funnel city matching funds above the legal limit to his campaign.

“I am very clear, the system that I put in place with my compliance attorney, with my team, we must stand up to scrutiny,” Adams said. “And whoever comes to me, all the time, when you look at the number of New Yorkers that have donated to our campaign, I’m very clear, you must follow the rules. And that hasn’t changed. My conversation is consistent. I can sleep well at night because I know that I’m consistent in what I say to people.”

Adams made the remarks in response to a question about fundraising discussion he may or may not have had with Dwayne Montgomery, one of the alleged ring-leaders of the scheme who he knew from when they served on the NYPD together, during an unrelated press conference on July 10. 

Montgomery was named in the indictment — brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office — along with Shamsuddin Riza, Millicent Redick, Ronald Peek, Yahya Mushtan and Shahid Mushta. Also named in the indictment was one entity: EcoSafety Consultants Inc — a site safety management company owned by Yahya Mushtan and Shahid Mushta. 

Prosecutors hit the six individuals with charges including conspiracy, attempted grand larceny, offering a false instrument for filing and attempted offering of a false instrument for filing. Montgomery, Riza, Redick and Shahid Mushtaq  pleaded not guilty at an arraignment in Manhattan Supreme Court Friday morning, while the other two will be arraigned at a later date.

Adams himself wasn’t named in the indictment and none of the six defendants worked for his campaign, according to Bragg’s office. 

The defendants were alleged to have recruited and bundled contributions from straw donors — those who are reimbursed for donating to political campaigns in their own names to skirt legal contribution limits — to illegally extract more money out of the city’s matching funds program for Adams’ campaign.

The alleged conspirators’ goal was to boost Adams’ into the mayoralty and score lucrative city contracts for businesses they operate.

During the Monday press conference, the mayor acknowledged he knew Montgomery from their time serving as Black ranking members of the NYPD, but made clear his former colleague had not visited him in City Hall since he took office last year.

Adams did say he would see Montgomery at events, as he used to command the NYPD’s 28th Precinct in Harlem and is well known in the community there.

Greedy developer steals investor funding and exploits government exemptions for luxury towers to build his own luxury houses

NY Post

Their money was meant to help create jobs — instead it appears to have gone towards buying one man three mansions.

So claims the Securities and Exchange Commission in a case filed against Queens developer Richard Xia.

According to documents the government agency filed in federal court in the Eastern District of New York earlier this month, Xia allegedly defrauded a group of investors by using their money not for the development of two Queens real estate projects, but the purchase of three Long Island manors, Crain’s reported. 

Xia used assets from his investors — who were part of the federal EB-5 visa program, which provides investors in job-creating US real estate projects with green cards — as collateral to get over $30 million in loans, which went significantly towards the acquisition of two estates in Great Neck and one in Sands Point. Meanwhile, one of the Queens projects the investors believed they were funding — a 498-room luxury hotel, convention center, retail space and performing arts center called Eastern Emerald — remains undeveloped. 

The tony Long Island properties, on the other hand, are very much constructed and Xia, along with his wife, is currently living in one: a 13,000-square-foot Kings Point Road home boasting seven bedrooms, seven fireplaces and 13 bathrooms spread across 3 acres with views of the Manhattan skyline and Long Island Sound.

In a deposition defending his purchase of the property (which is under his wife’s name), Xia claimed it was a business transaction because he uses it as an office, Crain’s reported.

Lt. Governor Brian Benjamin arrested for campaign fraud

 

 

 

NBC News 

New York Lt. Gov. Brian Benjamin has surrendered to authorities to face campaign finance fraud-related charges in connection with a past campaign, two people familiar with the matter said Tuesday.

Benjamin is expected to appear in Manhattan federal court later Tuesday. Gov. Kathy Hochul's office couldn't immediately be reached for comment on the arrest, nor could a representative for Benjamin.

His arrest comes after reports that Manhattan federal prosecutors and the FBI were investigating whether Benjamin knowingly engaged in a campaign finance fraud scheme. Subpoenas were issued in connection with the investigation, two sources familiar with the subpoenas said at the time.

The investigators also looked into whether Benjamin helped dole out state money to contributors and/or their projects as part of the alleged fraud.

