New York prosecutors indicted a half-dozen people who allegedly used a straw donor scheme to funnel tens of thousands of dollars in public matching funds to the successful 2021 campaign of a New York City mayor York, Eric Adams.
“We allege a deliberate scheme to game the system in a blatant attempt to gain power,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in a statement Friday after the court filing was unbelted
The indictment does not charge Adams with a crime, but says the six defendants were trying to curry favor with his campaign aimed at getting city business.
“FYI! This is what I want, Safety, Drywall and Security one project, but we can all eat,” Shamsuddin Riza, one of the defendants, wrote in an email to another, Dwayne Montgomery, in July 2021 about a construction project in Brooklyn. , the indictment said.
That email exchange took place about 12 days after Montgomery allegedly told Riza in a phone conversation that “[the Candidate] he said he doesn’t want to do anything if he doesn’t get 25G”.
The indictment did not say what the basis for Montgomery’s claim was.
A spokesman for Adams’ 2021 campaign, Evan Thies, said: “There is no indication that the campaign or the mayor is involved in this case or under investigation. The campaign always held itself to the highest standards and We would never tolerate such actions.”
Bragg said “the indictment charges the defendants with subverting campaign finance laws by improperly structuring campaign contributions.”
Prosecutors said the group used nearly two dozen straw donors — people they could funnel donations to and avoid donation limits.
The size of individual donations was generally about $250, but the city had an eight-to-one matching program for elections, meaning each of these donations could be matched with $2,000 in public funds from the New York City Campaign Finance Board.
The filing indicates that Montgomery, a former inspector with the New York Police Department, masterminded the scheme. He is currently listed as the integrity director of Teamsters Local 237, which represents municipal workers, according to the Associated Press.
The indictment alleges he hosted two fundraisers for Adams, a fellow NYPD veteran, and withdrew nearly $40,000 from his bank account to pay for the straw donations.
Thies said, “Montgomery was a colleague of the mayor in the police department whom he knew socially and worked with on criminal justice issues. Dozens of former police officers and criminal justice advocates organized events for the “mayor throughout the campaign”.
The six defendants are charged with conspiracy, attempted grand larceny and offering a false instrument. Montgomery, Riza and two other co-defendants pleaded not guilty to the charges Friday, and the remaining two defendants are expected to be arraigned at a later date, the DA’s office said.
Riza’s lawyer, Muhammad Ikhlas, declined to comment, but confirmed that his client pleaded not guilty and had been released on his own recognizance. An attorney for Montgomery did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Thies said the Adams campaign “thanks the DA’s office for their hard work on behalf of the taxpayers” and “will of course work with the DA’s office, the Campaign Finance Board and any authorities relevant”.
