NYPD gave boat rides for Reichberg

First it was a private jet, then helicopters – now an NYPD vaunted harbor unit boat.

Hardly a day goes by without any mention of R&R in New York’s papers. Today is no exception. Needless to say, indictment rumors are swirling.

From the New York Daily News –  April 21, 2016

NYPD gave boat rides for businessman facing cop-bribe probe

The police patronage arrived by air and by sea.

A business honcho at the center of a far-reaching police corruption probe got the department’s vaunted harbor unit to give his friends brief boat rides during a catered barbecue at the 39th St. Pier in Brooklyn last summer, the Daily News has learned.

The event was “an appreciation” gathering for cops in the 66th Precinct and some assigned elsewhere, according to a source. It was hosted by Jeremy Reichberg, 42, and there were roughly 100 people in attendance, the source said.

“It was an event for the community, but he wanted to show how much clout he had and had harbor (unit) there to give people rides,” according to another source.

Reichberg — who donated to Mayor de Blasio’s 2013 campaign — is being investigated by the FBI for giving gifts to officers in return for favors, sources say.

The News reported Tuesday that the Borough Park businessman leaned on his cop pals to have two NYPD helicopters fly over a cruise on the Hudson River last summer. Reichberg was hosting a party on the boat for members of his bungalow colony in upstate Monticello, sources said.

The burgeoning federal corruption probe has resulted in nine officers, including several high-ranking officials, getting demoted.

The gifts handed out by Reichberg and his pal Jona Rechnitz include trips to the Super Bowl, Brazil and China, according to sources.

Rechnitz owns a private plane, which he’d use to treat the cops, a source added. At least one flight included a prostitute dressed as a flight attendant, sources said.

On Wednesday, City Hall announced that it is freezing two grants that were given to a volunteer Jewish police force because it has ties to the businessman busted for bribing NYPD officers for gun permits.

The Shmira Civilian Volunteer Patrol of Boro Park was to receive $35,000 in City Council discretionary funds. The decision to freeze the contracts was first reported by Politico New York.

Mayor de Blasio’s office is refusing to release the funds because the force’s chief financial officer listed on city documents is Shaya (Alex) Lichtenstein, the businessman who was charged last week with doling out cash and other goodies to try to expedite NYPD gun permit requests.

Reichberg did not return calls seeking comment. The NYPD also did not respond to a request for comment.

BOARD OF ELECTIONS PROBE – IT’S ABOUT TIME…

“There is nothing more sacred in our nation than the right to vote,” said Controller Scott Stringer, who planned an audit of the city’s voting apparatus.”

 

THE RIGHT TO VOTE, TWICE – OR NOT?

LostMessiah, April 20, 2016

Controller Scott Stringer we might suggest that you check the voting records in Brooklyn against those in Rockland County and Orange County and even Lakewood, New Jersey. We think you will  find some interesting if not astounding surprises.

If you are a voter and your name could not be found in Brooklyn when you went to vote in the primary, why don’t you check to see if it could be found in one of these other locations. We would place our bets on finding names registered elsewhere.

 

The New York Daily News reports:

Bungled NYC primary voting sparks Board of Elections probe: ‘It’s time we clean up this mess’

R&R-linked cops “squeezed” for information: NY Daily News Editorial

New York Daily News Editorial – April 19, 2016

The bigger they are: Stomach-churning NYPD scandal snares more top cops

In recent years, many a supposed wise head confidently asserted that the NYPD had broken a pattern that produced a major police corruption scandal every 20 years or so. Wrong, wrong, horribly wrong.

Past scandals often started at the bottom, with, say, narcotics cops stealing drugs and money. But now the rot is at the top — and it is stomach-turning, involving huge piles of money and big favors.

In the latest revelations, police in charge of processing pistol permits allegedly took payoffs to put guns in the hands of whomever . Federal prosecutors busted Shaya Lichtenstein, of a private Jewish Brooklyn security force called Shomrim, for taking as much as $25,000 each from dozens of permit-seekers and passing on a cut to NYPD contacts.

Police Commissioner Bill Bratton’s reassignment of the permit unit’s commanding officer and two underlings brings now to nine the number of NYPD personnel removed from their posts, in what Bratton now acknowledges as the department’s highest-rising corruption since the dark days of the 1970s’ Knapp Commission.

Previously, sources tied top commanders, including ex-Chief of Department Philip Banks, to junkets paid for by businessmen seeking special police protection services.

Yet, inexplicably, no cop has been arrested. The best guess is that they’ll be squeezed for information. The harder, the better.