A spokesman for the U.S. attorney and a spokesman for the FBI both previously declined WNBC requests for comment regarding the investigation into Benjamin.  

A spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins also did not return requests for comment. 

Benjamin was appointed lieutenant governor by Gov. Kathy Hochul in 2021, shortly after losing a primary bid for New York City comptroller. He previously served as the New York State Senator for District 30, which is made up of Harlem, East Harlem (El Barrio), the Upper West Side, Washington Heights, Hamilton Heights and Morningside Heights.

 Wonder who Kathy Clown is going to pick next and if she will bother to vet that person thoroughly.

Mayor Adams benefited from his chief of staff's LLC dirty money

 

 THE CITY

In 2018, seven employees of two medical companies in New Jersey began donating thousands of dollars to the campaign treasury of then-Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams.

They worked for two companies — Ridgewood Diagnostic Lab and Interstate Multi-Specialty Group, both in Hackensack, and owned by Dr. Alexandr Zaitsev, who was among the Adams donors.

They each gave what was then the maximum amount, $5,100, or close to it, to the campaign account for Adams between April 19 and Nov. 29, 2018, Campaign Finance Board records show.

At the time, Adams had not officially declared he was running for mayor.

Ridgewood, Zaitsev and two other of the Adams donors are now defendants in a lawsuit filed by GEICO in September 2020, with the insurance company alleging they and other medical groups billed GEICO for more than $4.5 million in fraudulent claims.

The lawsuit filed in Brooklyn Federal Court and first reported by Bloomberg News, also lays out the two medical companies’ connection to Adams chief of staff Frank Carone, who was a part owner of two limited liability corporations that helped finance their launch.

The employees donated $40,600 to the campaign by the end of 2018.

They were all later refunded more than half of the money after the Campaign Finance Board made changes to the maximum amount for donations when a candidate takes part in a matching-funds program.

GEICO’s lawsuit alleges that Carone, along with his former law partners, father and son Howard and Jordan Fensterman of the firm Abrams Fensterman LLP, used limited-liability companies to advance money to Zaitsev and other medical companies as they waited for insurance claims to process.

After fronting the money, the LLCs would be paid back with interest when GEICO paid the no-fault claims, the company alleged in its suit.

The companies that fronted the cash to the medical groups, Financial Vision Group LLC and others with similar names, are owned by Zaitsev and Daniel Kandhorov, according to court documents.

Kandhorov, who lives in Queens, could not be reached for comment.

During his mayoral campaign, Adams opted to take part in the new 8-to-1 matching-funds program — which allows $2,000 per person, with city-funded matching dollars for New York City-based donors.

A spokesperson for Adams, Max Young, said that Carone had nothing to do with the contributions from the mostly Jersey-based donors.

“Mr. Carone was a passive investor in these LLCs, didn’t solicit these donations, never met the donors in question, and had no knowledge that they donated, then or now,” said Young in a statement.

 

St. Saviour's developer bankrupt, likely headed to prison

From The Real Deal:

It’s collection time for accused fraudster Tomer Dafna.

More than two years after the investor and developer was indicted for participating in a mortgage fraud scheme, the industry players Dafna borrowed money from are coming out of the woodwork to recover funds they claim they’re owed.

Two of Dafna’s creditors filed a petition for his involuntary Chapter 7 bankruptcy last week, citing $1.3 million in claims, court records show. But that number could balloon to more than $20 million if the parties behind numerous lawsuits and outstanding judgments against Dafna become creditors.

The case against Dafna and his co-defendants is ongoing. Each man faces a $1 million fine and up to 30 years in prison if convicted.

In the meantime, private lenders are coming after Dafna to recoup funds they say he never repaid.

For those who don't recognize the name, Tomer Dafna was a co-owner of the St. Saviour's property in Maspeth. Karma is not always instant but it is most certainly a bitch, ain't it?

