New York public housing bribery case ends with a milestone 70 convictions

NEW YORK (AP) — The 70th and final conviction in a sweeping New York City corruption probe was secured on Tuesday, concluding a decade-long bribery scheme in which public housing employees steered work to contractors in exchange for bribes.

The arrests in February 2024 were the largest single-day bribery takedown in the history of the U.S. Justice Department, prosecutors said, and targted current and former employees of the New York City Housing Authority, many of them former supervisors.

“All 70 charged defendants have now been convicted,” U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton said in a release, “for attempting to criminally leverage the contracting process of work for affordable housing for New Yorkers to line their own pockets.”

The defendants generally demanded between 10% and 20% of a contract’s value, which typically ranged from $500 and $2,000, according to the release.

The housing authority workers pocketed over $2.1 million from bribes paid by companies that received $15 million in no-bid contracts, said Commissioner Jocelyn E. Strauber of the city’s Department of Investigation.

The city’s huge and aging public housing system is the largest in the nation, home to one in 17 New Yorkers in 335 developments citywide. Tenants have complained for decades about dangerous or unsanitary conditions, including rodents, mold, and heat and hot water outages.

Of the 70 individuals charged in the bribery case, three defendants were convicted at trial, 56 pleaded guilty to felony charges and 11 pleaded guilty to misdemeanor offenses, prosecutors said. The charges included bribery, fraud and extortion.

The housing authority known as NYCHA receives over $1.5 billion in federal funding each year.