The sibling homeowners of an Ozone Park pizzeria charged with bribing a high aide to ex-Mayor Eric Adams pleaded responsible to felony conspiracy fees Wednesday, the primary responsible pleas in a case that kicked off a damning collection of corruption probes of the Adams administration practically three years in the past.
Brothers Anthony and Joseph Livreri have been charged by Manhattan District Lawyer Alvin Bragg on Sept. 13, 2023, in one in all 5 sweeping indictments that focused Eric Ulrich, whom Adams had appointed first as a senior advisor after which as constructing commissioner.
The Ulrich case was Spherical One in a stream of subsequent state and federal corruption indictments that may in the end ensnare the mayor himself, together with a number of of his high aides, together with his chief advisor, Ingrid Lewis-Martin, his one-time chief of employees, Frank Carone, and Jesse Hamilton, a protege Adams appointed to supervise town’s leases.
Standing earlier than Appearing Manhattan Supreme Court docket Justice Daniel Conviser, each brothers entered responsible pleas lower than two weeks earlier than they and their co-defendants have been scheduled to go to trial, admitting they bribed Ulrich in trade for his assist in gaining favorable therapy from the Adams administration.
Ulrich and the opposite co-defendants have all pleaded not responsible and as of this week had deliberate to take their case to a jury. On Wednesday each brothers admitted to handing Ulrich $4,000 in an envelope to do away with a metropolis Constructing Division vacate order on a Brooklyn bakery. Their legal professional, Jake Lasala, mentioned exterior courtroom they don’t seem to be cooperating with prosecutors.
Late Wednesday following the Livreris’ responsible pleas, Ulrich’s legal professional, David Cohen, declined to touch upon the brothers’ statements in courtroom that that they had handed him $4,000 in money, replying, “I don’t suppose there’s something to say about that.”
Cohen offered a press release he’s made up to now about his shopper, asserting that Ulrich “routinely borrowed cash from household and mates associated to his playing and paying payments. There was by no means any understanding or expectation on Mr. Ulrich’s half that he would carry out any official act in trade for the cash he borrowed.”
In an 18-page indictment, prosecutors alleged the Livreris gave Ulrich cash to fund his playing at public casinos — and at an unlawful membership known as the 89th Road Cafe owned by Joseph Livreri.
Ulrich had employed Joseph as a part-time aide when he was a member of the Metropolis Council representing elements of Queens; as soon as he was a senior mayoral aide he pushed Metropolis Corridor to rent Joseph, the indictment mentioned. Prosecutors additionally alleged that Ulrich helped the Livreris acquire particular therapy from metropolis bureaucrats, together with arranging an expedited inspection of their Ozone Park restaurant, Aldo’s Pizzeria, after the Well being Division shut it down for a number of well being code violations.
ADAMS WORLD INVESTIGATED: Observe The Metropolis Reporter’s Protection of the Eric Adams scandals.
In August 2021, after Adams had received the Democratic mayoral major and was anticipated to win the final election, the Livreri brothers and Michael Mazzio, proprietor of Mike’s Heavy Responsibility Towing, hosted a fundraiser at Russo’s of Howard Seashore that raised $140,000 for the Adams marketing campaign.
Two days after Christmas 2021, the Livreris met with the newly elected mayor and Ulrich at Aldo’s. On the time of the sitdown with Adams, Mazzio was dealing with felony fees of working a fraudulent monopoly of towing introduced by the Manhattan DA. Weeks later Adams named Ulrich as one in all his “senior advisors,” and some months later as his buildings commissioner.
Prosecutors alleged the Livreri brothers despatched Ulrich funds by way of Zelle and generally handed over envelopes of money.
In addition to Ulrich, the felony circumstances in opposition to different high Adams aides are ongoing, together with these of Lewis-Martin, Carone and Hamilton. All have pleaded not responsible to all fees and as of this week their attorneys say they intend to go to trial.
Mayor Adams, then again, managed to stroll away after he was indicted by the Manhattan U.S. legal professional in September 2024. A couple of months later after President Donald Trump started his second time period, his Division of Justice moved to withdraw the case in trade for the mayor’s cooperation on the administration’s immigrant deportation marketing campaign.
Manhattan Federal Decide Dale Ho reluctantly accepted the dismissal however made some extent of claiming, “Every little thing right here smacks of a cut price: dismissal of the indictment in trade for immigration coverage concessions.”