Manufacturing consent of "cancel rent"

 New York Gentrication Watch

Meet Donnette Letford, a victim of COVID-19 and needing rent relief. If you learn of her plight, you will understand why this unfortunate victim of COVID-19 has become the focus of so many pro-cancel rent articles, and why it’s imperative that we cancel rent for everyone–not only just here in the United States but around the world!
Now, before you roll your eyes in disgust at the very mention of “cancel rent”, listen to Letford’s story of tale and woe and see if it won’t change your mind. Here goes:
Donnette Letford is a single mother of three from Flatbush, Brooklyn–and an American–who can’t pay rent because her small business folded due to COVID-19. At least that’s what Annie Lowrey of The Atlantic wrote in The Cancel-Rent Movement:

 

Oh, wait…did Annie Lowrey of The Atlantic say she lived in Flatbush? Because according to Shannon Ferry of NY 1 in City Tenants Advocate for a Rent Freeze, Weigh Possibility of a Rent Strike, she lives in Canarsie–

 

High school teacher and dean fired from Maspeth High School that is under investigation by the feds

NY Post

A Maspeth High School math teacher and dean who students say gave them answers on Regents exams and texted with them has been removed, The Post has learned.

Danny Sepulveda was escorted out of the Queens school in late December “due to an ongoing investigation,” the city Department of Education confirmed.

DOE officials said the investigation was “unrelated to academic fraud.”

But Sepulveda, 30, is one of several teachers who gave kids answers during Regents exams, according to statements given to investigators.

One student wrote last year that Sepulveda re-read the questions at the end of the exam: “But while he was reading it he was only saying the right answer choice, and this made me uncomfortable because it showed he didn’t believe in me to pass the exam.”

Another student wrote that during a math Regents exam in June 2018, Sepulveda and math teacher Chris Grunert “helped me and other kids in my room with answers.”

Grunert and others accused of academic misconduct have not been removed from the school.

NY Post

The feds have started looking into allegations of widespread academic fraud in New York City schools, a Queens lawmaker says.

City Councilman Robert Holden met this month with officials in the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York after his call for a federal probe of “deep-rooted fraud” in the city Department of Education.

“I’m encouraged by my meeting with the US Attorney. His team is taking this seriously,” Holden told The Post.

FBI agents have already contacted several whistle-blowing teachers whose names he provided, Holden added.

A spokesman for US Attorney Richard Donoghue declined comment.

Holden sent a letter in November to Donoghue in Brooklyn and US Attorney Geoffrey Berman in Manhattan, saying “an apparent pattern of conspiracy to cover up” grade-fixing, cheating and other wrongdoing might warrant an investigation under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), which covers criminal enterprises.

In Atlanta, eight educators were convicted under a RICO statute of manipulating student test scores and sentenced to prison in 2015.

Holden turned over records compiled by former and current faculty members at Maspeth High School in Queens, where teachers say administrators encouraged cheating on exams, enforced a “no-fail policy,” and retaliated against staffers who didn’t play ball.

"Birth tourism house" is quite illegal

From PIX11:

An unlicensed day care facility where three infants and two adults were stabbed allegedly catered to Asian mothers lured to the United States by laws granting citizenship to anyone born on American soil, a New York law enforcement official said Saturday.

Investigators believe the foreign women would give birth at the facility before returning to their home country and applying for US citizenship, the law enforcement official said. The return allows them to remain in good standing with authorities back home and, at the same time, claim to have a direct relative in need of care in the United States.

"If they're playing it right, they go back so that they don't get a negative status," the official said. "Then they come back."

An underground "birth tourism" network stretching from the United States to China has sprung up in recent years to cater to growing numbers of Chinese mothers who travel stateside to give birth, according to affidavits filed by federal law enforcement officers.

Federal agents have carried out "birth tourism" raids as part of larger criminal investigations targeting US companies that have netted millions helping pregnant Chinese women fraudulently secure visas and other services.

The residential facility in the Flushing section of Queens was used mostly by Chinese women who give birth and stayed there before returning to China, a law enforcement source said Friday.

101-year old man swindled out of home

From the Forum:

A Queens man who took advantage of his friendship with a 101-year-old neighbor is facing up to 15 years in prison for tricking the centenarian into signing over the deed to his home.

Authorities say Ricardo Bentham, 58, of 118th Avenue, has been charged with grand larceny and other crimes for allegedly conning a neighborhood friend into transferring the deed of his long-time home into the defendant’s name in October of 2017.