Shomrim – the Protectors or ..? Players 1-9

Select BSSP Boro Park Shomrim members: pose with former NYPD 66th precinct commanding officer, Deputy Inspector John Sprague. Top row (left to right): Official from DA’s office, Ari Weiss Unit-93, Moses “Moshe” Reichberg Unit-23, Pinny Ringel Unit-60, Joel Klein Unit-37, FSSP Flabush Shomrim Coordinator Chaim Deutsch Unit-01, Abraham Motty “MNS” Brauner Unit-58,
former member Booky Tessler Unit-62, Coordinator Abe Kaztow Unit-65, Yunty Rosenberg Unit-72, Hershy Eichenstein Unit-44
Bottom row: Coordinator Sam Follman Unit-48 and Coordinator Jacob “Yanky” Daskal Unit-05

 

COMMUNITY BOARD 12, SHOMRIM, MONEY, POLITICAL CLOUT, CORRUPTION – JEREMY REICHBERG

The Players in a High Stakes Game of Pseudo Law Enforcement, Borough Park Favoritism and Political Pandering

LostMessiah, April 19, 2016

We owe a lot to our contributors who provide us with information, stories and leads. Every once in a while there are those who provide us with information; and it is hard for us to tell where one story begins and another ends or where another begins and the second one ends. This is one such story.

New York City Hasidic community politics is very complicated. There are private/public community boards and then there are the volunteer Shomrim (protectors) and the paid police/fire/ambulance. The presence of the Shomrim requires the intricate cooperation of municipal organizations including the police, fire department and emergency services. The emergency services in many of these communities are privately owned, privately funded “charities.” In some cases, those so-called charities offer high paying salaries and preferential treatment.

The existence of the Shomrim alone is a source of financial necessity and, of course, the funds flowing into and out of each Shomrim organization can be boundless. It is not clear how it is actually calculated or accounted for, from where the funds are received and to where the funds are distributed. Articles on this topic are somewhat inconsistent as are, we guess, the funds themselves. We do know for certain that taxpayer funds are involved and may be extensive.

While some of the details of the Shomrim organizations may be sketchy, what is clear is that the power brokers within the ultra-Orthodox community whether within the seats they hold as publicly elected officials or within the vast network of Hasidic “charitable LLC’s” have largely unencumbered access to money, political clout, police protection, government advocacy, increased allocations of public assistance and the list goes on and on.

In our view, the players listed below, amongst a larger group, have created the structural framework for years of almost near lawlessness, the flow of endless sums of money, zoning and rezoning, the boundless sustenance of a highly insular community and the flow of taxpayer money into the linings of very specific pockets.

Trying to unwind the fabric of those pockets of corrupt public officials and ultra-Orthodox/Orthodox businessmen is like trying to carefully untangle a spider web into silk thread, equally as sticky and perhaps equally as toxic. You never know when the wolf is going to be a spider or the spider a black widow nor do you know when it is going to attack.

With the arrest of Shaya “Alex” Lichtenstein, we would not have considered the Shomrim to be an access point for arms dealing, falsifying gun licenses and bribery and conspiracy related thereto. That possibility had not come across our desktops and we have debated all day whether we would have believed it if it had. Licthenstein and co. have been added as players in this game of scandal and corruption today.

In 2016 a high level probe into funds that were spent on banquets for New York City cops (McDonald Avenue) brought Community Board 12 (CB12) into the limelight. CB12 is the Community board out of Borough Park, Precinct 66. It was in that precinct that Hamlet Peralta owned a club, frequented by NYPD police officials. It may have been in that club that Hamlet Peralta conducted his businesses including a Ponzi Scheme in which Norman Seabrook invested $5M of Corrections Officers Benevolent Association funds. It was at about that time, that we were introduced to two people who have become synonymous with New York City shady wheeling and dealing. We will focus on one of those two, who we have referred to as “Player 1.”

Player 1 – JEREMY REICHBERG

Will R&R Be Getting Some Unwelcome R&R?

Arrests Underway and Others May be Imminent

LostMessiah April 18, 2016

Several sources have contacted us to let us know that the arrests of Jona Rechnitz and Jeremy Reichberg may be imminent. We have not been able to independently verify our sources. 

Today’s events included the arrest of Shaya “Alex” Lichtenstein, who is listed as a member of the Brooklyn Shomrim but the complaint has him living in Pomona, New York (Rockland County). Those cynics amongst us wonder if he also votes in Brooklyn and Pomona. According to the article from the New York Daily News regarding his arrest,  federal prosecturo Kan Nawaday stated, “He was no less than an arms dealer for the community.”

Immediately preceding his arrest,

NYPD announced that the License Division’s commanding officer, Deputy Inspector Michael Endall, 48, was transferred from the unit into an administrative position “pending further review.”

The department also placed Sgt. David Villanueva, 42, and Officer Richard Ochetal, 36, on modified duty and moved them away from the unit, Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said in a statement.

Lichtenstein, who has his own gun permit, is a member of the Borough Park Shomrim, the Jewish volunteer patrol. He was arrested Sunday in his Pomona, N.Y. home.

See the New York Daily News.

