New York Times: The core of the bribery scheme detailed on Monday, however, relates to the gifts showered on the police by two businessmen, Jeremiah Reichberg and Jona S. Rechnitz, both of whom have been generous supporters of the mayor. Mr. Reichberg, 42, of Borough Park, Brooklyn, was charged along with the officers, the papers said. Mr. Rechnitz, 33, of the Upper West Side in Manhattan, had been a target of the fund-raising investigation until recent weeks, when he pleaded guilty to corruption charges and began cooperating with the federal authorities, people briefed on the matter have said.
…Some of the conduct detailed in the court papers veers toward the bizarre. It describes the two businessmen, both Orthodox Jews, visiting the deputy inspector’s Staten Island home on Christmas Day in 2013, wearing elf hats to deliver a video game system for his children and a piece of jewelry for his wife valued at $1,000. On the same day, the two men visited the deputy chief’s home and delivered a video game system for his children.
Far from being an unwelcome intrusion, it was the start of what Inspector Grant apparently hoped would become a Christmas tradition. When Christmas rolled around the next year without any gifts for his family, Inspector Grant expressed his disappointment to one of the businessmen, Mr. Reichberg, during a phone conversation in January 2015, captured on a wiretap.
“First of all, first of all, the two elves didn’t come” for Christmas, he said using an expletive for emphasis, according to the papers. During the same conversation, Inspector Grant complained that Mr. Reichberg had not invited him to the Super Bowl again this year, choosing instead to extend the invitation to another police official.
“See, you don’t love me anymore, bro,” Inspector Grant complained, according to the complaint…
Mr. Rechnitz’s cooperation with federal prosecutors and F.B.I. agents has already helped prosecutors bring corruption charges in another case linked to the same fund-raising investigation, people briefed on the matter have said. In that case, a criminal complaint unsealed on June 8 charged Norman Seabrook, the powerful head of the union that represents city correction officers, and Murray Huberfeld, a hedge fund financier, with honest services fraud and conspiracy.
That complaint said Mr. Rechnitz had pleaded guilty to committing honest services fraud in connection with the scheme in which Mr. Seabrook and Mr. Huberfeld were charged, “among other things,” suggesting he was involved in additional criminal conduct, and that he was providing information in the hope of obtaining leniency when he is sentenced.
While the document does not identify Mr. Rechnitz by name, referring to him only as CW-1, or Cooperating Witness 1, several people with knowledge of the matter said CW-1 was Mr. Rechnitz. Mr. Rechnitz’s lawyer, Alan Levine, declined to comment. At a news conference announcing the arrests of Mr. Seabrook and Mr. Huberfeld, Mr. Bharara, whose office filed the complaint, would not answer questions about the identity of CW-1 or the degree to which the witness could be helpful in other cases. Mr. Bharara described him only as a “real estate friend” of Mr. Reichberg…
The criminal complaint in the earlier case details two trips that Mr. Rechnitz, Mr. Seabrook and another businessman — also a supporter of the mayor — took to the Dominican Republic. On the first one, in November 2013, they were accompanied by an unnamed officer from the Police Department. On the second one, in December 2014, the four men were accompanied by a fifth unnamed person. Mr. Rechnitz paid for the airfare for both trips.
Then, in March 2014, Mr. Seabrook, Mr. Rechnitz, the police officer and the other businessman — Mr. Reichberg, who was identified in the criminal complaint as Co-Conspirator 1 or CC-1 — traveled to Israel, with Mr. Rechnitz paying the airfare, according to the complaint. In July of that year, he paid for the same group to travel to Las Vegas and then Burbank, Calif., the complaint said.