According to the criminal complaint, the defendant submitted a quitclaim deed to be filed with the city on October 5, 2017. The document stated that 101 year-old Woodrow Washington was transferring ownership of his 143rd Street home which has a value in excess of $50,000 to the defendant for a sale price of $0. The victim realized something was wrong when he received a letter from the Department of Finance stating that the deed to his home had been transferred to Bentham. An inquiry was conducted and revealed the document that was filed bears the signature of the Mr. Washington along with a notary stamp and signature of a notary.

Mr. Washington stated that the signature on the form is his, however, he is adamant that he never signed any documents in front of a notary.

Mr. Theodore White, the 93-year-old notary, acknowledged knowing Bentham and would often sign documents for him because he trusted him. The document bearing his signature was missing the notary seal, which White always added to a document.

Mr. Washington identified the defendant as a neighborhood friend who offered to help him collect rent from tenants. He recalled signing documents that the defendant brought to his residence and that some were blank.

Woodside visa fraudster cuffed

From Sunnyside Post:

A Woodside woman has been charged with visa fraud for filing false documents to get Filipino nationals work visas, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Rena Beduya Avendula, 50, who owned Woodside-based Professional Place & Recruitment Inc. (PPRI), would submit fraudulent documents claiming that her clients would be employed in “specialty occupations,” therefore qualifying for H-1B work visas, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Avendula is charged with five counts of visa fraud and with conspiring to defraud the U.S. by bringing in undocumented immigrants. The scheme allegedly took place from October 2009 through February 2015.

A small business' scary story

From Forbes:

Late last summer, I 'Googled' my regular diner to confirm its closing time, and was shocked to find that the site had marked it Permanently Closed. I quickly called the restaurant and learned, thankfully, that it hadn't shut down; however, its Google presence had been hijacked.

And despite the owners' best efforts, it seemed there was nothing they could do about it.

Bill's with Shola

From the Daily News:

Mayor de Blasio is still standing by his New York City Housing Authority Chairwoman Shola Olatoye — and channeling a president he doesn’t quote very often in doing so.

“As George W. Bush once famously said, ‘I'm the decider,’” de Blasio told reporters Tuesday. “Hold me responsible for the decision. I am responsible. She is the right person to lead.”

De Blasio has repeatedly defended Olatoye as the authority she leads has come under fire for years of failing to conduct lead inspections in public housing apartments — and for falsely claiming on federal documents they’d been done even when she knew they had not.

Another Assembly Member indicted

From NBC:

A New York state assemblywoman from Brooklyn who claims to be an advocate for Sandy victims has been accused of bilking FEMA and New York City's's Build it Back fund out of thousands of dollars following the monster 2012 storm.

Rep. Pamela Harris, a former New York City correction officer, was named in an 11-count indictment charging her with cheating the two storm relief agencies out of thousands of dollars before and after she was elected to the State Assembly in 2017. The indictment also accuses the Coney Island Democrat of stealing from New York City Council coffers while running a nonprofit and lying about her schemes during bankruptcy proceedings in 2013.

City getting away with filing fraudulent deed

From the Daily News:

A man who swiped an elderly woman’s house with phony documents did time for the crime — but an appellate court is letting the city off the hook for processing the paperwork that let the ex-con make himself at home.

A Brooklyn appeals court has ruled that a judge was right to toss a lawsuit brought against the city by Jennifer Merin — whose Queens abode was filched by a criminal who filed a fraudulent deed.

Merin, 74, had sued the city for not catching the forgery when the paperwork was first filed, but lost on appeal when the court backed a judge who said she couldn’t prove the city was negligent.

The feisty homeowner is fuming and has vowed to fight the decision.

“I find it absolutely astonishing and sickening that the city that gave away my property without due process by registering an obviously fraudulent deed, while it was still charging me for taxes on that property and water usage on that property, is now insisting that it has no accountability for those actions,” Merin told the Daily News.

The city said Merin was suing over a missed “needle in a haystack,” according to court papers.

The phony deed that started all the problems was one of almost 1,400 deeds recorded that week, city lawyers noted.

Questioning Cy's judgment

From NPR:

"If we could have prosecuted Harvey Weinstein for the conduct that occurred in 2015, we would have," said Karen Friedman Agnifilo, chief assistant district attorney.