 

Regarding Mayor de Blasio’s response (or lack thereof) to the arrests today:

Shaya Licthenstein Busted! Stay tuned.

 

SHOMRIM – WHO ARE THE PROTECTORS AND WHO THE FRAUDSTERS?

LostMessiah, April 18, 2016

The Shomrim are not without their controversy. The recent spate of arrests are prime examples. As this article and some to follow will show, the Shomrim’s practices have been somewhat un-kosher.

Updated 5:40pm: Papers filed in Federal Court today indicate Lichtenstein was arrested at home in Rockland County.

From the New York Post, April 18, 2016

http://nypost.com/2016/04/18/shomrim-leader-busted-amid-nypd-corruption-probe/

A leader of the Boro Park Shomrim private safety patrol was busted by the feds in a gun-permit scam tied to the widening NYPD corruption scandal, The Post has learned.

Shaya Lichtenstein, a Shomrim coordinator, was charged with bribery and conspiracy to commit bribery and was awaiting a Monday afternoon appearance in Manhattan federal court, law-enforcement sources said.

Lichtenstein’s arrest capped an investigation into allegations that he used payoffs to help members of the Orthodox Jewish community obtain expedited pistol permits from the NYPD, sources said.

Meanwhile, Police Commissioner Bill Bratton announced that three cops had been transfered out of department’s License Division, which handles permit applications.

Deputy Inspector Michael Endall “is being re-assigned to an administrative position pending further review,” while Sgt. David Villanueva and Officer Richard Ochetal were stripped of their badges and guns and also re-assigned.

Mark Peters and de Blasio Fundraising Probe, Recusing Himself?

 

Mark Peters – Crosshairs? Not so Sure

LostMessiah, April 18, 2016

City Department of Investigation Commissioner Mark Peters recuses himself from de Blasio fundraising probe

The New York Daily News reported on April 15, 2016

The head of the city Department of Investigation late Friday bowed out of a growing probe of Mayor de Blasio’s fund-raising because of his previous role as the mayor’s campaign treasurer.

DOI Commissioner Mark Peters was de Blasio’s treasurer during the 2013 campaign. His agency is currently involved in an ongoing probe of the mayor’s fund-raising by the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office.

EDITORIAL: THE MARK PETERS PRINCIPLE

Peters’ office issued a statement — without mentioning his role as treasurer — saying that to avoid the appearance of conflict of interest, he would step away from DOI’s probe of the matter.

“As has been reported, the Department of Investigation, in conjunction with its law enforcement partners, is investigating allegations related to certain (de Blasio) campaign donors,” the statement read. “In order to avoid the appearance of a conflict, the commissioner has recused himself from these matters.”

 

Read additional:

The Mark Peters principle: The city’s investigations chief, former de Blasio campaign treasurer, won’t recuse himself from a fundraising investigation. Bad move.

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

 Friday, April 15, 2016, 4:05 AM

“Peters draws a bright line invisible to the naked eye. Any possibility of improper influence colors the entirety of this donor’s giving — and any investigation must go from the very start of a timeline that begins, in de Blasio’s own telling, with his victory in the September 2013 primary.

\

Presciently, Council members Jumaane Williams and Daniel Garodnick fretted about this very scenario in Peters’ January 2014 confirmation hearing.

“I can’t think of an instance where . . . I would need to recuse myself from a matter involving the mayor,” the nominee harrumphed.

Are you sure? asked Garodnick. What if the Campaign Finance Board came calling about the de Blasio campaign?

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Peters admitted, and then restated: “If the Campaign Finance Board were to make a referral to DOI involving the mayor’s 2013 mayoral campaign then yes, for that I would recuse myself.”

Oh, nothing like that to see here — just a relentless, corruption-busting U.S. attorney chasing some very bad behavior closer and closer to de Blasio’s doorstep.”

For the entire article click, here.

 

See also:

Police Leaders Questioned Amid Inquiry of Businessmen Linked to de Blasio

The New York Times, April 5, 2016

Some of the police officials interviewed responded later to follow-up questions from the agents, who are assigned to a squad that investigates public corruption, one of those briefed on the investigation said. The inquiry is being conducted with prosecutors from the United States attorney’s office in Manhattan, and a federal grand jury has begun hearing evidence in the case, two of the people familiar with the matter said.

The two businessmen, Jona Rechnitz and Jeremy Reichberg, served on Mr. de Blasio’s inaugural committee in 2013, along with more than 70 others, including the actress Sarah Jessica Parker, the author Junot Díaz, the billionaire businessman Ronald O. Perelman, the real estate developer Steve Witkoff and Mark G. Peters, who was Mr. de Blasio’s campaign treasurer and is now the commissioner of the Investigation Department.

The precise allegations under investigation are unclear; neither man has been charged with a crime.

 To read the entire New York Times article click, here.