But criminal attorney Matthew Galluzzo, who once worked in the DA's sex crimes unit, told The Associated Press he believed the audiotape, in which Weinstein acknowledges touching Gutierrez on the breast, could have been used to pursue a case.

"She can testify about what happened, and you've got him acknowledging he did something wrong," Galluzzo said.

Before this week, questions were also being raised about Vance's handling of a fraud investigation involving the Trump SoHo, a condo hotel built by the Bayrock Group. Some early buyers of units at the hotel sued Bayrock, arguing that they had been misled about the hotel's sales records.

The Manhattan DA's office had considered pursuing fraud charges against Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr., who played a big role in promoting the hotel. An investigation by The New Yorker, WNYC and ProPublica said prosecutors wanted to pursue a criminal case, but Vance said evidence to do so was lacking.

The report also noted that Vance had received a $32,000 campaign contribution from one of Trump's lawyers shortly after dropping the case. Vance had also received an earlier donation, which he had returned.

"It was improper for him to accept it in the first place. He responded by returning those donations and then apparently accepted them again after the fact," noted Jim Cohen, a professor at Fordham University School of Law.

They're all connected

More from Progress Queens:

In Queens, faith in Government institutions was revealed to be severely lacking after New York City Council candidate Paul Graziano filed a civil petition in New York State Supreme Court for Queens County, alleging criminality, such as fraud and forgery, in the ballot petitioning process carried out by incumbent Councilmember Paul Vallone (D-Bayside). On the Queens Crap blog, which attracts some of Queens most formidable civic-minded activists, some of the comments posted by readers to news of the court filing expressed concern that the justices of the Queens County court system would not be able to independently oversee the Court case. To some Government reform activists in Queens, the Graziano Court petition served as a symbolic Rorschach test, providing insight into the public's lack of faith in the Queens County court system. Many comments on the Queens Crap post raised questions about the "allegiance" that justices in the Queens County court system owed to leaders of the Queens Democratic County Committee, expressed concern that Mr. Graziano would not be able to receive a "fair hearing," and invoked the resignation that the "the [Queens] Machine will work to stop this at all costs."

Concerns about possible interference by the Queens Democratic County Committee were rooted in the fact that the County committee supports the reelection of incumbents as a way to earn political allegiance and to create a lockstep on power and authority over local elected officials. The role of money in politics is also a factor, because the County committee can marshal resources to support the reelection of incumbents, leaving primary challengers at a distinct financial disadvantage. Indeed, as reported by Progress Queens, Mr. Graziano ultimately discontinued his Court petition due to the high anticipated costs of having to litigate his case, reaffirming the belief to some Government reform activists that the role of money in politics even extends to being able to successfully petition the Government for a redress of grievances. The allegations made by the Graziano campaign against the Vallone campaign heightened new fears about the integrity of the voting process in Queens. In the 2016 election cycle, it was revealed that the New York City Board of Elections purged large numbers of voters without cause, triggering the filing of a Federal civil rights complaint in Brooklyn Federal Court that was later joined by both the U.S. Attorney's Office, headed at that time then by Mr. Capers, and by the office of the State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman (D-New York). To some Government reform activists, it has appeared that Queens voters have been disenfranchised for two years in a row, first, in 2016, when some voters were purged from the rolls, and, second, this year, when Federal prosecutors did nothing to investigate the allegations of criminality in the Graziano petition against the Vallone campaign, thereby allowing voters to cast their ballots for an incumbent, who may later be investigated for wrong-doing, although there is no indication that Federal prosecutors are presently conducting any such investigation. The press office of the U.S. Attorney's Office in Brooklyn did not answer advance questions submitted by Progress Queens for this report.

Sordid petition fraud story comes to its conclusion

I like how Grace Meng is involved in this! Amazingly sloppy.

Vallone used Young Dem who's not a Dem to collect signatures

Case for petition fraud getting much stronger

Patrick Jordan - Vallone Field Director and Serial Fraudster - Part 1 by Paul Graziano on Scribd

More about those Vallone petitions...

Forgery - Garden Variety and the Real Deal - Part 2 by Paul Graziano on Scribd